The following day we awoke to less promising looking weather. Now the comp was done it was time to have our own session on the trails at Penyier. The jumps are pretty large and intimidating so it took a little while for everyone to get into the swing of things. Jimmy and Chris were looking good though, Chris especially going super high and stretching out no handers in his signature chilled out style. Unfortunately before everyone could fully get to grips with the trails the heavens opened and promptly ended the day’s riding. Not cool after driving 800 odd miles to get there! It was decided that we’d cut our losses, load up the bus and head out towards Toulouse in search of La Source. About an hour outside we stopped at another of those convenient rest stops, this time setting up hidden away in some woods so we could have a camp fire and get our BBQ on, something that had been lacking thus far in our trip.

It didn’t take long to finish up the journey in the morning and following Jeremy’s directions, with the aid of a helpful satnav equipped delivery driver, we made it to La Source. These trails are well known in the BMX world, having featured on many videos and web edits, but to my knowledge, MTB’ers riding them is something of a rarity. This shows in the way the jumps are built, not huge, but very tight and tech. There’s also a lot of lines, it took a good half hour of walking around to figure out what went where, and as everything was meticulously well groomed and tarped, we had to pick which lines to uncover, as there was no way in hell we’d be able to ride everything in the one day we had there. In the end we ended up session two very different lines, one which started small and tech, then gradually got bigger, and another which was only three sets long but ended up a nice trick–suited jump. Once everyone had gotten dialled–in a good session went down, I wont bore you with trick lists or anything, but suffice to say Phil was throwing down, and Jimmy was just being Jimmy, which is always a treat. After a good days riding it was time to water and re–tarp the jumps and then head off towards Paris, in search of Luis’ trails. Not before a quick dip in a random lake though as by this point the weather had got its act together.

I’m not entirely sure why, but for some reason we decided to just drive through the night again, and at about 2 in the morning ended up in Paris, staring up at the Eiffel tower, shortly followed by a lap of the Arc de Triomphe. At this point it was discovered that a minibus full of trails riders who have barely slept in the last few days does not make for very successful navigation around the confusing streets of Paris. There was a definite glow of morning in the night sky before we managed to escape back onto a main road and promptly pulled into a truck stop, and just crashed–out on the grass next to all the parked up lorries. A few hours kip and the drone from the motorway about 30 feet away became too much to sleep through, so once again we loaded up and headed out.

Finding Luis’ place was relatively easy, he lived in a small town on the outskirts of Paris, his parents had a farm and had let him build on some land there. He’d created a strange combination of normal looking trails, interspersed with ghetto looking wooden skatepark style creations. It turned out to be hella fun to ride, and I think everyone would agree that the best session of the trip went down there. Luis himself, despite not speaking much English, was a great host and did everything he could to make sure we had a good time. Even letting us camp on his parent’s lawn, so massive thanks to you if you’re reading this dude! Riding wise, everyone was fully on it, apart from Cullis who took a bit of a spill at La Source the previous day. Builder and Jonny both pulled out tricks I hadn’t seen them do in a while, and Phil even went upside down! A great last session to our trip.

The following day it was time to head home, so we were up and very quietly packing the bus at about five in the morning as we still had a way to drive to Calais. Once again it was a bit of a lonely drive as everyone bar me spent most of it fast asleep, but seeing the sunrise on a particularly pretty part of France made it all worthwhile. The Eurotunnel trip home went smoothly and we arrived back in good Old Blighty in time to catch breakfast at the first Maccy D’s we came to, cheap mashed together bits of random animal never tasted so good! Returning the seats to their home in the back of the bus was considerably easier than taking them out, thank God. In the end I managed to return the bus with 4 miles left in the fuel tank and the clock had just ticked over 2000 miles, I’d say we definitely got our money’s worth….

So, in conclusion, if next summer turns out to be a washout again, hire a minibus, grab a few mates and head out to somewhere it’s less likely to be raining. It’ll be a shit–ton of fun, guaranteed, and if a bunch of ‘tards like us can manage it, anyone can. Bon Voyage!