Final Tour July 16-17 / Final Tour July 18 / Final Tour July 19 / Final Tour July 20 / Final Tour July 21-22 /

Final Tour July 22 / Final Tour July 23 / Final Tour July 24 / Final Tour July 25

July 21

    Rest Day at the Tour - Up at the crack of way too early to catch our 5:30 train to Paris on the rest day for the Tour. The nice thing about our experience with the trains compared to typical airlines schedules we deal with at home is that they run on time and you better be ready to board when they pull up because they don't wait long. The unusual thing is only about 1/2 the time do we see anyone to show our tickets. My favorite part of the train is that I don't have to drive the long, really long boring drive to Paris from the south of France.

    We decided to skip the next couple of stages and just watch them in Paris because we know the Tourmalet will be extremely crowded since the race passes over it twice. We just heard the weather was going to be nasty also, which only made us feel better about our decision. Angie has a friend living in Paris that has been in pastry school for the past year so we'll have more time to visit with her as well.

    Nice uneventful 5 hrs of sleep on the train before we got to Paris, a cab to our hotel and we're set for the next several days.

July 22

    This was a big day for the Tour de France and likely the deciding factor in the race. We went to our favorite bar, Bugsy's to watch the Tour today. Bugsy's has good food, they speak English, they put the Tour on tv for us and get this, It's NON-Smoking! Totally awesome. We ended up making friends with the bartender, Ollie, who wore a yellow wristband and said he and his girlfriend may try to meet us on the Champs for the last day. Clare, Angie's friend met us there, also. As we saw the coverage of the rain and mist on the Tourmalet, we felt really comfortable sitting at the bar. We've been over the Tourmalet in previous years and if the weather is nice it's one of the more beautiful mountains we've been on, but today, wouldn't be one of those days.

    Another American group came in the bar just prior to the Tourmalet climb. They we're from Colorado, so we visited with them a bit, then they left for their hotel. They said they had just gotten into Paris and had been up for 36 hours straight and they looked like it. They were tossing back drinks and very happy for being so exhausted!

    We enjoyed the stage today from the dry warm bar and although Levi had a bad day on the climb it was nice to see Chris Horner (nick named Red Neck by Lance) ride himself into 10th place. Chapeau Red Neck! That should have secured the Team Classification for Team Radio Shack, which is cool so Lance will be on the podium for his last Tour as leader of the strongest team!

    Looking forward to tomorrow, not because it's a flat stage with a sprint finish that Mark Cavendish will likely win, but because we're meeting back up with the Fowkes family and some other LiveStrong staff for a Fat Tire Bike Tour around Paris.