07/18/02- ALL PACKED AND READY TO GO, but had to get in the regular Tuesday/Thursday ride first!  Todd Norwood, Ueyn Block and Bob (first time with us) in attendance.  As is usually the case, we don't settle for the new guy riding his/her usual time up the hill... we go for their personal best!  And we got it, as Bob shaved over a minute and a half off his time up the hill.  If he keeps doing that for the next couple of weeks, he'll be in the TDF in no time!

07/19/02- NOW IN SWITZERLAND, shortly to be in France!  This is one of those never-ending days, starting Thursday morning at 7:05am, when I got up for my usual Tues/Thursday ride up King's Mountain, then down to the shop for a couple hours, then a flight first to Amsterdam and then Geneva.  It's 12:18pm Friday back home (10:18pm here in Switzerland), so we're up to 29 hours so far, with probably an hour or two yet to be tacked on.  Thank goodness it's not an early morning tomorrow!  And were there any other cyclists heading to France?  Uh, yeah, just a few!  Including Mike & Karen Podgorski, who were on the same flight out to Amsterdam, where they transferred to a flight to Lyon, for a couple weeks of cycling in France and Italy.

07/20/02- DON'T YOU WANT THE CHEESE FIRST?  Try as I do, I cannot help but encounter an occasional clash with French culture.  I'm really trying hard to fit in, even learning a few bits & pieces of French (for example, when riding with a group and there's a car behind, instead of yelling "Car Back!" and telegraphing to all the world that you're a foreigner, try "Voiture a derriere."  Of course, I have no idea if any French cyclist would ever say such a thing...).

OK, back to the story.  We're eating dinner at a very nice restaurant in Grenoble, where we probably already got off to a bad start when we moved the tables out of the sun and into a shady section.  It was about 90 degrees outside and, for some reason, they set up our party outside (lots of air-conditioned tables inside that we empty) and in the sun.  OK, maybe that was our first act as ugly Americans, but from where I (literally) sat, it just seemed to make good sense and saved them from having to do it themselves.

Excellent food, many courses, and not quite the typical euro experience of half an hour between courses.  After finishing with dinner (and some nondescript wine; I don't think they were wasting their good stuff on us) it's time for dessert, right?  And it's a semi-formal serve-yourself thing (yeah, I know, there's a regular word for that sort of thing but my mind still isn't working on all cylinders) (Buffet!  Yes, that's the word!).

So I have them set me up with what looks like an excellent chocolate mouse sort of thing, along with a not-quite-lemon-meringue pie.  I bring it back to my table, I'm about to try it, and then the waitress instantly sets upon me and asks "Don't you want some cheese first?"  To be truthful, I was wondering where the Fromage was (cheese in French, and I was mildly disappointed that she thought so little of my cultural assets that she'd call it "cheese" instead) (but of course I do acknowledge that her sizing up of such assets wasn't really out of line with reality!).  So, of course I want my Fromage.  Who wouldn't?  How can you properly prepare the palette for dessert if you haven't yet had your Fromage?  She explains that she just needs to clear the tables, bring some new settings, and all will be well (that's her, aka French Minister of Culture, at the right of the photo above).

She didn't tell me what day that would be!  Apparently, I had been chosen to punish for the sins of my group.  Everybody else was happily tasting the various desserts, without benefit of Fromage, and without any nasty glares (or at least weren't paying attention to them) from the waiters & waitresses.  All except me.  It was maybe 15 minutes before she finally came back and took away the plates and brought some new silverware, all without benefit of a single word (like, for example, where I would find the cheese, er, I mean Fromage).  I finally screw up enough courage to go ask inside where the Fromage is to be found and, sure enough, there it is hidden underneath a colorful cloth.  And, fortunately, a very helpful attendant to explain that "You must try our local cheeses!"  As if, looking at maybe 15 different cheeses of various colors and shapes, I would have any idea which were local and which were not.  He did set me up with three very fine cheeses, along with some not-very-interesting nut bread, and finally, long after everyone else had finished their dessert, I enjoyed a most excellent chocolat mousse and lemon not-quite-meringue pie.

PRIOR TO THIS WE PRACTICED OUR ROUNDABOUT MANEUVERS on our bikes.  Got in a short bike ride this afternoon, but, unfortunately, somebody decided it would be a good idea to map out a route ahead of time.  Sounds like a reasonable idea, except that our map didn't quite square up with the roads we encountered.  Would have been much easier just to head thataway, towards that first big mountain, make a left at the bottom, ride along the valley a way and then take another left and eventually wind our way back on a different road.  It's not really rocket science.  But with a pretty large group they felt a need to try and organize it so people wouldn't get lost etc.  Right.  At one point, we (all 30 of us) ended up going 1 3/4 trips through a roundabout until we could figure out which way to go.  If there had been video, it would have ended up on Letterman with a caption like "Failed driver's test, has not yet mastered basic roundabout."

TOMORROW, VENTOUX!  Hopefully.  It's become quite warm, in the low-90s, and Ventoux is just not a very kind mountain.  Plus we have a 3.5 hour drive to get there, and have to ascend and then descend it before they shut the road down entirely for the race.  At this point, I have some doubt we'll be able to pull the ride off, but we're off in our bus promptly at 7am tomorrow, so we'll see!

07/21/02 7:14am- ON OUR WAY TO VENTOUX at local time.  Do I need to remind anyone that I'm not a morning person?  We're on the big bus, a double-decker monster that seems to hang over the edge of the cliffs when you're on a twisty mountain road.  Very cool, but reminds me of why I own a bike shop and don't drive a bus.  It's raining outside and fairly cool, but we're told it will be 90 degrees and no shade from the sun at Ventoux!  And yes, I brought my Ciclomaster HAC-4 bike computer, so we can look at my feeble attempts to seek revenge on Ventoux and analyze where I went wrong on the climb (I think it started with getting up at 6:20am).  Darn.  I thought I was going to sleep on the 3.5 hour trip to Ventoux, but they're showing Breaking Away on the video monitors.  Oh, and our arrival at Ventoux was somewhat delayed by this Eddy Merckx guy, who you can see in the photo.  Seems our bus was too big for his entourage to pass.

