Saturday 7 July. Tour de France Prologue.

Today I travelled by train and joined a crowd estimated at over a million watching the Tour de France get underway through the streets of central London

Weather was  clear and sunny with temperatures up to 22C. This was a welcome relief after many weeks of showers and high winds.

I was there at 11.00 well before the scheduled start of 3.00. I strolled up Whitehall past the start watching the preparations. It was great to see the usually busy streets of Central London closed down for the Tour and all the Tour banners everywhere.

There was a cosmopolitan atmosphere with many French and Spanish voices. After a picnic in St James Park I headed up the Mall past the finish to Buckingham Palace and watched the Tour Caravan come past. Lots of free goodies were thrown into the Crowd but I didn't catch any. Some of the Tour riders rode past among the Caravan including David Millar.

Then back to the Park and to the Tour village in Horseguards where mechanics were giving bikes a last check. Between Horseguards and the start in Whitehall the riders were warming up and I watched them come through Admiralty Arch and past Trafalgar Square.

Then on to the start to watch and photograph the first riders come down the starting Ramp.

I then headed down Whitehall towards Westminster and spotted a gap in the crowd and there I found 2 friends from Bognor CC, Dave Prior and Don Lambert. I stayed there for a while and then walked on down to Westminster aiming to get some pictures of riders coming round the road with Big Ben in the background.

The right spot was obvious with a lot of Pro Photographers with giant lenses lying on the road behind special barriers. I lucked out when somebody standing by a railing moved on and I got their spot with an ideal view.

All in all a great day out to a very special event.

Edwin