2013 Ride (Bonnie View)

A postcard from Bonnie view as confirmation - Quite unusual don't you think.

Hebridean Ride, May 2013

At the meeting last night in the Flowerpot, kindly attended by Les Sims to allow us to benefit from his considerable experience of Scotland, it was quickly agreed that we would take up Maldwyn's suggestion of a ride from Castlebay on Barra to Stornoway on Lewis with intermediate stops at Carinish and Tarbert. We would travel back via the Ullapool ferry and a ride from there to Inverness.
A provisional date of Thursday 23rd May was agreed as the day to arrive at Castlebay - a trip finishing with about 5 hours on a Calmac ferry from Oban. This is based on 2012 summer timetables. The national Rail 2013 summer timetable should take effect from Mid May and so should be available by February.We would hope to have the Calmac 2013 summer timetable by then as well.
It seems sensible, therefore, to have a next meeting in Mid February when we should have enough data to make final plans but with the maximum booking-ahead time still available. Perhaps we can agree a date early in 2013 when Clyde is likely to know when he will be in the UK.

2013 Ride

Sounds like Martin had an interesting time on the Hebrides back in the 60's.

How does 11th October sound - I don't think I can make 4th.

Clyde,  I am assuming you are back in the UK in October.

Having had an excellent couple of weeks in the Outer Hebrides and seeing a number of cyclists touring the Islands,  it gave me the idea that it would possibly make a good ride for us.

My suggestion would be to meet in Oban and catch a ferry to Castlebay on Barra (this is a 6 hour crossing so the first night would be in Castlebay).  We would then ride  across the Island to Ardmhor to catch a ferry to Eriskay. Riding would then be through Eriskay, South Uist, Benbecula and North Uist, all linked by causeways, so no ferries. We then catch a ferry to Harris. We ride through Harris and on to Lewis, reaching our destination at Stornoway. A ferry from Stornoway to Ullapool, then a 60 mile ride to Inverness to finish the ride.

The roads on the Islands have been improved in recent years, but still mainly single track and very quiet. It is about 140 miles from Castlebay to Stornoway plus the 60 mile to  Inverness. We would add a few more miles on the Islands to see some of the sights and places of interest. I am told by the locals that their best weather is normally in the month of May - so good for us. By riding north the prevailing wind should be behind us. The ferries are quite cheap for foot passengers and the bikes go free. There are plenty of Hostels/Bunk House and small hotels so accommodation should be ok.

That's the first one in the pot - does anyone have any other idea's for a ride. How does a meeting towards the end of September/October at the FP sound?

A few pic's:

Boat Lift Still Working

Anyone notice the boat lift during today's Stage of The Tour in Belgium?

Another link to the epic ride! - France 2012

Please follow link for a few more pics.

https://picasaweb.google.com/108790443294133612295/FranceRide2012?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCM2M-o_w7dG4CQ&feat=directlink

Reclaiming the Streets

....... Paris, Sunday afternoon. ........ Waiting patiently for the police to escort them round the Montparnasse road junctions; about 2,000 skaters.

Motorway Art

One of the few advantages of Formule 1 Hotels, trapped between motorways, rivers and main roads is that, very occasionally, gems like this appear. On the A9 motorway roundabout complex, junction 30, outside Montpellier. Passed it several times in a vain attempt to find a safe way across the motorway.

Link to my photos of epic ride!

Dear all I have posted my pictures on Picassa under the following link- sorry if 150 are too many to go through but I think there are some fantastic memories recorded- the weather made every shot a picture- so I couldn't cut out many. Let me know what you think and download or swap any you like and share your memories of a fantastic weeks ride. I spent monday on the beach and visiting the Nature reserve at Portiragne Plage. What a lovely place even though the warm mistral wind ensured I got sandblasted as I topped up the tan. I even earned myself a free beer for proof reading an english menu in a bar in Portiragne village. English cream is now 'custard' and megot is translated as 'cigarette butt' and one bar owner made happy. I look forward to seeing your pictures at some point and hope we can all catch up soon and plan 'Dragon ride V - England?Scotland. a bientot!


https://picasaweb.google.com/101875583746637889849/DragonRide2012EntreDeuxMers?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCOTlsLGi5KfHiQE&feat=directlink

