Day Thirteen - Notre-Dame-de-Monts

A tough day - I had a bit of a mental breakdown. The milk I bought yesterday ended the day upturned and soaked a lot of things in my pannier. There was a large milky pool in the bottom.

I felt pretty crushed at discovering this. I had double-bagged the milk and, for example, double bagged my powerbank. But it got soaked anyway.

On arrival at this great municipal campsite in a large pine forest I spent a lot of time wiping and washing trying to clear up the mess.

One saving grace is that my sleeping bag was in the other pannier. This is my brand new expensive down bag and would have had to be thrown away. Phew.

So, learnings - Try even harder than ever to be careful with milk, never ever put it in the same side as sleeping bag.

I won't detail the saga of the dropped poncho that cost me 5km to recover - and don't ask me to explain further either!

Day Twelve - Pornic

I did a medium thorough chain clean and then moved on to clothing repairs. A week ago I broke my favourite pair of shorts when they got over cooked in a dryer. They have taped seams and one (critical) had parted ways.

After a week of planning I used my gas stove to heat my adjusted wrench from my toolkit. Gradually increasing the heat, and repeated application, found a sweet spot and satisfaction.

Oh, I did remove the shorts first by the way.

I arrived in deepest Pornic today. I had a celebration McDonald's which was pretty rubbish. Should have had the Cassoulet.

Day Eleven - Canal du Migron

I have spent the past hour double-checking the count - five beers and three glasses of Muscadet.

I stay tonight at Camping Du Migron, 30km west of Nantes.

I became woke this morning at a lock gate near Blain. I had had a terror in the night where I heard (imagined?) a large creature was dozing against the tent and pressing against the tent. I have had this before - I must attract beastly behaviour. I survived.

I was suprised to find on leaving that a lock keeper was in attendance. He had a deep tan, haiiry and burley arms and a string vest, Apparently it takes a lot of effort to press the button to open the electro-mechanical lock gates,

Later I enjoyed the part deux of the gut busting sandwich whilst stitting in the Jardin Botanique in Naates.

Heading out I had an easy 33km to Camping du Migron. However it turned out to be 10km of very heavy hill climbing followed by the flattest 22km you could ever have - under a hot sun.

Tomorrow I see the Atlantic.

Day Ten - Blain

.....yes, quite a few days have passed since I complained about the rain so I can indeed mention the terribly hot weather.

That also combines with today having entered a slightly lower level of towpath quality with sometimes bigger stones to traverse and signage a bit less than the exceptioallly good seen so far.

I got a rustic baguette, ham and goats cheese in Redon and made myself an enormous gut buster of a sandwich. Hopefully the remaining meat and cheese will have survived the sun so I can have another tomorrow.

I got caught by a lack of tree cover, a hot sun, and tiredness around 6pm and decided that I must find shade and stop for a while. I parked up next to a lock gatehouse and relaxed for an hour. It is very quiet around here with barely any foot or bike traffic tongiht. This then became my wildcamping spot and I had a douse in the canal to clear the sweat from the day.

Day Eight - Pontivy

I arrived in Pontivy today. The biggest town for many miles but dead as a door-nail in the evening though. However I did see a beaver in the local canal as I crossed from the campsite to the town center so that makes up for it.

I have been on the Brest-Nantes canal the entire day and will be for the next twto days. I think I saw two cars the whole way.

I made a proper lunch for the first time of spaghetti with pesto. It didn't take too long and is very inexpensive. I am also upto the fourth hour of French lessons I am following and really picking it up now.

I know I have been complaining about the repeated rain but I would like to ask - how long should I leave it until I can reasonably complain about the hot weather?