You couldn’t get any closer to the stage finish at today’s Tour de France unless you were on a bike. Today, we decided to take a rest day and make the most of our VIP visit to the Izoard Bus and the VIP finish area in Morzine-Avoriaz. If you saw today’s stage, you know it’s a big climbing stage that changed the yellow jersey wearer. We watched it all happen from about 25 feet away.

The Izoard bus is a two-story bus that looks out over both the peloton arrival area and the finish line, depending on which way you’re facing. It also has a “front yard” that goes right up to the barricade along the last 50 meters of the stage. It was pretty awesome to get so close to the action. And we were on tv: As we drove back to our hotel, a friend of two of our guests called to say he saw them on Versus! Pretty cool. Now, they’ll have to get the Tour de France DVD.

We also got a tour behind-the-scene of the media area. Fact of the day: They have 800 people build and dismantle the media area every day and have 35 kilometers of cable running through the place!

Since we got our rest day today, we’ll ride on tomorrow’s Tour rest day. We did recon on the Col du Columbiere, so our Discover France will know exactly where to attack. 🙂  We’ll get an early start, as it promises to be a hot day again. Then, maybe an afternoon of exploring La Clusaz for everyone. Looks like good shopping, if anyone has the legs to walk around town after!