07/21/02 5:25pm- ON OUR WAY BACK FROM VENTOUX!  A somewhat kinder, gentler Ventoux this time, as there were no weather-related issues (aside from it being on the warm side), and nobody to turn us back.  Well, that's not quite true... we passed quite a number of checkpoints where the Gendarmes were telling us we couldn't go on, but heck, I don't understand enough French to know what they're saying (am I supposed to interpret their gesture of waving their palms in front of you as some sort of sign to stop?), so you just kinda rode around them, just like many other people.  Got almost to the very top this time, but they had quite the set of barricades and Gendarmes at about 500m to go.  You could hike up a steep, gravel trail to the finish line, but it really didn't seem all that necessary.  I did see quite a few of our customers too!

French gaffe of the day?  Seems I'll always have at least one.  Today, waiting for the racers to arrive about one-third of the way up Ventoux, I decide to buy a coke from a roadside vendor.  But I packed the wrong money with me... I handed them a 20 Swiss Franc note, not a 20 Euro note that I'd thought I'd brought.  So, once more, I provide some entertainment to the locals.

07/22/02- ALPE D'HUEZ REDUX.  Today I got to ride up my (so far) favorite French mountain, Alpe d'Huez.  There's something very friendly about it, despite how steep and tall it is.  Haven't had time to go through all the photos and get a new web page up, but will, possibly later this week, but it might not happen until I get back.

French gaffe of the day?  None that I know of involving me directly, but our fairly-large group of Americans doesn't seem to quite fit in with the French style of dining.  Butter and ice are two things we take for granted, but life is a bit different here.  For example, you get lots of bread & rolls, but rarely is butter supplied at the same time.  It seems to magically appear much later, when it doesn't seem terribly relevant to what's on your plate.  And I think they take a perverse joy in making Americans beg for ice.  Not a problem for me, I'm sure there are reasons that ice is scarce, and I'd rather try to fit in than accentuate whatever differences exist between myself and my French hosts.  I'm gradually picking up on more of what's normal here, and really trying to fit in.  It's not that hard, but some people would much rather make fun of anything that's different (I'm talking about Americans, not the French), and, while I think it's interesting to observe the differences, I don't think it's respectful to make fun of them.

07/23/02- 7:30am- AND WE'RE BACK ON THE BUS.  Did I tell you about the bus?  This huge double-decker jumbo-bus, the type that seems to overhang the cliffs when you go around corners, the type that, as a cyclist, you just don't want passing you on an inside corner.  The reason that, in those villages where the buildings come right up to the road, there are a lot of re-worked corners and even bumpers to keep the damage to a minimum.  But it's smooth, it's got comfortable seats, and, for some, it's even possible to sleep on it.

Today it takes us to a stage that, we're told, Lance feels is an important one to win.  Beloki is no longer seen as a threat, but Richard Virenque, the French climber, is coming up fast.

07/23/02- GOT IN SOME NICE RIDING TODAY on the Col d Ornan, scene of the final King of the Mountains sprint in today's Tour de France stage.  Quite a bit of history in the area, lots of old buildings with signs designating them as a resistance something-or-other during World War II.  Interesting thing about places like France is that they have a long, continuous history, very different from the US, where we have a short modern history, and an entirely separate Native American history, and no real reconciliation between the two.

High point of the day?  Probably meeting the Devil himself!  Yes, that guy on the Tour de France mountain stages who dresses up as the Devil.  Couldn't resist stopping to get a photo with him, one of the few photos you'll find me in on this website.

07/24/02- SOMETHING I NOTICED YESTERDAY but forgot to mention.  Seems like there are an awful lot of older fans lining the roads, men & women in the 45-55 range.  It surprised me that there was such an intense interest in cycling in that age group.  Oh.  Right.  I'm in that age group!  Darn, hate it when that happens.

07/24/02- MY ENCOUNTER WITH AN AGGRESSIVE GENDARME was just a bit of a surprise.  I'm descending the Col de Madeleine towards the hotel we were watching it from, and was well aware that, a certain amount of time before the race comes through, they stop allowing bikes to be ridden through the congested areas.  You never know exactly when this will be, nor do you know how serious they are (seems like they usually are happy to have you simply go very slow).  So I'm riding down the hill (slowly) and this Gendarme (that's a French cop) in the opposite lane drives across the road right in front of me, forcing me off into the ditch.  Well, that's a bit dramatic, just the edge of the road really, but if there had been a ditch, it wouldn't have been much fun!  He then proceeds (in French, of course) to explain that I shouldn't be riding now, etc etc etc.  Of course, I don't speak French, so I'm calculating in my mind how long to allow him to ramble before I say "No Francaise."  Since I was rather annoyed, I let him go a bit long.  He moves on, I proceed to walk a bit, and then, seeing that it's not so congested (my opinion, of course) start riding again.  Next a motorcycle Gendarme comes along waving people over.  OK fine, back on foot again (did I ever mention that Speedplay cleats aren't great to walk in?).  A short while later I'm off the bike for good and come across the meanest, baddest Gendarme of them all... this guy is actually physically grabbing people on their bikes to stop them!  Yes, it's the guy in the photo.

We also came across the famous German Telekom Pigs!  Couldn't resist snapping a photo of them, hard to believe they take themselves seriously.  I'm sure they do wonders to enhance the French impression of the German people...

07/25/02- FINAL DAY OF RIDING IN FRANCE, and what a day it was!  We were hanging out above Cluses for today's stage, and did a nice ride up one of the unknown Cols (mountains) in the morning before lunch.  The original intent was to ride up one of the mountains in the stage, but we made a wrong turn, and found ourselves on this fun little one-lane rode that very quickly gained 1600ft in altitude, complete with a couple 14% grades.

After the race went through, most of our group took the bus home but a few of us chose to ride back to Annecy.  We could have gone the same way we drove in, but would have had to deal with massive traffic, so instead one of the locals mapped out a cool alternate route for us, complete with quite a bit of climbing along with a very memorable descent down Croix de la Croix Fry.  Sometime later we found ourselves in a crowded little town and engaged in the local style of cycling, running right down the middle of the narrow streets, between rows of passing cars.  Yikes!  If you look at the photo, you can see my group riding down the middle of the street (which means I'm also riding down the middle of the street, taking photos at the same time...as many customers have already surmised, they removed the IQ test for bike shop owners a long time ago).

But if that wasn't enough, we then proceeded up an old Roman road which was too narrow for one car, so narrow, in fact, that I wonder if they made special carts for such passages?  And, of course, a car came around the corner in the opposite direction, pretty much pinning me to the side of the cliff.  When I get back home I'll put up lots more info on these rides, but for now I've got to get a bit of sleep so I'm ready for my big travel day tomorrow.  Get to do the rental car thing, such fun!  Would much rather do the train thing for this part, but too much luggage (and I haven't even gotten my kids those green hands they pass out at the Tour yet!).

