Roadside Report Stage 4: I wrote about anticipation on Saturday, that feeling when the race is about to start. Today is different: there are already so many scenarios at play, and so many people either out injured or compromised by time, that we know the stories being written. The Tour is alive and its coming to us on the cobbles, we just have to wait.Last night’s arrival in Lustin was a fantastic surprise, as our room looked south over the Meuse river valley. There are some parts of the Ardennes that aren’t the prettiest, due to the legacy of the heavy industries, and heavy goods trains grumbled along the riverside far below us, forty cars long and more. Despite that, looking across to Profondeville was a view well worth the wait.There was a lot of waiting today it was that kind of stage. The route was a pretty straight south-westerly, making seeing the race more than once with such heavy Tour traffic too risky. We chose a one-stop strategy, heading for the first of the day’s cobbles at Pont--Celles, aiming to arrive early.Pont--Celles is a small Wallonian village named for a monastery founded by the Belgian apostle Saint Amand, and ended up giving its name to what is now a municipality of 16,000 people. Jazz legend Django Reinhardt was born not far away in Liberchies.Even before the caravan had tooted its way into our consciousness the roads were closing up, but we managed to jam the hire car into a...
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