Nightglow Window

Le Tour

It had rained the night before. It was not a soft wetting of the grass, but a deluge complete with crack and flash and wind and mayhem. Driving around Chamonix, looking in vain for a grocery store and filling station, Mussorgsky's "Night On Bald Mountain" would have been our theme as I cursed the French and their early hours and crappy roads.

Predawn was cloudy but dry as we loaded the car. A full gas tank we had, but the filling station supplies we bought the night before looked unappetizing and inappropriate for this big day in the Alps; a day of life lists. Stage 9 of The Tour De France and we would be there.

We slowly pulled out of Le Houches before first light and had arrived in Saint-Gervais-les-Bains at 5:45 a.m. -- killing 15 minutes walking the quiet streets before the bakery opened.

Our destination was Col des Aravis, a lowly category 2 climb too early in the stage and too easy to be selective to the race, but beautiful nonetheless.

I have described elsewhere the subtle joys of watching a bicycle race in person. Our Tour de France day was similar but wider and deeper in every category that mattered: bigger crowds, more waiting, a deep and gnawing excitement, and then the sound of helicopters as you lose your mind.

Was it worth a whole day of waiting? Truthfully, if it was for the race only, then no. But taken as a whole? The waiting, the promotional caravan, the lovely scenery, watching the clouds among the peaks? Yeah, that constitutes just about the most perfect day ever.









On top of the Col des Aravis



Some of the caravans had arrived days before.



Looking down into La Clusaz



More Cowbell!


Col des Aravis perhaps wasn't much of a cycling challenge, but it was gorgeous.









The KOM points spot on top of the Col. We set up camp about a kilometer down the road on the steepest part of the climb up.



Chapelle Sainte Anne on Col des Aravis.



Our bit of the Tour.






The most pleasant wait.












The beginnings of the promotional caravan.



Then, with surprising ferocity, the quiet beauty of the Alps erupts with the mayhem of the promotional caravan, complete with floats and music and blaring horns and cars whizzing by like artillery shells.











Schwag!



And then after the madness of the promotional caravan is come and gone, and a expectant quiet fills the crowd, you hear -- so far off you think you're imagining it -- the sound of helicopters. And then time leaps forward and you have to look back at your photos to realize that Luis Leon Sanchez and Jen Voigt (Jens fucking Voigt!) were leading the breakway. And you were there. And you saw it. But in all the excitement, not really.















Luis Leon Sanchez with Jens Voigt hot on his wheel. A breakaway doomed to fail, but beautiful and heroic nonetheless.



Team cars following close behind the breakaway group.


So many options at Le Tour


And then you hear it.... Far down the valley the unmistakeable sound of the approaching peleton.



Later, at the finish line after he lost 8 minutes and the yellow jersey, Cadel Evans would break down in tears. But over the Col des Aravis, team BMC was in good form protecting Evans at the front of the peleton.



BMC with George Hincapie leading the peleton over the Col des Aravis.



Tony Martin back in the Gruppetto.



Another familiar face in the mountain-stage gruppetto, sprinting sensation Mark Cavendish, the fastest man near the finish by far.



Tyler Farrar had lots of bad luck during this year's stage, including a horrific crash, but still managed to grab a stage win.



And after the grand tour comes the grand traffic jam. On our way off the hill and heading toward Annecy.