Oh yeah, regarding the Tour de France thing they have running out here?  You have no idea how much I miss OLN's coverage.  Nothing wrong with the French TV video feed, except that A) it's in French and B) they almost never tell you what the time gaps are, and don't put up any graphics.  Fortunately, you can tune into Eurosport for the repeat later the same night, but then you get David Duffield and whatever side-kick they're using that night.  The other day it was Christine, and, when asked what rider she thought might win a particular stage, she chose Botero, and added that he has "The most gorgeous bright blue eyes I've ever seen."  Yes, she really said that. 

07/26/02- DON'T WAIT AROUND FOR ME TONIGHT,  I MIGHT NOT GET THERE! For the past two hours I've made about a half-mile progress on the toll "expressway" between Annecy and Bourg en Bresse.  Right now I'm stopped in the middle of a long tunnel, fortunately with daylight at the end so I'm not too worried you'll be reading about me in the papers tomorrow (along with a couple hundred other victims of carbon monoxide poisoning).  But I guess I should be thankful for the fact that I managed to rent a car in the first place.  You see, it's like this... the plan was originally to have the hotel Concierge call and reserve a car for me this morning, but just as I hit the lobby a cab was heading to the train station (where the rental places are), so I figure hey, free ride, I'll just go down with them and rent the car and come back to the hotel.  Should be easy, right?

Wrong.  I went to Hertz.  No cars.  Avis.  No cars.  National.  No cars.  Car-Go.  Yes, they have a car!  No, it cannot be dropped off in Macon, must be a round trip.  Sigh.  After walking to every car place in town, I finally give up on the idea of renting a car and head back to the hotel, resigned to grabbing a train into Macon and skip the finish of today's stage.  In the lobby I see Dick Burke, founder of TREK bicycles, and tell him how my morning's gone so far.  He asks "You don't think it was because you're not French, do you?"  I say no, I'm sure that's not the case.  But even the suggestion (from someone far more traveled than I) gets me thinking, so I go back to the Concierge and see if he knows of any place I might rent a car.  One phone call, to Hertz, and suddenly the car which didn't exist before is now available.   (Bruno, if you're reading this, sorry, but it does seem rather suspicious!).

But at this exact moment I'm not sure if the Concierge did me much of a favor.  It's 1:25pm and in the past hour and 15 minutes, I've gone about 3 kilometers.  I'm also getting a bit hungry, thirsty, and, well, there is a reason most of the plants alongside the roads here are yellow...

No doubt the racers are making much better time than I am to Bourg en Bresse!

07/26/02- NOT THE GREATEST DAY OF MY TRIP.  The number of things today that didn't go quite right, starting with the traffic jam mentioned below (finally made it to Bourg en Bresse about two hours later than I figured) and ending with the wonderful Windows ME operating system on my laptop, that just loves to cause it to crash at inopportune moments, like right after I just typed about a page and a half of diary entries just now!  Note to self- please upgrade laptop operating system to either Win2000 or XP when I get home.

OK, so I finally make it to Bourg en Bresse, discovering that I have exceptional navigational skills in France.  You just kind of get a feel for how things are laid out after a while.  Found a nice parking spot only a kilometer from the finish line, way closer than everyone else was having to park.  Hey, I'll get the hang of this yet!

But the race itself?  Not so sure what all the fun is about being at the finish line of a big race, unless you're one of the lucky few with grandstand seats (and even TREK's largest OCLV dealer doesn't get that).  Or perhaps have a hotel room that overlooks the finish line.  But the rest of us have to settle for contorting ourselves severely, one foot wrapped around a post and the other about six steps up some stairs going nowhere, trying to hang on despite a wall of humanity that presses in like a human airbag.  You do this for a good 15-20 minutes while you listen to the announcer describing the action in a language you don't understand.  Actually, you begin to get the hang of it after a while, but you really miss the different video feeds and the commentary from Paul Sherwin and Phil Liggett.

Eventually the riders race past, and, if you're lucky, you might just catch the top of a helmet (and be able to differentiate it from the 15 other heads that stand between you and the racer).  There is, of course, an element of excitement, an almost tangible electrical charge in the air, but for my money, it will never replace watching on a steep climb.  You don't even know who won until they post it on the big screen (and enough people have moved on so that you can see it).

OK, so the race was interesting, something to experience, but not particularly the thrill I was hoping for.  (Well, actually, you do get to see the PDM "Hand" girls... although, once again, I came up empty "handed", which will not not please my kids!) I was definitely getting hungry & thirsty by now, so, on the way back to the car, I stop in at the local Casino Supermarket.  This is when the day started to go seriously bad.  I thought I had everything down good, and the Euros sure make it easier to pay, but didn't realize that, in France, you weigh your fruit & veggies yourself, before bringing them to the counter.  Not an especially wonderful moment for me as I'm holding up a long line while they call for a young girl who (slowly) takes the bag back to the produce section, weighs it, and comes back.  So, we're back to the French gaffe of the day.

Now remember that stuff I was telling you about my navigational skills?  It's all a lie.  The 40k trip from Bourg en Bresse to Macon ended up being around 100k or so, taking me all over the place as I tried to figure out how to get back onto the (expensive) toll road.  Hey, I saw some gorgeous countryside, quaint little towns, great places to ride!  But it's just not the same when you don't have someone to share the experience with.   Even stupidity and the strange sort of adventure that ensures is so much more enjoyable when you've got someone with you.  But when you're alone, and things aren't quite working out, well, you start missing your wife & kids, and heck, you even start missing the bike shop.  You even start thinking about coming home earlier than planned.

But eventually I find my way to Macon and, without anything more than an address (no directions), easily find the hotel I'm staying in.  I check in and get settled in just a bit, then head out while it's still daylight to see if I can find the train station and, more importantly, the car rental return place.  Found the train station anyway.  Then I try to locate the start area for tomorrow's time trial and figure I might have found it when I see a whole lot of official Tour de France vehicles.  Not quite.  What I'd found was something even more interesting.  I found the hotel the teams were staying at!  Now this was a new Tour experience for me, so I park the car, get out the camera, and start taking photos of all the kids waiting for an autograph.  And waiting.  And waiting.  Waiting for someone to come out, hoping that many might.  Finally a couple CSC guys give the kids a few autographs, but the crowd isn't all that interested in them... they want one person.  One person who I never quite understood his popularity.  Richard Virenque.  What's with that, I've always wondered?

