Gallery Rally — Jersey to Saint-Tropez 2012

Welcome to Day 4 - Privas to Saint-Tropez

A very warm welcome to all you avid readers from our fantastic hotel in Saint-Tropez!

Here are a few teasers for you!

So lets start at the begining!

Our day started far to early. Ok, so it was the same time as every other day so far on this trip, but having not got yesterdays update done and dusted till almost 2am, not to mention being woken up at 3.30am by the sound of one of the teams jumping in the swimming pool which from all accounts was very cold! (they shall remain nameless for now!), we were somewhat tired!

This morning we awoke to the theme tune to Mission Impossible, which was especially apt given how difficult clawing back 34 points was going to be on the 4th official day of the Gallery Rally! Although I did hear Church Bells at some unearthly hour which I had convinced myself was Mikes alarm going off, but they actually turned out to be real Church Bells somewhere in the town - which went off on the hour every hour!

Never mind, at least the sun was shining today!

So on with the day; the usual brief breakfast was followed by a few maintenance tasks on the car...

 

... and then it was soon time to be handed our days tasks!

We were told "to make sure we were prepared before getting to Clue 2b" - and a quick scan down the Clue sheet explained why, as it read "Get a photograph of your team at 1912 with a melon, a sprig of lavender, two red hats and a pineapple"

So the first task was evidentally to find a fruit and veg store, and a flower shop!

We headed into Privas, but apart from apples and potatoes and any other flower except lavender, they had nothing.

On the suggestion of the flower shop lady, we made tracks to a large Hyper-U situated a couple of k's down the road, where we headed in search of our treasure.

We came out of the shop with everything except the lavendar! Even red hats - which were admittedly childrens hats - and given how many we bought between us, probably meant a few dissapointed children that day were unable to get the hats they had saved their pennies for!

We mused at how the hyper market managers will be experiencing a big surge in the sale of pineapples and melons that day!

Not to worry though, as we had also tracked down a garden centre half a mile back up the road, so we headed there and before long were the proud owners of a Lavender plant!

Ok, thats the goods obtained for the photography question, now to find out where we need to go to.

Location Clue Number 1 was "Cheer amour muddled" - which after a reasonable amount of searching was tracked down to a town called Rochemaure.

We plotted our route and headed up to the old town - mainly because the question there was "How many languages can you get water in up in the old town?"

Some lovely roads and views on the way there...

Once there, we parked up and walked the length and breadth of 'the old town', finding a variety of loosely fitting answers that didnt quite click in our heads.

We kept searching...

We even asked the locals for advice...

 

However we then looked down and realised the answer was litterally under our feet!

Happy that the answer was 3, we decided to head onto the motorway for some lunch, passing a few cloud makers on the way..

Even a plane taking off just as we drove past it..

After a very pleasant lunch of (yes, you've guessed it!) steak frites, we set course for our next location, passing various interesting sites and views..

The location clue for this doesn't work unless you are actually looking at the map, as it was "1909 triangle" - which meant scouring the map for triangles in the likely intended destination area with the altitude of 1909 next to it. Trust me, there are lots of triangles with various numbers, so it took a while to find it, but find it we did, and set course for it we did too!

Basically, the '1909 triangle' was Mount Ventoux - which is apparently a famous tour de france mountain stage.

Crazy to think that people cycle up it, as its a 32km twisty climb to the summit from the bottom, but it was going to be a lot of fun driving a motor car up it - not to mention the stunning views on the way up and at the top!

First though, a quick modification required to ensure we got up in safety...

Modification carried out, it was time to enjoy the road up the mountain...

Once at the top, we assembled around 1912 and had our photograph taken - not at all embarrasing with lots of tourists watching on in amusement!

We then admired the views some more...

 

As clue 2a was "Refreshingly discover the number of the sideways passenger?" we decided to go into the cafe at the summit for some refreshments, and whilst waiting for our coffees to arrive, had a look around, where we discovered a variety of photographs on the wall, one that seemed to fit the bill quite nicely:

There was also a very interesting photograph showing some serious snowfall one year!

The latest in technology allows us to show you a direct comparison between that day and this day!

Now it was time to return down the mountain...

Time to head to Clue site number 3 - "Pert you is!" - which we tracked down on the map to the town of Pertuis. Seeing as the clue once there was "Choo! Choo! What time has ceased to exist?" - we set course for the Gare at Pertuis!

Once there, we found an alarming number of clocks both inside the ticket office, and on the platform, which we studied intently for some time, much to the amusement of the lady on the ticket desk!

We eventually settled on this clock.

...and went with the answer 18:00, as the number 18 was missing from the clock face.

Time to head to the 4th and final clue site of the day - in fact of the whole trip! With heavy hearts, we worked out that "I and mother get in to a confused drug" was intended to take us to the very beautiful town of Grimaud, where upon arrival, we parked up just beside the clue.

Obviously we didn't realise this at the time, hence we spent the next hour looking for the answer in various other places in that town, but eventually we came back to where we started and finally found the answer to "What does the little 16.45 not do?"

You can't easily tell from the pictures, but the asterix against 16.45 in the bottom section of the timetable means that it was a one way journey and does not return!

By now, it was 8.10pm and we were supposed to be back at the Hotel for 8.30pm. Fortunately we were not that far away from Saint-Tropez by this time, so we plotted the hotel into the sat nav, and motored down - eventually arriving at 8.28pm - perfect timing!

We were then ushered into the hotel to check in, whilst someone took my car keys off me, and promised to bring our bags to us in our room. We waitied patiently for them to arrive, had a quick change of clothes and then headed on down for drinks on the terrace

It was soon time to be seated and enjoy a lovely meal!

In between the various courses, they decided to throw a firework display for us, which was very nice..... especially clever was the way that had planned a lightening storm to coincide with it all!

There was still two teams missing at the stage of the evening - The VW camper team of Karl and Neil had suffered some minor mechanical issues - worse still was that they had been giving a lift to Craig and Julie all day, who had suffered a break down in their Porsche the previous day - and now presume they just curse any car they get into! (I'm keeping them well away from mine!)

At 11pm, they eventually made it to Saint-Tropez, just in time to see us finishing desert, and to witness the prize giving!

And here are those eagerly awaited results!

Huge congratulations to Ben and Ben in the Gallery team for coming 1st and getting to add their name to the trophy - a fine acheivement!

Mike and I were more than happy with our finishing position of equal 2nd - there was no way our plane could compete with theirs, and evidentally our knowlege of American Presidents needs some brushing up on!

Well thats the first part of the rally over, but as always, we'll be saying our emotional farewells to the people we've spent the last 4 days with and beginning our own secondary tour - the exact location of which will be divulged to you over the next 4 days as we work it out!

We would be delighted for you to continue to follow our progress. Put it this way, we'll publish a blog, whether anyone chooses to read it is out of our control! The good news is, they'll be less taxing on the grey cells, as Chip has once again forgotten to give us any clues for the return trip!

Thank you for all your guest book responses, particualy liked that Denise and Yvonne, who we learnt live together in a room in Saint-Benoit-du-Sault have tracked us down! The strange thing is, they must be on holiday in Jersey at this moment in time! (We think they may be imposters, but don't worry, we'll get to the bottom of it!)

And many thanks to those people that have generously sponsored us over the last few days - we really appreciate it - and so do Jersey Hospice.

If you would still like to sponsor us, please click here:

Finally, here is our route from today:

Until tomorrow, its good night from us both - well, good morning really as its gone 3.30am now!