Late, but better than never...

Yes, it’s been some time since we’ve been able to update.  So much that we’ve done and wished to post here.  There have been no cyber café’s anywhere that we’ve been since our last posting.  The weather has been somewhat interesting the past few days, with mixed beauties and some real snarling rain squalls, everywhere from the stage on Saturday to now. 
 
The start in St. Flour was very, very positive.  We have video of a conversation with Bobby Julich (Team CSC).  The girls got team hats from Credit Agricole, CSC, and Ileas Balears.  Bobby and Jacob Piil, Ivan Basso (currently number 3 in the GC), and big Magnus Bakstedt.  It was a very exciting start, and it would have been better still had we seen the finish, but we had to head on south to our hotel near the Col d’Aspin (an unbelievably beautiful place).  We stayed there for two nights.  Our drive in netted us a Tour de France arrow sign (yeah!), perfect for mounting in the upcoming guest bathroom, cycling montage.
 
We managed to see the riders on TV at our hotel on Saturday, then we hurried down the mountain to our road intersection to capture sub-two-minutes of the Rabobank rider and Richard Virenque, who were later caught by the peloton.  At that time, Lance and the others were making chase at speeds (downhill on wet roads) that was faster than the cars and motorcycles, it seemed.  They were 9 minutes back at that point, and reeled past the second peloton by nearly fifteen minutes… wow ! They were flying.
 
Tonight, we’re in Paris, and I wish we had more time to post to our Blog all that we’ve been up to.  We did the Fat Tire Bike Tour from the sud (French for south) end of the Eiffel Tower.  It was a four hour tour that included a stop for ice cream and an extensive boat ride up and down the river Seine.  Kelley did a lot of video taping of the boat tour, and it will make for some fantastic memories.  The view of the tower at night is really quite amazing.  We wish we could post some pictures, but there have been some technical difficulties that have arisen due to differences in formatting here and in the US.
 
We should be able to post a few more things here before we leave on Friday to return.  We’re staying at the Hotel Tonic in the Les Halles region near the Louvre.  It’s really incredible to see all of this.  Wish you all could be here.  Blog you soon !!!