Well, wonder no more.  Eventually Virenque did come out, and what a crowd-pleaser.  He doesn't just sign autographs, he kisses babies, poses with the wives, chats a bit... it's like he's running for President!  And he comes off as being totally charming.  OK, Bruno, now I understand the attraction (Bruno's our service manager in Redwood City and also the token French National on our staff... everybody needs one Frenchman to keep them in line, and Bruno's the best).

Sorry this will have been delayed quite some time before you read it, but tonight's accommodations are sans phones.  Tomorrow night I'll be in Paris, where I think I'll be just a bit better connected!  And probably feeling better, too.

07/27/02- ONE OF THE BEST DAYS OF MY TRIP!  Sometimes, if you're nothing more than a bit patient, the world will change for the better.  This was one of those times.  Today was as "up" as yesterday was "down."  Macon turned out to be a very nice town, met a lot of our customers, a lot of new people I didn't know before, some interesting characters, and generally, everything just went the right way.  In fact, I just got off the taxi and checked into my Paris hotel room, and it really is just 100 feet off the final criterium part of the race course!  More in a bit, but have to get unpacked and download all the photos etc.  Just didn't want to leave people with yesterday's entry as the first thing they saw.  Sorry about no update yesterday, but the hotel in Macon was dorm-style with no real phone service.

I arrived in Macon last night, after a pretty tough day (and much longer drive than it should have been), but quickly found my hotel, and, even though it was dorm-style accommodations (quite a switch from what I'd been in so far and since), the bed felt great and I got just a bit over six hours sleep, a major victory!  But this morning there were some major issues to take care of, such as where the car rental place was so I could return it before getting charged another $140, and where the train station was (so I could coordinate my escape), and how I was going to get from the car rental place back into town, and then back out to the train station later on.

Well, like I said, it's like this.  I drive out to the train station, and suddenly see some friendly (or at least familiar) faces... Jon Riley, TREK's road bike product manager, and Chad Price, the Bontrager Wheel product manager.  They're waiting for someone else from TREK who was supposed to be picking them up, but, for the moment, they were looking rather stranded and really wanting to find someone who spoke English.  That would be me.  So I give them a quick tour of the town, but first discover that the car return place is actually the train station.  That would be so incredibly convenient if I wanted to spend another $140 to keep the car for the day, but truth is, I'd bonded with that car about as much as I cared to yesterday (when trying to find my way to Macon).

Unfortunately, their friend's car was full of Bontrager wheels for the team, no room for me.  So I figure I'll have to take a cab from the train station back into town (about 10-12km).  Just then I hear someone call out to me, a couple of customers (John & Kristen, shown in the photo above) in their rental car.  I readily accept their offer of a lift into town, and in fact we spent a fair amount of the day together.  Incredible how things can turn out for the better, if you just give things a bit of time to work out.

But that was just the beginning.  The fun & crazy & sentimental things I saw at Macon were incredible. 
From the kids waiting to get autographs and photos taken with Virenque at the team hotel last night, to the crazy young lady in the photo at the right.  Check out those boots, and the outfit in general.  Yes, those are LOOK cleats mounted to her boots, and yes, she actually rode all the way up Mont Ventoux in that exact outfit.  She and the guy next to her (wearing the "Don't mess with Texas shirt") were on their Honeymoon, and let me tell you, I wouldn't want to mess with either one of them (but especially her).

And then we came across a person whose daughter had created some very nice posters for Lance.  "Austin loves Lance" ,"Lance Pedal to the Max" and "Go US Postal." The Tour de France is about a whole lot more than just a bike race.  It's about families & friends & meeting new people & getting exposed to things just a little bit different (not necessarily better or worse) than you're used to.  And, for me, discovering that a day of nasty little obstacles (like yesterday) is something you can easily get past with a little bit of patience.

07/27/02 11:50pm- DO THE LIGHTS EVER GO OUT IN PARIS?  I've never seen anything like this.  It's nearly midnight, and there are more people out on the streets than I've ever seen in the daytime in San Francisco.  It becomes difficult to fathom how they're going to suddenly throw a switch and toss everybody out so they can run a bike race, but at some point I'd imagine people run out of steam and go home.

Other observations- this is not a good city to drive a car in (and yet people do!).  And the food at the local Quik Burger is no better than McDonalds, but it seems like a good place to try and practice French (but I still need to look up the phrase "with ice, please"("Avec glace, si'l vous plait" perhaps?).  And the water in Paris... OK, now I finally understand why people drink bottled water.

Also forgot to mention the first thing I noticed when I got off the train- a young lady on a cell phone, choking back tears on the platform.  Reminded me of the scene in Casablanca where Rick is standing on the train's steps in the rain, reading a note saying that Ilse (Ingrid Bergman) won't be leaving with him.  Yes, I can come up with a movie scene that parallels just about anything.  In fact, when waiting near the top of one of the mountain passes for the Tour de France cyclists to come through, I was reminded of that part in Close Encounters of the Third Kind where everyone's waiting (on a mountain top road) for the ETs to arrive.

Oh, by the way... that Arc 'd' Triomphe thing?  It's BIG!
 

The view down the road at 9am this morning, looking towards that "Arc" thingee.  It really is big! At last I found them... the elusive Green Hands people!  Scored a couple of Green PMU Hands for my kids (who made it clear I wasn't to come home without them), and a PMU Tour de France board game. 

On the left is the street my hotel is on, just off the Elysees.  For those who worry that you can't find a hotel room in Paris shortly before the TDF, fear not; July isn't quite high-season (August is another matter), and I booked a room at the Best Western Collissee Inn just a few weeks prior to the TDF.  Not inexpensive  (about $100 euros/night) but less than a block off the main drag, very clean & very quiet (and, thankfully, air-conditioned!).

On the right is our chosen spot, maybe 100 feet from my hotel room.  Life is good!  And we'll defend our spot to the death.

Getting set for the finale- how? Well, you start looking for your spot to watch it about 9am, make sure you've got it staked out by 10:30, and then guard it with your life until... you won't believe this... but sometime after 6pm!  That's our spot in the photo above on the right, being tended to by Eric and Kathy (two Chain Reaction customers), Jeff and Noelle (two nice folk from England), and Paul and Lynette (two more Chain Reaction customers... wonder if we did any business during the Tour de France, since all of our customers seemed to be in France?).  The way it works is this- you get there earlier than the other people around you, and you've earned your spot at the barricade.  People try to move in on your space, but life's tough, it's your space! 

