Sorry readers for the delay in publishing yesterday’s blog trash but couldn’t write it last night due to collapsing in shock at watching the England football team actually win a penalty shootout (against Colombia). England have perfected the art of playing backwards so it is a miracle that they won at all. Anyway enough about the WC – what about the Velodyssee I hear you say.
Hendaye to Bayonne via Biarritz – the first real stage. Got drizzled on in the morning and baked in the afternoon. The ever-present Atlantic breakers made a fine distraction to the stiff climbs out of one bay over the rocky headlands to the next. Mrs Nelson is already eagerly awaiting the the miles of flat dunelands of La Côte d’Argent that lead up to Bordeaux.
Had to wrestle with a fair amount of traffic through St Jean de Luz, Bidart and Biarritz including the typical scooters which rasp around like angry wasps in bottles.
Arrived in Bayonne and the scaffold erectors has beaten us to the Cathedral again. Haven’t seen a church without scaffolding yet.
St Jean de Luz is a very attractive fishing port with a very long harbour wall at the end of which is a massive lump of concrete. Sprayed onto the concrete is some graffiti which says ‘Altsasu Koak Askey’. This neither French nor Spanish but I doubt very much that this translates as ‘I love Arthur Askey’, unless the Basques had a hidden penchant for second-rate British comedy of the 1960’s, but I guess anything is possible. If any of you readers are able to make suitable translations then feel free to submit them as I am keen to know what it means.
A Kraken is a fearsome cephalopod- like sea creature that lurks about off the Norwegian coast and scares fishermen and, according to Tennyson, lies
‘Below the thunders of the upper deep,
Far far beneath in the abysmal sea
His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep The Kraken sleepeth…. etc etc (look it up)
How this one ended up in a scrappy old industrial estate on the outskirts of Bayonne one can only speculate.
Velodyssee 
Elementary mon ami. I looked out the largest magnifying glass I could find and…..hey presto!
Altsasu is a town in Northern Spain, ETA country. Well turns out there was an incident in 2016 between some policemen and local youths. Charges of terrorism were made but finally dropped. However the sentences ranged from 2-13 years. I can’t find any ref to Askey but the graffiti sounds like a statement of defiance. Bon voyage. Sherlock Mckay signing off…for now.
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Well thankyou Sherlock.
Mr B sent a response also directing me to a website about this. It all seems a bit fraught with frequent protests and demos. Good job we are heading out of Basque Country.
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