Tour De France

This year the tour came quite close to our house, about 40 minutes drive south, so we thought that we would take in this legendary sporting event for the first time. A lot of our friends had the same idea as well. My brother and his family came to stay with us, Andy and Anna had a house full of there family and Pete Rat was down with some of his kids in his camper van.

All in all, there were 12 adults and 7 kids rendezvoused at a junction south of Dignac, where Pete had parked his van.

With only 3 and a half hours to go until the race arrived, it was time to get out the picnic's and then wait, and wait and wait some more.

As you can see, we marked out our territory, on the side of the road, just in case there were any Portsmouth types ( les skates as they are known in France). unlikely, but you never know, as there were a lot of caravans around.

Several hours, and several beers later, the tour caravan started to pass us, with all sorts of freebies and samples being thrown out by the tour sponsors. All I managed to pick up where two pens, but the kids did alright, even getting a Marge Simpson mask from the float advertising the Simpsons movie. Not very French, but that's the global village for you.

Things calmed down again for another hour or so, while Pete scoured the skies for the tell-tale signs of the TV helicopters filming the race. Then they were upon us.

There was a break away group of 4 , who came through at the sort of speed I could only manage down a steep hill, and about ten minutes later the pelethon arrived en masse. How the hell they don't crash into each other more often, God only knows.

As national obsessions go, there is more waiting round than at a test match, and a lot more drugs.

And that was that. We packed up and all headed back to our house for a barbecue. It seemed like a good idea, but it was hard work cooking for 17 people at once, but we coped, so much so that we could always come back to work in the Charcoal Grill in Andover, if we need some cash.

The pool was a big hit with everyone, as it was a rare hot weekend for this summer.

Pete stopped over with the kids for the weekend, and I even managed to fix an electrical fault on his camper van. My first job, but I didn't charge him a call out fee, as he was parked up in our garden.