Question is, how much space can you truly defend?  That's the tough one.  It becomes obvious after a while that the place is going to be mobbed, and we don't have quite enough resources for the area we've seized.  That's when we offered to expand our group to include Tracy, seen in the left photo.  She had arrived maybe an hour after we did, but before things got ugly.  Turns out she's been in France four weeks, studying French, and teaches foreign languages at a school on Long Island.  She's also much older than she looks.

SO WHAT'S THE TIME TABLE?
9am Prowl the course for a good place to watch the race. 

10:30am Discover that the best place to watch the race is right in front of your hotel.  Now you've got to be on your spot, ready to protect it from intruders. 

2pm Last chance to get all your food, drink & bathroom runs in, because, from then on, you're not going to have a place to come back to anymore! 

2:30pm The Caravan starts cruising through, and that lasts for about an hour.  Not much fun either, since they're not throwing out any freebies anymore. 
 
3pm The Caravan is making yet another run, and you're beginning to question the wisdom of picking the sunny side of the street.

4pm The racers finally arrive!  Sure would be great to know what's happening, but the PA system is borrowed from Jack in the Box, making the French completely indecipherable, even just trying to pick out names.

4:30pm You're desperate for water & food.  Fortunately your friends have some extra water, but for food?  Found out that you can eat a Snickers bar that's been out in 90 degree sun by squeezing it from the bottom like Gu.

4:35pm (or thereabouts) You find out who the strong and the weak are, as some of your group decide they can't stay out in the sun any longer.  Outsiders quickly move in, and have absolutely no respect for your own personal space.

5:12pm The race is over, but you have no idea who won.  Once again think that it would have been worthwhile to buy a small europe-compatible (meaning it won't work in the US) hand-held TV.

5:42pm You're waiting for Lance to take his Victory lap, only to find that's not the way it works.  Each team gets to do a full lap around the course, after the announcer has read off each rider's name.  21 teams, about 3 minute intervals..

6:17pm Lance finally makes his way past your position...yay!!!  Of course, you wait until 6:26pm, when he's riding back on the side opposite you.

6:30pm You're on the prowl for last-minute trinkets & trash for your kids, wondering how in the world you're going to bring Umbrellas back on the plane.  Despite the fact that you really want to get back to your hotel room (and its bathroom), the urgency of getting those final souvenirs is even more important, as the shelves are quickly becoming bare.

7pm You're back at work updating the website (this is optional, and probably not relevant to most readers), and noticing that you had incorrectly set the focus on manual mode, wrecking a lot of great shots. 

9pm You've just finished the website work and are about to update it, and then remember that you've got to wash some socks in the sink so you have something for tomorrow.  Or, you go out and buy some more.  Some questions don't take a whole lot of thought.

You'll note that this differs quite a bit from the experience of watching Phil & Paul on OLN television!  Everything at the end is heavily compressed (you don't see the procession of each team riding around the Champ Elysees, and the Caravan is omitted entirely, in favor of covering the actual race... what a concept!).  But it's definitely worth it, at least once.  If I come back again though, I'll have a Camelbak and a bunch of food.

Will I come back a fourth time?  Probably.  No, Yes.  I mean Yes, I will come back, but I have a feeling it might not be next year, but probably the year following, when Lance (presumably) goes for #6.  Or if I do go next year, it would probably be with one or two other people, not a really large group.  Or maybe even one of those low-rent Graham Baxter megatours (someone said they had 500 people here this year!).  Gee, can you tell that I'm just a wee bit conflicted?  But there's a part of me that wouldn't mind spending 12 days doing something just a little bit less hectic than following the Tour de France, and yet another part that says maybe I could do both, maybe it's time to stop working six days and 90 hours/week.  Sorry for the ramble, but if you've read my diary entries in the past, it's nothing new and means that I'm pretty much settled in here.
  

07/28/02 10:45pm- VOUS PARLEZ ANGLAIS?  Oui?  Je Joudrais Le Dolce Vita et Fanta et Tart Chocolat si'l vois plait. OK, no, I don't get it either.  I go into a sandwich place to grab some dinner, ask the guy at the counter if he speaks English (to which he replies yes), and then I order in (awful) French.  If I wasn't alone, whoever was with me would be having a pretty good time at my expense!  I miss that.  So I compensate by including it in my diary entry, so that lots of people can have fun at my expense!  And that's the nice thing about having a bicycle shop and running its web site and meeting up with our customers everywhere I turn.  I'm not really ever alone.

But if I had more time, and another person willing to help take on the project, there's a couple things I'd really like to do.  I'd start with a search for a 32 ounce soft drink!  Or even take-out coffee.  Strange the way everything is min-sized here, although I have to admit people are generally not overweight here either.  Could be a connection?  I'd also do some research on why just about every sandwich you can buy is made with ham.  Have the French scored a great deal on ham?  I don't recall seeing a lot of pigs in my cruises through the countryside, but have seen quite a few chickens.  Yet chicken is optional, ham is mandatory!

Language is a funny thing.  Tried to buy a Le Parisian magazine at the Champ Elysees during the race, but this particular vendor sold them only as sets (along with a TDF hat and a refrigerator magnet).  But instead of saying that it was only available as part of a package, his literal French-to-English translation was "I demand that you buy it together."  Makes me wonder how some of the things I've said come out!

I've also noticed that I'm not quite fitting the stereotype of an American, and I don't know why.  The locals feel perfectly comfortable coming up to me and speaking French, assuming... what?  Not sure.  But I don't notice this happening with many others.  It's not as if I look all that confident as I wander around (at least I don't feel that way!).  The downside of this is that it makes me reluctant to look stuff up in my phrase book, which would give away the disguise.  More seriously, the definition of a French native is pretty broad, and may even include people with really bad hair days and relatively new shoes with way-long laces.

Just thought of something else on the language thing.  Being in Paris might not be the best place to try to speak French, for a couple of reasons.  First, it's a very busy place, and there's little tolerance for holding things up for a few seconds.  Thus, the person at the counter will simply speak English to you.   Second, people just really aren't that interested in helping you with your French lessons, while in the country, even a small amount will often bring a very big smile.  It probably just gets back to that "busy" thing.  The French countryside is as slow and laid back as Paris is fast & frantic.  It's really two different worlds.

07/29/02- LANCE 500,000 vs MONA LISA, MAYBE 5,000?  It wasn't even close.  But we'll get to that later.  This was my "free" day in France, the one I'd deliberately scheduled ahead of time, a full day after the finish of the Tour de France so, instead of jumping on the first early plane out of town, I could actually do some of the tourist things and see a (little) bit of Paris.