Some details for Day 1

I suggest that we meet at this hotel-restaurant. I'll be there, sipping a G&T! In fact, the car park might be more appropriate, after looking at the website! (see below) Start assembling from 10:00 but let me know if that's going to be difficult for anyone (Shawn?) I think we ought to climb the 107 metres of the Dune - hard work from memory, in the fine sand, but the views are awesome! Then we dip our wheels in the Atlantic, then set off eastwards any time after 11 (more likely 12) with a huge tail-wind! I suppose it would be an idea to bring sandwiches? Look forward to a pizza in the evening! (there's a pizzeria opposite the campsite, apparently)
Hôtel Restaurant La Corniche

46 Avenue Louis Gaume Pyla

33115 Pyla sur Mer

Itinéraire

lacoorniche-pyla.com

The plan is to access the Aquitaine Coastal Greenway D804 which runs parallel to the main road D259 to La-Teste-de-Buch, then continue on this GW to "Kid Parc", where my IGN map shows it fizzling out. Then a minor road northwards (Ave de Césarée) to Gujan-Mestras, where I'm hoping we can quickly find the GW which passes through the Le Teich Ornithological Park  http://www.af3v.org/-Fiche-VVV-.html?voie=70 (6 km long according to AF3V). After this, the map shows another short stretch of D804 going towards Facture. Unfortunately, it seems impossible to avoid a short bit of the D650 but, from there, there is a 4.5 km link, including a new footbridge over the M-way, to Mios and the ex-railway GW which we use all the way to St-Symphorien. Any questions?!
plus d'infosAdresse :

Incorrect ? Afficher toutes les modifications Incorrect ?

Le positionnement sur la carte est approximatif. ‎

Ride to the Garonne Canal – just to whet your appetites!

Less than three weeks to go, folks!

I had my longest ride so far this year – 132 km. Passing through Seyches (belltower/arched entrance to the village, next to the church), I arrived at the canal (La Gaulette Lock) and sought out the two B&Bs near Lagruère where we shall be staying. One was quite tricky to find, so I’m glad I made the effort. Note the diseased trees; there was hardly one that was not affected. A shame! Note also the British narrow boats – brought by low loader, I guess, unless one of them featured in the book ‘Narrow Dog to Carcassonne.’ Suspension bridge over the River Garonne, to La Réole (oldest town hall in France, built by Richard the LH) and La Réole itself on the river, reminiscent of Chateau Gontier 2 years ago. I don’t know if we’ll have time to go there – maybe the faster of us might manage a diversion! (but that lets me out!) I may have remarked somewhere else that from Arcachon to Bazas we will be riding bits of greenway which will one day be all joined up under a departmental road number, D804 (at least in the Gironde). Now I see that the Garonne Canal towpath also has a number, D809! In all, I covered 36 km of the canal – all tarmacked, of course.

And now an apology. A spreadsheet I sent out after I found those two B&Bs contains two errors. The distance from Lagruère to Agen is not 73 km as stated, but only 43 km, making Day 2 our shortest. That’s the good news! More good news is that there is no error overall, as far as I am aware. It follows, however, that there is a mistake elsewhere: in fact, Agen to Toulouse will be in the region of 109 km, not 81 km. Sorry about that, but not a huge distance to do, given the terrain and the wind (we hope!) On that subject, the wind today was blowing from the SE – we can do without that, thanks!!! (but it wasn’t strong) It was also quite hot today: 26 C was predicted and I’d guess it reached that!

Some details on the route

Greetings from the Lot-et-Garonne (47, Martin). I attach here the map from Julien Savary’s first booklet which covers the latter part of our journey and shows the bits of the Canal du Midi towpath which are ‘voie verte cyclable revêtue’ (surfaced greenway – red on the map!) and those which are ‘itinéraire cyclable non revêtu’ (non-surfaced cyclable route - orange). Just to recap, the various greenways from the Dune du Pyla to the Garonne Canal are all tarmacked, as is the towpath to Toulouse – so no problems there. After Toulouse, the towpath is surfaced as far as Port Lauragais. Then there are small red stretches as follows: through Castelnaudary; through Carcassonne; from Béziers towards Agde for a few km. The rest is orange. There are also a few exclamation marks, which the booklet describes as ‘difficultés’. The majority of these seem to be in the region of Sallèles-d’Aude, Argeliers, Capestang, Poilhès, but there are some around Carcassonne as well, which I will try to research. I will also ascertain which IGN maps are relevant and attempt to transfer the information concerning the towpath surface onto them and hence find alternative roads. More on all this later ... 
May I lead for the first day? I'm looking forward to finding our way through the initial twists and turns to Mios and onto the ex-railway line to Bazas. I hope the weather will be kind to us. Here it has been rubbish recently, with showers and temperatures of only 12 C max, altho at last things are beginning to change: temperature today is 15 C.

