I don't really know what the point of this post is - I just know that I wanted to show you guys the transformation that the city of Leeds went through for Le Tour de France! Unless you've been living under a rock for the past few months, then you will know that stages one and two for Le Tour this year took place in Yorkshire. The Grand Départ got the event started with a bang in Leeds city centre on Saturday 5th July, before the race made it's way throughout Yorkshire, passing towns and villages and eventually finishing at the end of stage two the next day in Sheffield. It made it's way down south a few days later, but naturally being a Yorkshire less, I really was excited for stage one in particular!

Unfortunately, I didn't get to see any of the race in person, but that wasn't to say that I didn't join in with the festivities. I was actually meeting Martin in Leeds on Friday 4th July, the day before the Grand Départ was due to begin and I decided to snap some pictures of Leeds transformed. As you can see, there was everything from yellow knitted jerseys adorning statues, to inflatable bicycles and everything in between, with banners and posters wherever you looked. As you can probably tell, it was absolutely bouncing out down that day and felt quite sad, figuring that with Yorkshire being as it is, it would mean bad weather for the Grand Départ the next day. However, being "God's own county", the weather came up trumps that day and it was gloriously sunny! So whilst it wasn't nice trying to hold an umbrella in one hand and use my camera in the other, I'm glad that the weather cleared up just in time for the main event.

The highlight of Leeds' celebration for Le Tour - and the reason me and Martin were there - was the Magic Spanner Bar. Operated and run by the folks behind the Leeds International Beer Festival and North Bar, it was a Magic Rock Brewing pop-up bar in the Bridewell Cells underneath Leeds Town Hall. Having never had the chance to visit them before, I grabbed this opportunity with both hands - and to drink a special, one-off beer in there was a bonus! The cells are exactly like you would imagine them; cold, damp and dark, although there was obviously special lighting set up for the duration of the bar's trading. It was the most unique and memorable places that I've ever enjoyed a pint in, that's for sure! There was a main bar area, where it was completely full (It wasn't all that big, as you can imagine), so me and Martin transferred ourselves to one of the adjoining holding cells, lit up only by candles in beer glasses. Spooky stuff. As for the beer itself, funnily enough named Magic Spanner, it was a delightfully crisp and refreshing pale ale that went down like a dream. All in all, a great place to visit and whilst it was only there for the duration of Le Tour, I hope that one day that something similar will come back again.

After we had enjoyed our beer, we headed to a Wetherspoons to get something to eat and cut through Millenium Square. Well, I say cut through, it was more "edge around" because the entirety of it was fenced off from the public and we managed to sneak on some kind of official-looking briefing. They were talking in French so we couldn't understand what they were saying, but it looked quite important nonetheless. We noticed that on the chairs were names, and at the time we wondered if they were names of the current racers, but as it turns out it was the names of champions from previous years. Pretty sweet, eh?

After a while, it was time for us to head home and for me to soak up the atmosphere of Le Tour beginning the next day. It was eerily quiet in the city centre the day before everything kicked off, which was really strange considering how incredibly busy it turned out to be the next day! I ended up staying at home to watch it on television with my mum, who was otherwise on her own. My dad actually brought home his chickens that day, and when we arrived home with them we paused the event on the television so we could go see them. We'd paused it just as the Red Arrows were flying over Harewood House, and as we stepped outside into the back garden those same Red Arrows flew right over our house, incredibly fast and very low! How cool is that? Seeing them that close made staying at home completely worthwhile and my experience of Le Tour Yorkshire a very memorable occasion indeed.