So I start the day at about 7am (didn't set the alarm clock, thought maybe I'd sleep in a bit, but y'know, you get a bit excited, there's lots to do, so you get up and go!) and am out on the town before 8.  I got one of those multi-museum passes, and a ticket for the "Open Tour Bus" that, for $24 ($26 for two days) allows you to get on and off all over town, stopping at many of the more popular attractions.  On the way there I come across two guys I met on an earlier mountain stage, and whose names I wrote down somewhere... where the heck is it?  Guys (you know who you are, the ones in the photo to the left!), if you're reading this, could you send me an email with your names???  Nice guys, one works at Nike.

I can already tell this page is going to be a huge download.

OK, next stop Arc de Triomphe, which you can see in the background.  Do you have any idea how big that thing is?  A very impressive structure indeed.  In fact, there is a lot of that sort of thing in France, and you find yourself constantly scratching your head, wondering how all this stuff was built without modern technology.

Now I'm back to that life-imitating-art-imitating-life thing again.  Remember the movie Vertigo?  That scene with the circular stairwell that goes on forever and makes you dizzy?  I think I know where they got the idea.

Not a bad view from the top of the Arc de Triomphe either, but be warned that, unless you're handicapped, the only way to get up to the top includes well over 250 steps.

Did I say steps?  Next stop, the Eiffel Tower.  You could do the whole thing on elevators, but that would mean standing in a very long line and paying a bunch more money.  OK, about 60 cents more for the lower part.   But that's not the point!  After all, this is a day you're not riding, you need the workout, and the way they make these stairs, you're going to get a workout!  So you pay your 3 euros (pretty close to $3) and head up to the second observation deck, the highest you're allowed to hike.  From there you pay another $3 to take an elevator the rest of the way to the top.  Now here's the strange thing.  If you buy a ticket at the bottom that will allow you to take the first elevator to the second observation deck, and then the final elevator to the top, it will cost you over $9.  But if you buy the tickets separately, it's about $3 less.  What's with that???  I figure it's a reward for all of us who hoofed it up to the second level.

At the top, I met up with a nice couple from Washington State, Tim & BethAnn.  That's a photo of them above (and they took the picture of me up on top, as proof to my wife & kids that I made it).  They'd been following every stage of the TDF for the last couple of weeks (sound familiar?) and were going to be spending a bit more time in Italy.

How tall is the Eiffel Tower?  This picture will give you an idea.  It's the sort of thing that is simply impressively high when you look over the edge.  Even its shadow is impressive!  OK, so here's the scoop.  If you want to go up the Tower, and don't mind hiking the first two levels, you do not have to get in one of those incredibly long lines that two of the towers have.  You can choose the short line at the base of the tower that only services those who choose to hike up.  Don't worry about the ticket to the top, as you buy that once you get up to the second observation platform.  None of this is explained on the signage, by the way.

Almost forgot two things.  Up at the top, there are numerous signs telling you that bathrooms are available, and that they're free.  My guess is that they really don't want people taking a leak off the top of the tower (which really wouldn't be that unusual in France).

Second, I came across a couple where the guy had just proposed and the woman was in tears.  Nope, no photo (not because I have too much class, but I just didn't think about it.  Too bad, since they probably would have enjoyed a copy).  My guess is there are a lot of marriage proposals up there.

Next stop... the Louvre.  Oh my gosh, there is simply nothing like this place in the world.  Not even sure I should have gone in there, and was really thinking that when it first took me quite some time to find the entrance, and then, once inside, it's not at all clear where you go (but there are many thousands of people going every direction imaginable!).

You don't just go to the Louvre, see what you came for and leave.  Or maybe you do, and that was my problem, since I didn't have an agenda.  I was completely blown away.  You're talking serious history here.  I first visited the section with statues, and was just awestruck.  We're talking sculptures that are between 400 and 2000 years old, and look stunning.  We're talking all those things you've seen in books but somehow don't get the connection that they're real objects.  And there they are, right in front of you.  The real thing.  On the left you see the Venus de Milo statue.  I don't know why it's so surprising, but somehow you just don't think that those pictures you've seen are real, that we actually have this incredible art linking us to the past.

You wind your way through parts of the museum, past incredible paintings, and even begin to pick up some of the differences in style between French, Italian and Spanish art.  I could be totally wrong, of course, but it seems that the French tried to truly capture the scene, as accurately as possible (as if they were creating an historical record), while the Spanish tend to over-emphasize things to give more dramatic effect or for a more heroic feel, and the Italians have this thing for eyes and a sort of haunting feeling, more emotional.

Oh, and that Mona Lisa thing?  As everyone has already said, it's a lot smaller than you'd think.  And yes, it's fascinating, and yes, the eyes have this mysterious quality and seem to follow you around, but there's an awful lot of great art in the museum that probably gets overlooked by people rushing to see the Mona Lisa.  But regarding Lance vs the Mona Lisa, hey, it only took a minute to get to the railing surrounding the painting, none of this having to save a spot for six or more hours!  And maybe just 40 or 50 people milling around, perhaps 5000 during the day, vs half a million watching the last stage of the Tour de France.

My plan was to see quite a few museums today, but the Louvre completely wrecked that.  I didn't emerge for four hours, and that wasn't nearly enough.  It was enough to make it too late to get into the towers at Notre Dame, and also late enough that the Open Tour busses stopped running, so I had to take a boat ride back up the Seine to get close enough (5km or so) to walk back. Could have been worse, as I got to the the sunset over the river, but the downside is that it's not all that much fun being in a romantic place when your wife is 8,000 miles away.

But hey, there's always billboards!  Check out this one, an obvious example of some sort of strange syntax in the French language that doesn't work quite right in English.  If this is someone not flirting, I'd hate to see (or maybe I wouldn't?) someone who is!  At first I questioned whether I should include this in the website, since it looks rather... well... but actually it's rather tame in comparison to some.

But believe it or not, the subject of that billboard isn't the best definition of "scoring" in France.  No, if you're in France, you've definitely "scored" if you've found a Monoprix market!  It's sort of a mini department store with just about everything you need, and at very reasonable prices, right in the middle of the high-priced district.  Bottled water in little tiny containers runs about $2 on the street, while a bottle three times larger cost $.51 at Monoprix.

Check out the spread in the right-hand photo here.  One quart (sort of, it's metric) of orange/grapefruit juice for less than $2 (less than what you pay on the street for a 10oz/33cl can).  The bottled water that I'd mentioned above.  Yogurt is $1.14 for two, and... well, we'll stop there before someone gets on my case about my eating habits.  But hey, how many Pain au Chocolats can you eat before it starts to get a bit boring?

