Day 20 - Camping directly behind the hotel we stayed in the night before!

After packing up and leaving the Formula 1 where we stayed, we started our day with coffee at, of course, McDonalds after riding back into Meaux. The McDonalds was needed to locate the bike shops and bookstores in town that we needed to get new chains and a map of Belgium and Amsterdam. Here is a weird thing about France. The country is dead in August. Everyone is on vacation. The weirder and more subtle thing about France is that it does not at all adhere to the same ideals of capitalism that are so prevalent and taken for granted in America. Don’t get me wrong; capitalism exists here in all it glory, which, ironically, we came to be very happy about, but the people and business here mostly operate which what seems like a different mentality than they do in America. For example, in France, when its time for a holiday, you just shut your shop up and put a hand written sign in the window that you will return and please have a nice day. In Meaux, the only sizable town for sixty miles around and, more importantly, the only one that had cycle shops for sixty miles around, all the bike store owners must have gone on holiday together. While I’m happy for their chance at a break and the confidence they have at the prospect of loosing customers while a way from their shops (perhaps that’s why they all left at the same time) we still needed new chains. After forgoing breakfast because we assumed that the trip to get new chains would be quick and after having visited three shops, one of which was very far outside of town, we were getting frustrated. I started to think of what would I do if I were in America and if I were faced with this situation. Since I could simply go to my basement and pick out a few new-ish chains at home, I was unable to fully comprehend how this could happen in America unless it was at 9:00 at night and even then I could just wait until morning and not until August 28th or whatever date my local bike merchant decided to return from his month long holiday. Then I had a thought that would turn out to reverse the course entirely to what could have been a very unproductive day. What if a store was open 24 hours and carried a bunch of crap that you could get in case you need it? In America, people with far superior free-market instincts had that same thought long before I, and they had brought that idea to fruition in a recklessly profit-driven venture that they called Walmart. Now the avid reader of this blog will note that, although what we found was a lame French replica of what we know as Walmart complete with set hours of operation, the superstore model did exist in France and, on our way out of town to the final bike shop we checked which was closed for holiday, we happened to pass one of these replicas. I admit that I have never been happier to have found a discount superstore, but would the French replica live up to it’s American conceived forerunner and provide for us a selection of low quality merchandise large enough to include bike chains? It turns out that the L.Eclerc, the name of the French monster retailer, had an inventory of bike parts that would rival that of all but the most serious of bicycle retail shops! We got two new chains, lubricant, break-pads (mine are starting to wear), and they had fenders that definitely temped me for a moment. Next, since we failed to find a map of both Belgium and Holland at the local bookshops, we checked for maps and found to our further surprise that they carried Michelin maps for nearly every part of the globe! We left; amused at our happiness at having just left a replica of the very store that we both avoid while in the states. Our next goal was to get food for what now would be more appropriately called lunch but was in fact our breakfast. The trailer had been left locked up at the hotel while we ran errands without its cumbersome presence, and we had picked out a grocery store on the way back to the hotel where we planned to stop and buy food both for our immediate needs and for our trip to Lille. Yet, when we got to said grocery store, we were confronted with another aspect of the more leisurely atmosphere in the French economy. The grocery store, although it was 2:00 in the afternoon, was closed. Turns out that everything also closes everyday from 12:30 and 2:30, so we waited until it reopened with a crowd of locals. The crowd queued up at around 2:15 and then go pretty restless when the manager opened the doors but wouldn’t let anyone in until 2:40. We were annoyed but if everything closes everyday for siesta time, I’m not sure why the locals weren’t more prepared for the inconvenience. Anyway we got food, made it back to the hotel, ate on their patio, and decided that we wanted to have a siesta of our own instead of starting our journey to Lille. While eating, we discovered that the code that we got for our room still opened the door to the hotel, and since the showers and toilettes were separate from the rooms, we still had access to them. After scheming about how our code may still open our room, but discovering that it did not, we decided to find a place to camp nearby and use the showers at the hotel for one more night. I worked on the bikes, and Alyssa went to scout a place to camp. She ended up finding a great place right behind the hotel so we set up our tent and returned to the hotel to eat, cut our hair, and shower before going to sleep. The day also included our first flat tire, Alyssa’s rear wheel, which went flat as we were scouting out our camping spot. Alyssa and I quickly fixed it with a patch so we still have two spare tubes. Tomorrow we are finally leaving Meaux…We hope.