The French Alps

Last Sunday the Tour de France stage 14 traversed 2 major passes in the French Alps, and this revived my memory of a certain day on 14th October 1998, when I drove over part of that route. We stopped at the summit of the Col du Lautaret at 2020m altitude. Last week it was crowded with thousands of spectators and parked cars lining the road as the 171 riders made their way over the pass to continue down to the next major peak.  But on that day many years ago, we enjoyed a peaceful few minutes in that spectacular location with the feeling that we were on top of the world.