This might be the last entry for a couple days, as I have to get packed for my 2:25pm flight out of town tomorrow (well, looking at my watch, that's later today!).  Main problem remaining is figuring out how to get five Tour de France umbrellas onto the plane, as they're too long to fit into my luggage.  I'll be back home very late Tuesday night, but don't look for me to have answered many emails for a few days.  There's going to be just a little bit of catching up to do!

07/30/02- A COUPLE FINAL ITEMS before I put away my laptop and start packing.

Dogs are everywhere in Paris.   In the countryside, you don't see too many, but in Paris, they're all over the place, taking their owners for a walk.  Actually they're very well behaved, but the owners aren't.  Watch your step, as they don't have any problem pooping in the middle of the sidewalk, and nobody cleans up after them.

Paris is for lovers is more than just a saying.  Romance is everywhere, this is where people seem to migrate when they're in love.  Much more hand-holding and leisurely walks in couples of all ages.

Personal space is a concept some people don't have here.  Don't be surprised when people are pushed up against you, sometimes embarrassingly so.

Thieves & pickpockets?  Signs all over the place warning you about them, but the only thieves I found were short-change artists at a money-exchange places.  Cashing a traveler's check is a 6% hit!!!  And if you don't watch out, they'll actually take more than that (they don't bother counting the change back to you, so best to figure out ahead of time what you have coming to you, and question things if it's different).

Sans and Avec are two words you should remember.  Sans is "without" and avec is "with."  You want to know how to say "With ice, please" (Avec glace, si'l vous plait), and, if you want non-carbonated water, "Sans gasse, si'l vous plait."  And, if you want someone to know you don't speak French well, tell them "Je parlez Francais come une vache espagnole" (which means something like "I speak French like a Spanish cow").  Sorry, never had the guts to use that one.

Heat was almost oppressive.  In Paris, it was 90 degrees (or more) every single day, and when you spend the day outside, you go through a lot of water.  Don't even think about visiting a large city like Paris without a backback to carry extra water when it's hot.  It was also pretty smoggy, and I noticed they were having the equivalent of our "spare the air" days.  It reminded me of a slightly-cooler version of Sacramento.  However, keep in mind that Paris can also be quite cool and wet in the summer.  My advise would be to bring clothing suitable for moderate weather and, if it's nasty, buy what you need at the local Monoprix.  But if you buy fruit or vegetables, make sure to weigh them first!

Tips & gratuities are already included in some restaurants bills, so look them over carefully before putting a tip on the table.  Unless, of course, your waiter gave you three cubes of ice without asking.  In France, that's an offense that would probably cause an employee to be fired if he/she got caught!

The artists on the rive Seine appear to be the real thing.  Only place in Paris where I saw real sketchings and paintings done right in front of you, rather than in a Chinese factory.  Don't know what it costs, but I'm sure it's a better deal (and higher quality) than what you get in Disneyland.

You can get by with only English in Paris but you find yourself wishing that wasn't the case.  In the countryside, they'll help you out as you stumble for words, but in Paris, they just switch from French to English.  It creates a rather funny scene, as they're speaking English to you, but you're speaking French (like a Spanish Cow) to them.  Must be very amusing for the locals!

Au revoir, and I look forward to seeing many of you back in the US.  --Mike--

07/30/02 2:41pm. WE'VE SENT YOUR BAGS ON AHEAD SIR.   WHERE IS IT YOU'LL BE STAYING?  The absurdity of that line should be immediately apparent, and yet it bears remarkable resemblance to reality at the moment.  Due to a number of things not lining up quite right (the airport shuttle was 20 minutes late, Paris is having some sort of emergency "spare the air" day such that maximum speeds allowed on freeways are reduced significantly, and a thunderstorm just rolled in, reducing visibility and speed yet further), I didn't make my flight out of town.  So, instead of flying to San Francisco tonight, I fly first to Amsterdam, where I'll spend the night in what they assure me is a lovely little city, and then tomorrow morning fly home by way of Minneapolis.  Not only that, but in the shuffle, the highly-coveted (and darn near impossible to travel with) green PNU hands have disappeared, and there's this cute little girl who keeps wanting to play with my computer.  You know the type, strays quite a distance from Mom, who just doesn't seem to care that she's hanging all over a complete stranger, playing with his computer.  Go figure.  I just must not look very menacing.  And yes, that is a Tele-Tubby she's holding.  I'm told they're still very big over here.  Barney hung on for quite a while too.  Please don't believe everything you hear about Europe being ahead of the US in terms of sophisticated television!

I've sent my luggage on ahead so all I'm carrying with me is my backpack and something that looks far more sinister than I'd think they'd allow on a plane- a package of five umbrellas strapped together.  Doesn't take much imagination to guess what it looks like, but here's the photo anyway.  I swear I look just like the Terminator, walking around with a sawed-off shotgun (and, for the first time on my trip, I'm definitely getting some stares!)  Some people are probably thinking they don't want to get on a plane with that guy, like how can security possibly allowed something that looks like that onto a plane?  When I created that package, I figured it would go as checked baggage, but nope, you're only allowed two pieces, even if they're nowhere near as huge as some of the stuff they let on.  Actually, I think the guy at the counter thought it would be fun to have me carrying it around!  And you know what?  It is.  Heck, nobody's going to mess with me when I'm walking the streets of Amsterdam!

I'll let you know what Amsterdam's like.  Hopefully not too cold, since I sent all of my clothes on ahead to Minneapolis, so I don't have to cart two big pieces of luggage around.  Plan is to buy stuff in town, or just wash everything in the sink one more time.

Most distressing thing about all this?  Right now I'm just wondering who has my green hands!

Strange airport, this CDG (Paris) is.  You head way out into the hinterlands (they call them satellites) and sit in a gate area that serves maybe 8 or 9 planes, and once you get past the security checkpoint, there are no phones.  You could be stuck here for hours with no phone.  Guess they assume (nearly correctly) that everyone in Europe has a cell phone?  There's also no newstand, virtually no food (and what there is cannot be bought with a credit card) and, since this is France, the terminal is avec flume (smoking allowed).  The adventure continues!

