Off to France for the weekend

Well no racing for me this weekend - I'm off to Chamonix today to visit my sister (she's working in a hotel there). It's been a while since I've seen her, Christmas actually. I'm really looking forward to seeing her again - I really miss her!

Then on Sunday I'll be down in Alpe d'Huez for a bit of work (and hopefully some riding). I'm planning on doing La Marmottes route on Monday - it's 175km and goes from Bourg d'Oisans (the base of Alpe d'Huez), over the Col de la Croix de Fer, over the Telegraph, over the Col du Galibier, then down to Bourg and finally back up Alpe d'Huez.....should be epic!

Then Tuesday the Tour finished up at Alpe d'Huez, so I'll catch the action up there and drive back on Wednesday in time for the last 3 days of the Nijmegen's 4-Day March. It's a crazy weird festival that has it's roots as a military training march. Basically everybody walks 50km/day for 4 days, and people (both military and civilian) come from all around the world to do it. It's evolved into a huge festival though, with bands and entertainers from all around the world performing all week, with the culmination on Friday night. Over the past 2 days they've been assembling the stages and band-stands, and it's been hard for me to get out of my neighbourhood in the mornings - my apartment is right downtown at the finish line of each day's March (literally - there's a line on the road about 100m from my apartment!). 100's of thousands of people come out for this festival - it's bigger than any music festival!

Every year since I've been here I've been away at the Tour, so this is the first time I'll get to see it and I'm pretty excited!

Ciao for now.