Europe > France > Languedoc/ South West > Ambialet > Articles > Cycling in the Tarn Valley

I was gasping for a drink after the long climb up to St Andre. The village sat on a shoulder of wheat fields above the plunging wooded valley of the river Tarn. Its main square was small and plain, dominated by a 12th century church - and a collection of tables and parasols. Thank god, I thought, a cafe.

I sat down. A tall, stooping gent poked his head out through a doorframe of hanging beads, a cigarette tucked into one side of a mouth which was clearly lacking several teeth. A drink? he echoed, in a voice roughened by a lifetime of hard liquor; a drink - sure. When he came back with my Orangina, we sat to talk. There were 25 houses in the village, he said, but only six full time residents; village life was struggling these days, but so far no-one had sold any of their properties to the English. The only person who knew any English around here was his dog Welcome - and here he indicated a plastic model sitting on his doorstep with a welcome sign hanging from its jaw - "and he doesn't speak English; he only thinks in it."

Eventually, sufficiently restored, I decided the moment had come to climb back on my bicycle; how much did I owe, I asked. Jacques Larroux (for he had introduced himself) grinned. "No need to pay," he said, gesturing at the tables and chairs, "this is my home." Seeing my expression of dismay, he explained that he liked to call it his Vrai Faux Cafe - true fake cafe - and I was just one of a long line of 'victims'. He and his wife had deliberately created the impression of a cafe so that they could pass the time of day with anyone who happened by.

Cycling may be a wonderfully intimate way of getting to know a landscape, but I hadn't expected it to be quite as intimate as settling myself down outside someone else's front door and ordering a drink. So I thanked Monsieur Larroux with as much sincerity as I could muster, and pedalled off into the sunset.

This was the Languedoc Roussillon region of south-west France, and I was trying out a holiday with cycle specialist Cycling for Softies. The Softies' regional base is at the waterside village of Ambialet, between the deep gorges of the river Tarn's upper reaches and the broad plains east of Albi, in an area threaded by tiny, looping country lanes where you might not meet a car for hours.

I was rapidly discovering that, hereabouts, everyone knows everyone else's business. When I'd arrived late at the Hotel du Pont, Monsieur Saysset (the fifth generation of Sayssets who'd owned the hotel), knew exactly who I was before I'd opened my mouth, and equally plainly he already knew that my flight had had all sorts of problems with Air Traffic Control.

In the saddle the following day I began to suspect that everyone else in this twittering, lush river valley knew everything about me too. "There goes that Monsieur Eames," the two dears would be saying to each other outside the village Tabac. "Did you hear how many croissants he had for breakfast?" A bit further on, I distracted an old gent watching his vegetables grow, who nodded sagaciously at me as if to say "I'd heard you were looking good, Monsieur Eames, but wait till the end of the day." And then there was that family who spotted me in the woods as their car sped through..."Wasn't that Mon-sewer Eames?" said little Sylvain from the back. "What was he doing behind those bushes, maman?"

The pure process of cycling undoubtedly brings about a much closer relationship with the countryside, and sharpens one's senses of hearing and smell. Farmyards were heralded by cow-splat and cow parsley, sun-drenched hedgerows smelled of wild mint and the woods reeked of wet dog. And then of course there was the wonderful food at the roadside auberges - for a good day in the saddle justified an even better evening at the table.

The Softies base at Ambialet was the focal point of a spider's web of routes, and once I'd had my fill of the river valley to the east, it was time to head out into the Gaillac vineyard region to the west, beyond the richly cultural city of Albi.

The landscape here was more undulating, the lanes more sinuous and the wine-tastings deeply intoxicating. The region's 800-year-old villages piled up whatever steep hills were available, for defensive purposes. One of the steepest was Cordes-sur-ciel, which these days only succeeds in defending itself against cars, but the result is a tranquil, hill-top atmosphere with wonderful views and a gentle summer breeze which is perfect for over-heated cyclists.

At the Hostellerie du Vieux Cordes, another Softies base, I met Margaret Clark, who'd come all the way from Australia for a two-wheeled meander through the countryside where Charlotte Gray was filmed. She was loving being a Softie, but she objected to her aged mother's insistence on calling it "Cycling for Sissies". There's an important distinction between a Softie and a sissy, she pointed out; a Softie can do it, and a sissy can't.

Margaret was clearly no sissy. Despite having gone 26 years without throwing a leg over a saddle, she'd done 70kms on her first day. She was also one of those characters who liked to see the funny side of every predicament, and she described in glorious technicolour how she'd arrived at the super-elegant Chateau de Salettes a couple of days before, hot, sweaty and in her cycle shorts. At reception, she'd attempted to enquire in her best Aussie French what she should do with her bicycle (velo), but what she actually did was announce that she was en velours...wearing velvet.

I don't know whether it was the dehydration or the degustations, but we both found this hilarious. There and then, in Cordes' main square, we drank a revolutionary French toast; Death to Sissies on bicycles; Vive les Softies in velvet.

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