A final final meeting?

.. or an excuse for a taste of one or more of the Flower Pot ales?? We had previously mooted the idea of this possible meeting to cross the "t"s and dot the "i"s for our French trip. Assuming a Thursday we have 19/4, 26/4, 3/5 and 10/5 as possibles provided that Clyde is at his winter palace (ie UK based). We could cover:

Accomodation, where and what for each day.
Maps, what have we, do we need any additional ones
Ride leading - perhaps most important to/from the chemin d'halage to our nightly stops or to avoid those bits of towpath (if any) which are not rideable.

Can Clyde confirm which of these dates are feasible and then everyone indicate which of those is convenient.   

More Bookings

Bookings have been made for Agen (30th May) and Toulouse (31st May) In each case it is in a F1 Hotel and I have booked 3 duo rooms. I shall take the solitary option. I accept that it will cost me a little more but at least I shall not have to be concerned that I shall wake people up when I make my nightly visits.
Room cost at Agen is 40.90 euros which includes a buffet style "eat all you can" breakfast for both occupants and at Toulouse it is 42.90 euros (well sombody has to pay for Airbus). Thats 20.95 per person average which at current rates is about £17.50.
I also have a booking in Bordeaux on 27/5 for Martin and me as we travel on the same train (and in the same coach) from Paris.
I am assuming we go our separate ways from the Grau d'Agde and will be making a reservation (dont know where yet) for me for the 3rd and 4th June prior to travelling back on 5th.  Maybe my English friends might put me up????

Carcassonne youth hostel

When I booked this hostel, there were a number of options. I went for 5 beds in a normal dormitory for 115 euros (inc sheets and breakfast, etc) but there was also the possibility of a private room with 5 beds, costing 87.90 euros (all included too). I went ahead with the former because it seemed the more straightforward, I thought there must be something I hadn't understood (and Sylvie wasn't around at the time!) and maybe time was against me. But at the same time I emailed the hostel asking them to explain this anomaly. The guy who replied said it was a family promotion and there was no catch - altho I still wouldn't pretend to understand it fully. So there you are: it's now 17.58 each, altho we will have to join the hostels association. If we do it on arrival, it's 7 euros, but I'm not sure what that might extend to: it could just be the equivalent of the £3 extra per night in the UK, or it might last a whole year in France, but it's unlikely to be for the whole year anywhere in the world, since that costs £14.35 in the UK! So absolute total is 24.58 euros, not bad when you consider that we will be in the heart of the citadel and therefore extremely well-positioned for sight-seeing!

Rayon-du-soleil 2 June 2012

Given that we wanted to explore Carcassonne on the morning of our penultimate day and therefore didn't want to ride too far afterwards, I thought that Maurice's "Rayon-du-soleil" was a good bet for our last night, at 24 euros each, including beakfast. The wine tasting at Domaine des Maels was tempting but it was also the most expensive place I had found! I have sent Maurice (who, you will remember, likes cyclists) a cheque for 30 euros as deposit, the rest payable on the day. He has written to say that he has received the cheque and also offers some advice on how to get from the canal to his gite (for VTTs, he says. I will ask him if it's also OK for folders. If not, there's always the road!) Just to remind you, it's 46 km from Carcassonne to where we will leave the canal at Argens-Minervois, then another 5 km to Lézignan-Corbières. Wine buffs will know that Minervois and Corbières are both wine-producing areas, so we won't go short!

Some pictures of the surface between Carcassonne and Béziers

Just to give you an idea of why AF3V doesn't consider some of the Canal du Midi between Carcassonne and Béziers a greenway. From top to bottom these are: towpath near le Somail; road at Ventenac; towpath changes to road at Ventenac; towpath between Colombiers and Béziers. All taken March/April 2011. No worse than the untarmacked sections of the Erewash Canal towpath but I accept that it is not as good as the Mickleover Greenway! How would the small wheels of the folders fare over this sort of terrain?

