This year, we were fortunate to see the Tour de France live, going through a nearby village of where we stayed in France as part of our summer holiday. Already a few weeks prior to the cyclists coming through Mervans, the whole village has put their best efforts into decorating every path and shop with flowers and bicycle themes to get ready for the Tour de France Stage 7 between Belfort and Chalon-sur-Saône.

2.30pm and it was time for the caravan who went through the village, blasting loud party music on their advertisement vans and cheerful people throwing branded goodies at us…

It was fun, but we were all just waiting and excited for one thing: to finally see the cyclists! As we knew it was gonna be at least a 1.5 hours wait, we made our way through the town center to catch a glimpse of the excited crowds who made their way to Mervans that day to watch the Tour de France. Our favourite people were elderly locals who casually put some tables in front of their house by the street and had a lunch party with cheerful atmosphere as they waited for the cyclists.

We waited and waited and waited and it was almost 5pm, and then suddenly: the first two cyclist went past in the speed of light, followed by a few security cars and then followed by a huge crowd of cyclists, also cycling at what felt like 100 km/h very closely together. And then, that was it!

A long wait for a short spectacle. Five minutes later, people started packing up, taking the decoration down and going home. It was a fun day out, nevertheless, exciting to see the build-up and we were already rewarded again the next day with fireworks by the lake in Mervans for Bastille Day.

– Her