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300 miles of cycling through western France here we come! đŸ™‚
It's our first touring trip and we're cheating a little by using Gites, but I can't wait.
*burgles PePPerR's house*
* nips round to bearnecessities house and waits for him to get back.
*burgles Bregante's house*
Well, this hasn't gone how I expected. Bon vacance! đŸ™‚
*lets out Bregante's house to lots of asylum seekers*
*walks out of Brengates house and shouts at Al for leaving his bike on the lamppost*
*checks tripadvisor*
Seeks asylum while thisisnotaspoon is out
touring is by far the best type of cycling.......enjoy yourselves, you lucky people. đŸ˜€
You can try burgling my house, but I have 2 dogs, a 17 stone son, and worst of all a couple of my daughters at home, if anyone could take them off my hands I'd be most grateful as they're very expensive to keep!
Well day ones over and done, 50 miles of flat railway gentleness, with one 500 metre climb at the end of the day.
Tomorrow we've got a 70 mile day as we wend our way down to Laval, the French have kindly opened up another ex railway from Domfront to Angier, so we are cruising along the rivers L'Orne and Mayotte .
Pictures man, pictures!
I'll have to do them when I get back, I'm rubbish on a mobile phone at uploading photos to here.
We've now done 4 days of cycling, nothing amazing about 55 miles a day,
We've cycled all the way down the Mayenne towpath and have dipped our toes in both this river and the Loire, we're now near Cholet and have found some great chambres d'hotes to stay in along the way. Yesterday eve we stayed in an old presbytery with a swimming pool which we we swam in with the rain pouring down. Had soup and bread for dinner as there wasn't a shop open for 10 miles and the guest house owner gave us a load of his fresh fruit.
We've done over 220 miles and have had some fantastic times, some arguments too (if anyone knows me and my wide they'll know this as normal tho).
I wish the French would adopt confirmation signing after joining a road, it would make life so much easier...
Righty, I'm back home having left my lovely teacher of a wife in France for the next 5 weeks!
Picture update time đŸ˜‰
Dog nicks the map and chews it up on the day we're leaving!
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Pegasus bridge memorial in Caen after getting off the ferry
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My Judith on a whacking great hill after a lovely days riding! She shouted at me...
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Lovely beautiful bridge crossings
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So many cycle routes
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Lovely little Renault 4
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Beautiful architecture
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Anyone fancy a resto job on the Mayenne?
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Ah Tommy V got lost again! đŸ˜‰
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Dust
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Arse puckering wobbly bridge!
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BOOM
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Morning Poo đŸ˜‰
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Follow Google maps you said?
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That's some scaffolding!
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This is what we mostly rode down, all through the Mayenne
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Crossing the Loire river, three bridges to cross it as its so big.
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Miss Bumble
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A beautiful 4CV we came across at a riverside wedding
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That looks Ace.
Nice.
Thanks it was! The French have put a cycle path in all the way from Caen to La Rochelle, so we just used that with a few detours along the way to see some other sights!
Nice! We nearly did that same route at easter. We ended up going climbing instead but it's back on the to do list now.
The French have put a cycle path in all the way from Caen to La Rochelle
Ooh. That sounds interesting. La Rochelle and Ile de RĂ© are two of my favourite places in France.
Did you pre book accommodation or find it day by day?
Here's a good starting point for some French cycling ideas.
http://www.velodyssey.com/troncons/la-rochelle-royan
Here's some of the route we used.
http://www.freewheelingfrance.com/where-to-go/la-velo-francette.html
Oh and don't let your wife get your cycling shorts off the washing line the day before you go and then put them somewhere totally unrelated to your own clothing in the house!
I woke up on the ferry to the fact that I was going to have no padding for the next 250 miles!
We pre booked our first night, then after that it was a case of stopping at the first bar we found when we'd had enough cycling, watch the finish of the days Tour De France then ask the Bar owner for local good Chambres D'Hotes, the most expensive was 70 Euro, and the rest were about 55 Euro a night, all the ones we stayed in had swimming pools, the most expensive one was an old Presbytery on the side of the Mayenne, and we had the whole top floor with a full cinema, table football, Apple Tv and it was a stunning stay!
