It was all going so well, but then that's the time to worry. I had stopped at Buxy for a village wine exposition. I'd even thought of a business idea that, based on history, I will never get around to implementing, plus the over night rain had cleared to give cool sunshine. I pulled up to clear the gravel from my tyres, just as a precaution. Then when I started again Back Tyre deflated. About 100m in front of me someone else seemed to have the same problem.
So I got to work. A kind lady who ran a pet grooming parlour called me over and provided a bowl of water to find the leak and even marked the hole for me. But that shouldn't be necessary as I had a spare inner tube, the one that had the first puncture in Lebanon. The problem here seemed to have been caused by conkers. I had ridden over a spiky husk.
Ten minutes later all was installed, using spare inner tube, and I pumped up Back Tyre, which promptly went down again. This is the time when the world goes black. By now Grooming Lady has shut up shop for Saturday afternoon and everyone else seemed to have gone back home to their families. Suddenly you feel alone with dark thoughts: Bargain-priced Italian Pump probably doesn't work, both inner tubes have unfixable punctures and may be the outer tyre is split.
But a cool head prevailed. So back to inner tube number 1. The hole got fixed, the tyre replaced and everything worked fine.
The longer term lesson was 'do not stuff spare inner tube into pannier pockets as eventually the valve will break away'.But the anxiety remained. Bike went from well tuned machine to something needing careful nurturing, all the way until we reached Chalon sur Saone, found a Decathlon shop and bought a spare inner tube. No reason to worry now but the scars are still there.
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