It was nice to wake up this morning and not feel like we had to hurry to leave our Airbnb. We had a relatively short ride, just over 40 miles, ahead of us, and we couldn’t arrive early. So we lingered in our Airbnb, ate our simple breakfast, organized, packed, and eventually checked out.
If I had to pick a word for today’s ride, it would be peaceful. We spent most of the time riding along a dedicated bike path near a river. Early on there were rowers rowing sculls – something is so peaceful and graceful about their movement in the water and how they glide. It made me think of the book Boys in the Boat. Occasionally, there would be cars for people who were going fishing. But they always gave us plenty of room. We had one trail closure which resulted in a little backtracking, but not too much. The backtrack took us through a beautiful small French town.
We had a simple grocery store lunch: chocolate soy milk and peanuts. It was what worked.
As we approached the town we are staying in, Chalon-sur-Saône, Natalie noticed her crank arms felt loose as she pedaled. Inspection revealed that her bottom bracket was coming loose. I bring a lot of tools on this trip, but I didn’t bring the tool to remove the crank arms or the tool to tighten the bottom bracket. Gratefully, we were relatively close to our destination and it was a pretty big city. We looked up a bike shop on Google maps, found it was relatively close to our Airbnb, so rode directly there. The bike shop employee informed us that there was no chance that the mechanic could look at our bike and their policy was that they couldn’t loan anyone tools. She gave us the name of another bike shop, which Natalie called, but there was a recording that they would be closed through 17 September. Our only option was to buy the tools at the bike shop that I needed to fix the bike, and hope everything would work out. Gratefully they had exactly what I needed. I first bought the tool to take off the crank arms, after removing the pedals. The bottom bracket was loose enough that I could remove it by hand and bring it in the store to make sure I had the right fit for the next tool that would be needed to tighten it back on. (It ended up being about $60 worth of tools.) Two very kind gentlemen walked up to the store and talked with Natalie about our predicament. They went inside, intent on convincing the mechanic to help us. Between their persuasion and my having the bottom bracket in my hands, the mechanic relented and came out. He wasn’t in a position to help (he and the other employee were following rules) wait sidewalk., but I was able to ask him specifically if he agreed with me that the bottom bracket was fine and just needed to be reinstalled. He agreed, so I carefully threaded it back and tightened it with the tool I just purchased. It seems to be a solid fix. We’ll see how it goes over the next few days. At least I have the tools I will need if the problem recurs. At first, I thought it was unfortunate that the mechanic couldn’t help us, but given some time to think about the situation, I am grateful that I had to buy the tools, and I am grateful that I have confidence that I can fix it myself if it happens again.
One of the nice gentlemen who was helping us on the sidewalk (to convince the bike shop to be more helpful) asked us if we had a place to stay. He kindly offered that we could stay at his house. When we told him we had an Airbnb, he asked if we needed a place to store such a big bike, and once again offered to let us store it at his house. I realize it might seem suspect to leave your bike with a stranger, but his countenance was such that I felt we could trust him. He was a little bit older than us and professional. We exchanged phone numbers and he asked us to call him if we needed any help.
We hurried to our Airbnb and were only a few minutes late meeting our host. Unfortunately, I had the wrong address in my bike computer so we were a few blocks away from the right house, but he found us and walked us to where we needed to be. He was so friendly and helpful. We didn’t know where we were going to be able to store our bike, and we’re kind of downtown in a busier part of the city, so I was a little worried about storing it outside. I had struggled to find an Airbnb here that had a place to store the bike. He had us follow him down a narrow hallway, which barely fit our bike. Then there was a U-turn, something that our bike would never make it around. But we picked up the front of the bike, so it was vertical with the front wheel directly 8 feet over the back wheel. Gratefully there was a high open ceiling which allowed us to slowly maneuver the vertical bike around the corner. (The bike looked hilariously awkward.) Then we had to position the back of the bike so that we could let the front down by backing the rear wheel down another hallway. This is the craziest place we’ve ever parked our bike. It was nice to have our host’s help. Tomorrow morning Natalie and I are going to have to figure it out on our own. Wish us luck!
Unfortunately, we didn’t get any pictures of the bike repair in front of the bike shop or the parking maneuver. We were too focused on problem solving. You’ll just have to use your imagination…
We had a simple outdoor dinner at a restaurant run by our airbnb host’s friend. It was just what we needed to wind down from an exciting finish.
Once again, we have been blessed by the kindness of others around us. Small things people do can make a big difference in others’ lives. These trips always remind us of our opportunity to be watchful and helpful to those around us – friends and soon-to-be friends.
