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January 7 Saturday Bicycle touring France around Nice France We get up at 6:45 AM. It's still dark and cold. We make hot chocolate while waiting for the office to open at 8 AM. We buy passage for Monday -- 282 francs ($78) each plus 30 francs ($8) tax and another 85 francs ($24) for each bicycle. It is a twelve-hour ferry ride. Hmm. Now what to do for three days? We get on our fully loaded touring bicycles and head out of the ferry terminal area. We see a sign for the Acropolis, so, having plenty of time decide to check it out. It turns out to be a live theater place. Five fountains in a row out front are arranged to squirt water inward to form a dome of water. We could see a castle wall on the hill from the port. (There is a great stone arch carved into the mountain rock which is amazing just in front of the port.) We climb up the hill into the park. We can hear school kids below. Do they go to school here six days a week? The view of Nice is spectacular from the edge of the park. I can see seven churches in one view plus the boardwalk, beach, Mediterranean, sailboats, swimmers (!), houses on the hillside and old buildings crammed together. The streets below from the old town radiate out from the church. There is a market. My rear brakes are worn out. The metal has
been scraping against my rim and there doesn't appear to be an
end to downhills so now looks like a good time to change them.
I take out the tools and get to work. Sharon hears a marching
band on the street below and runs to get a better look over the
edge. On the walkway above us the pervert appears with his pecker in his hand. I tell Sharon to ignore him -- that's how he gets his jollies by showing off his privates in public. I work away concentrating on the task. Suddenly Sharon lets out a huge gasp. I look for a bee that must have stung her. What's the matter? What happened? That guy is standing right behind you, she says. I turn around to face a guy about one foot away from me who is holding his now dripping wand in one hand out his fly. He backs up a couple of steps while still hanging onto his tally whacker. I yell at him to leave. He looks down. Beside the path is a fist-sized rock conveniently lying by the hedge that he picks up in his free hand. I look around for my rock. There's nothing for metres around. Can you picture this? A rock is being held threateningly over his head to bean me and in the other hand his shlong is held firmly to squirt me. Comical, huh? He then puts his finger to his lips -- the one with the rock -- the other is still crazy glued to his salami -- and he goes Shhh, like I'm causing a disturbance by making too much noise in the park. I yell some more and then remember my French. Allez! He goes Shhh again, but starts to back away, still gripping his cucumber. That is the last we saw of him and his meat loaf. That's what I call a ding dong. I go back to working on my brakes. Later we see two reporters -- they are wearing police uniforms but they are never there when some crime is committed -- they just write it down later when someone tells them, so we call them reporters. Yes, officers I'd like to report (see?) a sighting of a pervert of the penile variety. Can you describe him, sir? Well, he has sticky hands. Sharon and I walk all around the park. There is a waterfall that we could see up on the hillside as we came into town last night. We don't want to spend another night at the port so we get on our touring bicycles and ride back towards Cannes looking for a Formula One hotel that we passed yesterday. They are a hotel chain in France and rents rooms for 120-130 francs ($33 - $36) a night. We can't find it. We see signs for camping and follow them. It goes up a steep hill. At the top we find the campground. It is closed. That is the trouble with bicycle touring in France in the winter. I ask a woman at a house nearby if we can set up in the field. She says she doesn't own it, but go ahead, other people have stayed there before. A passing translator in a car stopped to see if he could help with whatever we needed. See? The French aren't nearly the rude or stuck-up folks they are made out to be. Certainly not when one is on a touring bike, anyway. It is cold again tonight. I fall asleep counting dicks -- which just goes to prove the old adage, I guess. One wang in the hand is worth two in the bush. |
