Wednesday, October 8, 2014

Tour de France hits Cambridge

Monday, 7th July 2014: Most of the time, because I work from home I can be very flexible about what I do and when I do it. Although there times when I have to work with others and I was involved in a meeting with various participants that had been arranged for some time which coincided with the day that the Tour de France circus came to town.

That was the bad news, the good news was that my participation in the meeting came to an end not long before the peloton was due to start. So at least I would get to see the riders, even if it was in the neutralised zone.

The week before the meeting warnings were sent out letting participants know that the roads around the city centre would be closed. Although mine did mention that as I usually cycled I probably wouldn’t be that affected.

Mind you I still set of much earlier than I would normally do that morning – partly because I wanted to be sure of getting around the centre on my bike and partly because I wanted to take a few pictures. It was such a nice morning that I took a great circle route from the north to the south via Cherry Hinton and then down The Tins.

It was clear that the TdF was quite an event, as I passed the Holiday Inn Express it looked like a Police Convention was taking place.  The car park was full of various police vehicles. 

Holiday Inn Express – Police Motorcyclists Convention

when I got to the centre – despite all the warnings about the roads being closed, this seemed to be true for motor vehicles but not cyclists. It was wonderful being able to cycle on roads pretty much clear of motor traffic. It seemed to incredibly quiet.  I parked my bike and went for a wander.

Fitzwilliam Street – Henry Welcome Building

The road closures were in place but not all the barriers were up, they were operating on a just-in-time principle.

Downing Street – Closed

St Andrew’s Street

St Andrew’s Street – still open for cycling though

The Lull before the Storm – TdF Cambridge

The Fitzwilliam Museum

A bit of advertising – by cycle

Roll up, roll up, for the greatest cycle race on earth – probably

I assumed that these two weren’t going to follow the peloton the whole way. Interesting they they are labelled “Ambulance” – where does the patient fit?

St John’s Ambulance Cyclists

Google  auto-awesomed the last picture

St John’s Ambulance Cyclists

Google also created automatically created a panorama out of several pictures I took of the cyclists. The two cyclists ended up in the same picture twice!

 St John’s Ambulance Cyclists (you are seeing double)

Don’t park you bikes here or they will be cleared except for the ones that haven’t been cleared?

Cycle Parking – Trumpington Street

There were loads of helicopters in the air – I reckon four.

Police Helicopter keeping an eye on things

TV Helicopter?

The crowds building up along Trumpington Street

Crowds on Trumpington Street and the Fitzwilliam Museum

Those buildings on the right provide a good vantage point.

Yep – definitely a good view.

Spectators on the Fitzwilliam Museum

The Yellow Jersey

Chris Froome – Sky

They’re off – not really just the way I panned it

Going the wrong way?

The aftermath – a jolly decent “pavement”

They let us on the road for a while and then moved us off it again. I met up with my son and we walked until we found a place to eat. The nearby pubs were packed, but by Cineworld the TdF fever didn’t seem to have had the same affect.

We ate outside – the weather was fantastic. Google Plus got to this picture as well.

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