Vorsprung mit Audi

Depart Lewes 05:35 in the Audi A3 2.0 litre turbo FSI quattro sportback. Is this a clue to the winner of this year's Le Mans twenty-four hour race? We'll soon find out. After wrong slotting at Little Common we arrive at Jack's house to meet up with our tour leader.
We park the Audi and I board the Mercedes 'V' class in my now customary front passenger seat and Dave Roadway joins the tour with his Toyota Avensis diesel.
We pick up Tim and Darren at Brede and arrive at the Channel Tunnel at 07:48 for an 08:29 departure. We are behind a black Corvette C5 in the queue for the
car-carrying train. There are plenty of other exotic cars joining the exodus for Le Mans. We grab a coffee at the terminus at Cheriton - an eye-watering £2.35 for a 12oz coffee and pass on a croissant at £1.65. Rip-off Britain lives.
There is a short delay on the train as they have to manually wind down the shutters due to a fault. While aboard we receive a free Audi gift pack which includes a copy of Autosport and a radio. We are listening to Danny Gatton, the king of the telecaster, as we emerge from the tunnel courtesy of an I-Pod shuffle loaded with Jack's vast collection of music. We make a quick pitstop on the other side for gas at "Bonjour" where I purchase a croissant for €1 (70 pence). We rendez-vous with Dave at Aire des deux caps - he is achieving 46 mpg on the highway. Enjoying Rosanne Cash and "Seven Year Ache."
Lunch at Abbeville, the plat du jour at the "C'est la Vie" Bar-Brasserie in the Rue Boucher de Perthes - a stop on the 2003 tour - but not as good the second time around. Much conversation about past trips to Pau and Croix-en-Ternois. The navigator (me) snoozes after lunch and we make a navigational error wrong-slotting toward Amiens. We are soon back on track and cross the Pont de Brotonne - there is no longer a toll to cross the bridge. We turn right through the Foret de Brotonne to Pont Audemer. We reconnoitre Orbec and deem it a good stop for the return journey. We arrive for overnight stop at Gacé at 18:00 in time to watch the football at the Bar Chez Roland: England 2, Trinidad & Tobago 0. Roland dispenses free snacks, unlike some British pubs that are charging for entrance.
Back at the campsite and the Tesco and Sainsbury's instant barbecues are letting us down. Neil struggles to cook the sausages while Richard improvises a bellows with a bike pump. Another rip-off. Dave Roadway produces a spare z-bed and I get a decent nights kip in the self-erecting tent. We are back chez Roland for al fresco breakfast under the sun umbrella with sweet peas growing up the trellises.
Back to the campsite for the start of the annual Folding-Bike Tour de Normandie. The entrants are in two classes for bikes with gears and those without:

GEARS

Jack Kellett, 1997 Brompton L3
Rupert Lloyd Thomas, c2000 Brompton L5
Bryan Hurt, 1970's Universal 3 spd (Polish design)
Dave Roadway, 2005 Dahon, 26" wheels, 16 gears, gripshift, personal import from U.S.
Richard Banks, 1998 Pashley Fold-It, 5 spd with drum brakes

NO-GEARS

Neil Turpin, c1966 Raleigh SW16 ¾ size (Sturmey-Archer gears defunct)
Darren Batchelor, late 90's Bugatti Royal of Chinese origin
Tim Watts, 60s Dingo from Italy, integral monocoque construction


