Day 100 - Rodez - South-Central France

I've been on holiday. Met up with friends and ended up staying there for 9 days. I reacquainted myself with many things - people, conversation, laughter, late nights, too much beer, hangovers, sitting around not doing much, not having much to do, eating cheese. A proper break. I even spent many hours not thinking about 'the trip'. Not thinking about cycling, about finding somewhere to sleep the night, finding a shop, making dinner. It rested my mind, and my body. It was good.

I thought the hard part was going to be returning to life on my own, on the road, but I've slipped back into that easily, almost immediately. It's a familiar routine now. The hard part was the cycling - I arrived in Rodez yesterday afternoon absolutely exhausted after only 30 miles. I barely had the energy to put the tent up and shop for supplies, and, after a shower, I did something I'd not done since Day One, in Combourg - I slept during the day, waking up at about 8pm, still exhausted. I had some dinner and went back to sleep. You don't realise until you stop for a while just how hard, physically, it is to live like this.

I was going to move on today but after a lazy morning I didn't really feel like it and wanted to see a bit of the town. I'll move on tomorrow, heading for Millau and then picking a route down and into Italy. The roads and mountains look like they'll make route-choosing interesting, but hopefully not too dangerous.