Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2022 Stage 16 - Carcassone to Foix

Stage 16 of the Tour de France and it is a 178.5km long hilly race that starts in Carcassone and ends in Foix.

The Map

Sights and points of interest along the route

The race starts in Carcassone, which I blogged about yesterday and so there is nothing more to add about that here so lets just get on the road with the first village of Leuc with its 14th century castle and then onto Saint-Hilaire which has the 8th century Abbey of Saint-Hilaire and abbey church, a former fortified Benedictine monastery that closed its doors in 1748 following devastation from the Hundred Years War, plague and famine.  It is currently used to host regular painting, sculpture and photography exhibitions as well as classical music concerts.  The next town is Peusse, which used to have a castle but that is now mostly destroyed with remaining structures being converted into living accommodation.  Limoux is a large town on today's route and is famous for its wine and there is the Petiet Museum where you can view paintings and also a Piano Museum.

Limoux

The town of Chalabre has pretty corbelled houses and was active in producing hats in the early part of the 20th century.  There is Chalabre Castle, built in the 13th century but now the Knights of Kercorb (an association) run workshops that allow visitors to step into history and become actors in the life of the castle.  They also have jousting shows and medieval dances and other such like activities.

At 60km along the route is the village of La Bastide-sur-l'Hers and then Lavelanet, which used to be a textile town but now has a museum that shows weaving, spinning and vegetable dies and runs workshops for people to touch and experiment with them. Mercus-Garrabet and the Devil's Bridge which has many legends attached to it and there is also 12th century Saint-Louis Church.  Tarascon-sur-Ariège is a very old town that has seen much war and destruction throughout many centuries and has a river running through it and there is the local Eastern Pyrenees Regional National Park, which is a very large green space with lakes, ponds and peat bogs and also rivers that run through it.

Tarascon-sur-Ariège

At 103km along the route is Niaux, with its huge decorated cave which has more than 200 entrances, the "Cathedral Hall" which is as large as Notre-Dame in Paris and 4km into the cave tunnels is the hall of the "Empire of Satan", which is three to four times larger.  The caves were used by priests during the revolution to hide in.  The next towns are Val-de-Sos, Port de Lers, Massat, Mur de Péguère, the later of which has a pass that is a bit of a climb, an average of 7.9% but the final part is almost 12%.  Serres-su-Arget is 170km along the route and it is here that a Benedictine Abbey was formed in 1991 by taking over former agricultural buildings.

Today's race ends in Foix, dominated by the 11th century medieval castle which has recently undergone a major restoration and rehabilitation project costing 9 million Euros and has created a museum within the now restored castle.  Locally there is also the 12th century Abbey of Saint Volusian, the Underground River of the Labouiche where you sit in a boat and see the city from below with rooms and galleries along the 4km route.  The 13th century Devil's Bridge with the legend that the architect made a pact with the Devil and could only finish building the bridge in exchange for the first soul to cross it.  Being smarter than the Devil the architect made a cat cross it

Foix Castle

Who Won the Stage and Who Won What Jersey

The Stage winner is Hugo Houle for Israel-Premier Tech/ISR.

The Yellow Jersey won by Jonas Vingegaard for Jumbo-Visma

The Green Jersey won by Wout van Aert for Jumbo-Visma.

The Polka Dot Jersey won by Simon Geschke for Cofidis/FRA.

The White Jersey won by Tadej Pogacar for UAE Team Emirates.

Combatif Award won by Hugo Houle for Israel-Premier Tech/ISR

Leading team: Ineos-Grenadiers

The Challenge: Carcassone inspired the popular game where you compete against other players to score points by building roads, cities and fields.  In Team Wow we don't really compete during TDF, but we do encourage you to blow you own trumpet and celebrate your own victories - however big or small.

Spin something you love and share a proud picture of your work!

Suggested Fibre:  Anything that you enjoy working with.  We're going to have a go with some of our grey BFL

What I did

It has been far too hot to spin today, high 30's, hitting 40 in some parts.  I did do a little bit of wool combing but it was really too hot to do that for too long.  It's supposed to be going cooler now, although we are still waiting for that to happen, certainly doesn't feel any cooler now that it's dark than it did earlier.