Swimming today: 1.10km
Two days before the road was due to re-open frantic activity was observed as the surface was sprayed with tar and several hundred tonnes of chippings spread on the surface. The result for a couple of weeks was a feeling similar to driving on a beach. Eventually things settled down until, in December, tell-tale skid marks showed where the first vehicle had ended up in the car-eating deep ditches.
(Chausée déformée = uneven road)
One of the common signs that announces the arrival of summer here are the temporary road signs saying "Chausée Déformée" as the combined effects of a hot summer, heavy lorries and poor road maintenance lead to another road surface buckling under the strain.
When we arrived in 2010 the road from Noyal Muzillac to Questembert had permanent signs and was a real switchback ride. So the news that it was going to be closed for four weeks last September for major works was well received. The road closure was accompanied by lots of machinery and chaos, all promising signs that the road would be finished to a standard suitable for the Tour de France (well we live in hope ....). Gradually however the slow pace of work, the absence of any signs that the roadbed was being replaced and the fact that 80% of the work seemed to be digging metre deep ditches on either side of the road led to a scaling-back of our expectations - perhaps not the 2015 edition of Le Tour then. Still, at least the chasm of a pothole at the end of our road would be fixed.
Two days before the road was due to re-open frantic activity was observed as the surface was sprayed with tar and several hundred tonnes of chippings spread on the surface. The result for a couple of weeks was a feeling similar to driving on a beach. Eventually things settled down until, in December, tell-tale skid marks showed where the first vehicle had ended up in the car-eating deep ditches.
And then, last week, after the wet and frosty weather, the first Chausée Déformée signs reappeared as the tar coating failed, as was always likely, to hold together the crumbling road edges. That's four months and 25 days after the work was finished. Almost comical except I remember the signs erected during the work saying how much the department had paid (from its allocation from central government) and how much the state had paid towards the work - all out of our taxes of course.
And the massive pothole has reappeared and been patched twice so far ......
There's a saying in French: plus ça change, plus c'est la meme chose.
Indeed.
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