There's more than one tour in France next July?

Howdy y'all.

I know, I know, it's been a while and you have all been on tenterhooks waiting for the next instalment. Well here it is.

Firstly, the good news. I have been waiting for the Tour de France dates/route to be announced, so I could check the route against our own. I was worried after all that planning, that I may have to re-route us to avoid all those lycra clad maniacs on bicycles. It was known quite a while back that it kicks off in the UK, oop that Yorkshire like but the rest of the tour route, through France, was a closely guarded secret.......until recently.

I've, checked the route today and, as I said, it's good news. The Hogs and I shall be about 3 days ahead of the TdF, even with our little excursion into Germany and Italy and in any case, our paths would only cross once, in Nimes, in the south. So, unless the authorities are planning on closing roads 3 days in advance, we shall be totally unaffected by the cycling, save for having it rammed down our throats on TV every evening, I suspect!

Not such good news, is that we still don't know if we shall be 3 or 4 Hogs on this trip. Biggsy is busy doing up his house with a view to selling it and at time of writing, is still unable to commit to coming with us. We understand his position and hope he achieves a quick sale in the new year but as Eurotunnel are now taking bookings for July crossings, I think I am going to have to  book for 3 and hope that if he does decide to join us, he can get his bike on the same crossing. If we weren't travelling at high season, I might be able to wait a while but these things are always better booked. A bit like football, it's better to have the points in the bag, rather than the game in hand, if you get my drift? Fingers crossed, we are a four come July.

Our 8th day of the tour sees us lodging for the night by Lake Garda in Italy. That also happens to be the night of the World Cup Final. That could be quite an atmosphere if Italy are in the final, though I'm not sure of the time difference, so we may all be tucked up in bed when the game is played. Might not be such fun if England beat them though ;-)

That's all for now. There'll be another update when I have the channel crossing sorted.