NON-STARTER

Roger Still, Brompton L5 5spd

We head out past the old Gacé station which has broken windows and is surrounded by an old scrapyard full of tractors and backhoes. Trains have not stopped here for some time. There is a splendid café across the street for a later pitstop. Darren Batchelor wins the 'man-of-the-match' award for the long climb of the col following the station hairpin. He gets the best from the Bugatti Royal with a cadence dictated entirely by the single-gear machine, the yellow bike handled memorably by Nigel Lewis and Tim Pepper in previous years. Darren said "I just carried on when others stopped. I set my sights on the top of the hill and went for it."
Bryan Hurt wins the Best Efforts award, reacquainting himself with a bike on the tricky hills of Normandy. On the long descent we spot an old man in a gunmetal Citroën 2CV with beret, and he gives a cheery wave as he heads up the hill.
We return via the Café de la Gare where a splendid old lady serves us drinks. We derig at the campsite after completing 6½ miles, and burning 400 calories.
A quick drink at L'Etoile d'Or is spoilt by hostile service so we find another bar nearby who want to take our money. Soon it is time to join Le Patron, Madelaine and Simone for lunch at the Restaurant Tahiti. The usual warm welcome and a blowout set lunch for €110 for eight, including copious wine and the tip. They set a standard which is hard to match later in the tour. The race crowd are thinner on the ground than usual, perhaps by-passing Gacé on the newly-opened motorway.
We take the motorway to Spay, within cycling distance of the Le Mans track, but curiously cannot find our intended campsite by the river, and end up on the municipal site in Spay - £5 for two nights each on a big pitch by a pond. [Domaine du Houssay, Rue d'Arnage, Spay. email: camping-spay@wanadoo.fr]
In the evening we ride to Guécelard to visit friends running a campsite. They have two live bands with the Kyla Brox Band opening the show. Recently featured on the Paul Jones blues show on Radio 2 they are the real deal. Another act to play on Rocket FM in the autumn. We return to Spay in the dark down the back lanes. We breakfast at the Café Le Physa'lis: rather strange ham and eggs something like an English breakfast. We ride to the track and watch two Brit victories in the Le Mans support classic car races. Radio Le Mans, sadly in decline, ignores these races favouring advertorial blather over proper reporting. Bring back Titchmarsh. Lunch in Arnage at the Bar Restaurant "La Croix de Paris", €10 per head including wine. We cycle to the Arnage curves for the start of the race and then back to the campsite for an evening nap.
The Joest-Audi R10 TDI with the diesel engine is heading for the race victory and we take the van back to the circuit for a couple of hours spectating opposite the pits in the fading light. The crowd is quite thin compared to some years and the newbies get a good view, helped by the giant Diamondvision screens. The Charlatans are somewhat improbably playing a gig next to the track.
On Sunday morning the Café Le Physa'lis is not open as advertised so after a couple of croissants we adjourn to Arnage for coffee and juice. We cycle to the Porsche curves via Maison Blanche. We stop by to see 'The Chef' in his RV, camped in a front garden, where we have stayed in years gone by. We return to the campsite to pack after a pitstop at the boulangerie in the Avenue de la Liberte in Arnage. We are exchanging instant messages with Matthew Marsh in Germany, as he drives to tenth place in the Nurburgring 24 Hours. As the bikes are packed away we have completed 40 miles using 2400 calories.
We drive to Mulsanne for an expensive lunch and watch the race on the big screen in the bar - some of the party take a last look live at Mulsanne Corner before we head up the motorway to Orbec. We walk in to town but most places are closed on a Sunday night. We choose the Restaurant l'Orbecquoise with good food and hit-and-miss service. The apple sorbet with calvados was a highlight. The town seems geared to an English holiday clientele. Unfortunately a thunder storm washes a couple of our tents out and I end up sleeping in the van. Next morning we drive into town for a quick breakfast and rapid sight-seeing. Certainly a place worth a second visit. The ex-Guy Ligier Ford France GT40 is revving in the high street searching for 98-octane gas, on the way back to Blighty.
We are back on the motorway to Rouen but detour via the Pont de Brotonne on encountering signs saying "24H DU MANS - CIRCULATION DIFFICILE." Jack switches
on the cruise control and we head for Calais, stopping at Abbeville for gas. Lunch at Flunch at Cité Europe and last minute shopping. Total cost of trip £178 plus race ticket and personal spends making for a grand total per person of around £300. Through the new self-service check-in for the tunnel and back in Bexhill having covered 700 miles round trip.
Plus points: more cycling, less excessive drinking, no breakdowns (bikes or vehicles), faster roads when required, live-music, bike-friendly track, historic diesel victory.
Downsides: thunderstorm, Cheriton prices, racetrack prices, dud barbecues, Radio Le Mans, noisy at Spay on the Friday.
Overall: Took Le Mans to new level.