07/30/02 9:20pm I'VE HAD THE GRAND TOUR OF CENTRAL AMSTERDAM, but it's an option that, given the chance, I would have taken at a different time.  (At this point, I feel compelled to admit that I'm typing in the most grand hotel room you, well, ok, I can possibly imagine.  Seems they were out of the regular rooms, so for the same $70 euro I'm in some sort of super-suite at the Jolly Hotel/Carlton.  Yes, I'm really roughing it at the moment) At the Amsterdam airport I asked for some idea of what I ought to do once I get there, and I have to admit I came across some very helpful people.  Everyone thought that, if you're going to be stuck in Amsterdam for the night, you ought to at least see the city, not sit in a boring hotel room next to the airport.  And these people were all so friendly, I figure it couldn't turn out to be too much of an adventure.  Right?  You just get on the train that goes to Central Amsterdam, takes all of 15 minutes.  Then take any of 8 different trolley lines to the hotel.  Simple!

I should have known things wouldn't go quite so simple when, at the station, they made an announcement on another platform, telling people that the train from somewhere is "...going to be a mere 10 minutes late."  Really, that's exactly what they said!  As if 10 minutes is something that's special.  OK, something to laugh about.  The trains are supposed to run every 10 minutes anyway, so no big deal.  I must have gotten there right when one left, since I'm sure it took a full 10 minutes for one to arrive.

But that "15 minute ride" into town?  That must have been running time.  We were stopped at various places on the track for a good half hour, with the ride lasting about 50 minutes.  Eventually I make it into Central Amsterdam, which, around the train station, looks a lot like the seedier areas of San Francisco.  But once you get out a bit it's actually very nice.  Of course, I got the grand tour, because I missed my stop the first time.  On the positive side, I went out to get a bite to eat (but I will most definitely not tell you where!) and walked a bit of the town.  It's very nice at night, looks much better than in the daytime.  In fact, you'd swear you're looking at the pattern for Mainstreet USA at Disneyland.

07/31/02 8am AMSTERDAM ISN'T FULL OF "MORNING PEOPLE" to say the least.  On my trip to the train station, I can't help but notice that all those happy, smiling people I saw last night are now, without exception, the most dour group of people I've ever seen.  Nobody's smiles, you don't even hear perfunctory hellos, just a whole lot of people drearily heading towards a train taking them to work.   Maybe it's not so bad, maybe I'm just imaging things a bit.  Maybe I'm just feeling a bit giddy about finally getting on a plane to fly home!

Or, as I board the same train as everyone else, maybe they're anticipating the smell of urine in the train's doorway?  I've quickly come to the conclusion that Amsterdam's trains are as bad as the French trains are good.  Similarly, I'm beginning to appreciate just how friendly the French actually are.  Even in the mornings, you're assured a peppy "Bonjour!" that, in retrospect, seems more real than rote.

07/31/02 8:45am (Amsterdam time) THE LOTTERY  "They didn't tell you that you'd be on standby?"  Turns out my flight was quite overbooked, and I needed to go directly to the gate and get on a waiting list.  But, she assured me, 9 times out of 10 you get on the flight.  So I'm making tracks to the gate, hoping to be first in line!  Got there a good half-hour before the gate desk opened, and immediately took up a place where I assumed they'd set up the queue.  Everybody else was content to sit down, wondering why some guy would want to stand on his feet for an extra half-hour.  But the way I figured it, if I was willing to stand in one place from 10:30am until 6pm to see Lance Armstrong, I could most certainly stand a half-hour if it meant getting home today!

Security at the final gate was impressive.  They set up three different interview stands, and had people asking passengers all manner of questions, frequently the same or similar questions asked different ways, just to trip you up.  First time I'd gone through anything like that, and it was possible that they were being a bit more thorough than usual due to the presence of a large number of people on the flight from Bombay.  This seemed to cause them quite a bit of concern.

Finally, those of us on the waiting list are told to sit in this one area, segregated from everyone else, until our name was called.  And, as befits a waiting list, waiting is exactly what you did.  25 minutes prior to departure, the most important woman in my life arrives.  The woman with the tickets home (shown in the photo).  There are a lot of us waiting to get on the plane, and nobody but her knows how many of us will have tickets home.  Talk about suspense!  She starts reading the names, and I'm immediately disappointed, to tell you the truth, because I assumed that the sooner you got on the list, the higher your priority.  The names go on... and on... and on.  Thinking back on it, it was similar to having your name called for Jury Duty, only, in this case, you wanted to hear your name!  12 names so far.  13.  And then, finally, I hear my name called.  Even pronounced correctly.  As far as I could tell, only one name was read after mine.  I felt sorry for those left behind, but didn't stick around to console anyone.  There was a plane to catch, and an itty bitty uncomfortable seat with my name on it.

07/31/02 2pm (Minneapolis time, add 6 hours for Amsterdam equivalent) WE'VE SENT YOUR BAGS ON AHEAD SIR (PART2) Flying back into the US, you clear customs the first place you land, grab your luggage off the carousel, and then re-check it for your next flight.  How can all this happen with less than two hours between flights?  Easily, if everything goes right!  So how could things go wrong?  Easy, as it turns out.  Your luggage.  What do you do when only one of your two bags comes off the carousel?  How long do you wait for it to magically show up?  A 10-hour flight doesn't exactly leave you perky and alert...how much do you trust your eyes to pick out your relatively nondescript bag amongst all the others?  Apparently, mine wasn't the only bag not to show up, as I overhear a number of other conversations, detailing the procedures for running down a lost bag (you make the claim at your final destination, San Francisco, not in Minneapolis).  As the clock ticked down to 40 minutes until my next flight, I figured it was time to jet, as I really didn't want to miss another plane, especially since I still needed to check in (my standby status on the prior flight meant that I wasn't in the system for the next one yet).

07/31/02 4:35pm (West Coast time) WITH A LITTLE PATIENCE, THINGS ALWAYS WORK OUT  The final 3.5 hour flight home was a breeze, on a plane filled to only 2/3rds capacity and exit-row seating.  Approaching San Francisco, you see one of the most welcome sights in the world... fog coming over the hills.  Natural air conditioning.  And a wife & kids I hadn't seen in two weeks.  It was great to be away for two weeks, but right now, it feels even better to be back.

08/05/02 8am MY LUGGAGE MAY CATCH UP WITH ME today, according to Northwest's website!  Took a bit longer than they'd first said, and I'm not exactly looking forward to opening up a bag that has mostly cycling clothes in need of washing, but it's also got my bike computer with downloadable info from the rides I did in France, not to mention all of my keys!

08/05/02 10am NO KNOCK AT THE DOOR, no barking from the dogs, but miraculously my missing luggage has appeared on my front porch.  And yes, everything's there.

Last updated 09/08/07 since 05/06/05