I am sharing a bit of bike related stuff this week with you. Plus a tip on how to watch the Tour de France for free and learn Dutch on the fly.
Tour de France 2025
If you happen to be half interested in the Tour de France but you are not willing to pay for a channel broadcasting it, then I have the solution for you.
Dutch television broadcasts the entire stage live, but unless you have VPN, you can’t watch it live outside the Netherlands. However, after around noon (EST) the Dutch broadcaster NPO puts either the entire stage or the last 75% or so on line for you to watch.
All the video is from France TV anyway: the images from the helicopter and the motorbikes, all the data in the screen corners such as current speed, timing, distance from the peleton etcetera too.
Dutch commentators
However, you have to put up with Dutch commentators. They mostly talk about past performances of riders, historic events and assumptions and guesses what might happen near the finish line. Honestly, you won’t be missing too much. The broadcast is calm, there are no cheering guys, no pumping music and important, no commercials either. Just 3-4 hours of watching cyclists meandering through the French countryside with shots of castles, cathedrals, rivers and mountains thrown in the mix.
Don’t worry about the language, you will figure it out. But to help you out, ‘Vandaag’ means ‘Today’ and ‘Gisteren’ means ‘Yesterday’. ‘Laatste uitzending’ (the orange button) means ‘latest broadcast’.
Sometimes the broadcasts are split in two. From what I understand is that they have to switch channels sometimes due to other programming.
Canadians in the Tour
I noticed Microsoft’s AI (Copilot) writes the following about Ottawa’s (Osgoode) Derek Gee and the Tour de France: “Derek Gee, riding for Israel-Premier Tech, is set to compete aggressively in the 2025 Tour de France, aiming for stage victories and showcasing his strong form after winning the Canadian national championship.
That is just total BS as he isn’t riding the Tour (that is why I don’t rely on AI ever). However, Mike Woods and Guillaume Boivin do ride in the Tour.
Where to watch the Tour de France for free?
As mentioned, you can watch the Tour de France for free on the Dutch NPO website. https://npo.nl/start/serie/nos-tour-de-france/seizoen-25/nos-tour-de-france_238/afspelen
Subsidised bike racks
I didn’t know this, but the City has a program for businesses to order a bike rack at a reduced cost. As we have all experienced, locking up your bike frame and at least one wheel all with one lock is often a challenge.
While commercial building owners often provide abundant car parking, cyclists often get the scraps, if at all. That is probably because your local mall is likely owned by some remote landlord who never sees a bike passing from their corner office in some suburban business park.
Yet, if you don’t ask, you shall not receive. You could probably suggest a mall owner to invest in a discounted rack, even though I believe 500 dollars for a rack is nothing for a big cooperation. Non-profits, schools and multi-unit residential properties can apply too.
You can read more about the City of Ottawa’s Hello Velo program or email: hello.velo@ottawa.ca
Bike Lockers
The City currently has three lockers: one in the ByWard Market at 141 Clarence Street, one at the Glebe Parking Garage at 170 Second Avenue and one on Slater Street near Bank Street. The lockers work using a code from a parking app and Near Field Communication (NFC) technology.
Locker rentals are free for the first two hours, and $0.50 for each additional hour.
Based on feedback from users, the bike lockers and app were recently improved to streamline the reservation process, make the app more user-friendly and reinforce the smart locking system.
More on the City website
More bike racks
The City of Ottawa is now offering free bike parking facilities to event organizers, encouraging cycling as an alternate mode of transportation to organized events. The bike racks are A-frame type, u-lock compatible and stackable for easy transportation. you have to organise transportation yourself. There is also a smaller version.
More on this initiative here.
Boardwalk Ottawa river Gatineau open
Finally, after years of closures, that boardwalk along the Gatineau side of the Ottawa river at the foot of the west side of the McDonald Cartier Interprovincial bridge is open. But don’t hold your breath yet, unfortunately the years (3? 4?) that it was closed (for construction nearby) weren’t used to repair it. You will find sheets of plywood mounted to the deck, but it is open.
Good News for Westboro Beach
I emailed the NCC that the set up of the bike racks underneath the Mikan was wrong because they were too close together. The NCC actually listened to me and move them further apart.
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Love your site! I look forward to your emails. I have difficulty finding maps of the paths in Ottawa. I have tried the NCC site and a couple of others and find them hard to follow. Would you have a recommendation (an app or site) with easy to follow maps?
There are no great maps for cycling in Ottawa. This is why I developed the routes under the tab ‘Ottawa Cycling maps’. I believe these are the best and safest routes for enjoying cycling in Ottawa. There are several apps like Komoot and RidewithGPS and several others. Indeed the large NCC map is hard to follow too although it is probably the best to get the big picture.