More input for France, 2012

The Comments facility of this site seem to have completely frozen now so I am adding a new post to add my thoughts to those of others.
Looking at Clyde's initial proposals for routes and overnight stops I concur fully as far as Toulouse. This city has 5 F1 Hotels and,as far as I can see, 2 of them are almost on the "Chemin d'halage". These are Hotel Toulouse l'Union and Hotel Toulouse Ramonville.  I would be happy to book on our behalf if agreed on 19th.
As our basic remit is "Coast to Coast" I am wondering if we need to go as far east as Sete. There are Plages in the Narbonne area and either side of Beziers. I am familiar with that at Portiragne, east of Beziers, and I note there is a greenway mentioned in the AF3V website. There is also a HotelF1 at Beziers, albeit in the NE quarter a little way from the Canal (but on the  Airport side, if that becomes a significant factor). On a personal note, my friends from my working days live only 14km from Beziers and it would be a shame to be so close and not meet them.  
At a guess this could reduce the distance after Toulouse from its current 257 to about 225 to 230, spread over 3 days. The AF3V website and a (1998) book I have both suggest the towpath deteriorates after Avignionet Lauragais, a few kms short of Castelnaudary, and finishes after Bram, 15km beyond Castelnaudary but still some 25km short of Carcassonne. We may have to be ready to do some roadwork and I do wonder if the Toulouse to Carcassonne target may be stretching us to the point where we have insufficient opportunity to indulge in the local cuisine (Cassoulet, in particular). Unfortunately, there seems to be very little accomodation between the two "C"s.  A possibility may be to stop at Castelnaudary and then Trebes, just a few km beyond Carcassone. This would make distances of about 65km and 50km which should allow stopping time at both venues. The Canal starts to wander a lot more after Trebes and I know that the towpath approaching Beziers from the west is poor so maybe we could do Trebes to the staircase locks at Beziers on-road which might cut the distance to around 100 to 110km.   From Beziers there is the possibility of a flight back to GB, or a train to either Montpellier where there is a TGV service to Paris and an airport served by Ryanair or there is alternatively a train back to Carcassonne for the airport there.
Please give this your consideration.

More information on distances

The good news is that, as the distances I discover get more accurate, they get shorter - generally! Have a look at this leaflet: http://gironde.fr/cg33/upload/docs/application/pdf/2009-08/pistes_cyclables.pdf
There are a number of maps of pistes cyclables in the department of the Gironde (where we start). In particular, there is the Arcachon Basin Greenway and the Mios to Bazas GW. Arcachon station to the Dune du Pilat would seem to be 12 or 13 km. Pilat to Facture is 24 or 25 km. We know that Facture to Mios is 4.5 km (AF3V website) and the distance from Mios to La Gare comes out at only 62 km (instead of 76 km). So to get to Castets, the beginning of the canal , the distance from Pilat is 111 km. I'm working on ways of splitting this, plus a bit more, over two days.

Some notes on our route

1. The distance from the Dune du Pilat (or Pyla – there are two different spellings) to Arcachon varies according to what you read or measure! My IGN map makes it 9 km; an approximation to the greenway on Autoroute Express, but using ordinary roads, calculates it as 12 km; and the AF3V website mentions this link to the Arcachon Basin greenway and gives the distance as 15 km! I’m giving the total from Pilat to Facture as 30 km now, instead of my previous 28 km.
2. When we leave Pilat, we can ride the Arcachon Basin Greenway as far as Facture, then follow a linking piste cyclable to Mios and the start of the Mios – Bazas Greenway. For those riding from Arcachon railway station, you could make use of this GW, rather than ride on the road. Finally, if Shawn wants to ride from Bordeaux station, he can pick up this GW at Biganos (near Facture).
3. The Arcachon Basin GW forms part of that 1200 km cycle route from Roscoff to Bayonne.
4. Peter has identified a F1 hotel at Bordeaux. There are also two youth hostels, one near the St Jean railway station, the other further out at Blanquefort.
5. We want to stop at Carcassonne. I suggest therefore that the 7 days be split as 5 days from Pilat to Carcassonne and 2 days from Carcassonne to Sète. With distances of 430 km and 152 km respectively, this gives averages of 86 km per day for the first 5 days and 76 km per day for the last two.
6. We could use the youth hostel at Carcassonne.
7. Toulouse also has a youth hostel, so maybe we should stop there too. Toulouse to Carcassonne is 105 km – quite do-able. Then we could have a short day the day after this, which would allow us to look around Carcassonne.