Topbikes

     It's a little slow around here right now, literally. Shaun has thrown his back out and can only move at a snail's pace. It's not only a shame for Shaun but also because the weather has been super nice, which got me reminiscing a little of last spring/summer here. So I thought that since we did so many fun things last year, that I will do a few posts re-capping some of our favorite times here in Toulon.   Let me start off with saying I had the perfect partner in crime last year, Allyson. She was down for anything, no responsibilities and had no problem making an ass out of herself, sounds familiar huh? She is a professional basketball player so she only could be here from the end of March on and coincidentally, when she arrived, so did the hot weather. The first day I met her, we went and bought folding bikes (at the grocery store none the less). I have always had this vision of riding a bike through the city in a long skirt with a basket full of fresh vegetables from the outdoor market in the front (so cliché). Needless to say, I had been eyeing a bike forever. (Little did I know that a long skirt can and will get caught in the spokes/pedals and riding in the city is more dangerous than I thought as I did get hit by a scooter once. For the record, it was not my fault, the bike held up beautifully, I did not fall and I would like to forget about that as quickly as possible.)  The hard part is where we live. We live in a neighborhood full of hills so at some point you were going to be in an uphill battle. That is where the folding bikes come in, or Topbikes as we called them. You put it in the car, drive to an area where you want to ride (one preferably with no hills or scooters), pull that bad boy out, un-fold it and go. It solved all our problems and looked a little like a 'low-rider' too, double bonus. The guys would meet at the gym for practice and we would take one car and drive down to the beach and bike all day. We would go to markets, wind through old residential streets, discover places we would vow to return to with the guys, stop for lunch, try to pop wheelies, in other words, go wherever the bikes took us. The boardwalk seemed to go for miles and we were more than happy to follow it. We used those bikes so much that we became 'locals' at the food market down on the beach. Sadly, Allyson is not back this year, or rather they were one of the many players affected by the poor management here, so it is just me, myself and 2 Topbikes...hmmmm, wonder if I could get Shaun and his 200lbs on one of those, after all, it did hold up well against the scooter.

After a few hours ride we stumbled upon a hidden beach..

This being the beach.

Another stop on the way.

Who knew Allyson was a tour guide for Mount Faron also? Notice, the walking stick, took us 20 minutes just to find the right one.

Don't know if you can tell but we are really high, like 2,000 ft high and I'm about 2 feet from the edge. I may seem calm but I'm not.

Port at Sanary sur Mer where we stopped and ate many times.

The Wednesday market at Sanary.

Remember my last post about the clothes that sometimes don't flatter?? Well I had to give it up for this lady cause not only did she wear this, but she wore it PROUD.