I should recommend a company called stopoverconnections. For places to stay in France booked by someone who uses language like a local. Interesting places with real French people.
I just tried looking up the cost of the ferry from Portsmouth and the site reckons there are no fairs available for passengers with bikes. How'd you get across PePPeR?
That looks nice! I like the Renault 4 a lot.
If it helps when we did the Outer Hebrides earlier this month there was a reasonable amount of yelling and effing and jeffing from my wife.
some arguments too (if anyone knows me and my wide they'll know this as normal tho).
Calling your wife 'wide' probably explains where you're going wrong with that... đŸ˜†
Looks like an awesome trip - very jealous!
There are loads of people going out on bikes, and they only have one tiny little place to store them in the ship!
We were going to go via St Malo, but they didn't have any places to store our bikes either.
In hindsight, I'd have put the bikes in cardboard bike boxes and then dumped the boxes at the other side!
Looking on Brittany ferries website thought they have loads of spaces for bikes. on various travellings.
Yes if my wife sees that I may be dead!
I own a white 1979 Renault 4 and am restoring it at the moment!
Just sold a blue 1983 ex French police one!
At last! Yup, definitely looks ace đŸ™‚
Right, after last year's successful cycle trip, we're off again, this time we're doing Portsmouth to Roscoff, then cycling through Brittany towards the Vendee, about 400 miles of lovely French countryside.
Drove down to my friends house in Princetown last night and have done the usual silly daft thing, last year I forgot my cycle shorts, this year it's my shoes!!!
Waiting for the bike shop in Tavistock to open to make a distress purchase!
In my defence if put everything together in the conservatory at the weekend, then a certain Mrs P, decided she'd move everything into the living room, shutting the curtains and doors, I never even thought to check, when she said "I've brought everything out of the conservatory"!
Obviously you've made it very clear to her that as she has put you in this situation she'll be footing the bill for new shoes?
Is your house empty this time?
Any chance of some pics? I'm feeling all cycletour-curious.
pepper please start a new thread (or just use this one) to give us pic updates. I love to see and hear about cycle tours & will give me something to read while dealing with a 2 month old and a 5yr old on our holiday, which starts today!
Picture,s not showing here
I'm going to just use this one, big up to Dartmoor cycles in Tavistock for helping out with a pair of Lake shoes and a pair of fandangled Shimano pedals, got to try and get used to them after using Time since 1999...
Before the off at our friends house.
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How did they know we're coming?
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Grr, who's best for hosting some pictures?
flickr works for me
Well day one is over, 97kms of lovely quiet trails on route 1 of France's premier cycle route. Lovely old train tracks visiting the port of Moulaix and ending up in Carhaix, Brittany is beautiful!
Tomorrow we'll be up bright and early as it's the biggest climbing day, after that it's all downhill to Nantes.
I'm just starting to wind down from work, by the end of the week all will be good with world.
stayed in morlaix and carhaix in may. are you riding on the voie verte?
we used it for 2 great quiet carfree days.
Anyone seen Al this past year?
Ohh know the area well, my mother lived just outside Cahaix until 2009 100m from the Nantes-Brest canal which is a stunning cycle route.
Sort of like a Monet painting from the saddle.
Yup the voi verte is lovely. We started in Roscoff and are going down to the Vendee again. About 400 miles this time.
Day 2 of our journey is over, 94kms covered today, started out from Carhaix on the old railway line, then dropped down onto the voi verte alongside the canal, such a shame it isn't active as we've hardly seen a soul on it all day.
Plenty of other cyclists on the paths though and have enjoyed conversations with French, German and Belgian tourers.
The route is well maintained perhaps a little too flat for some people but for two relatively unfit people it suits us just fine.
We found accommodation through booking.com who I hate using but I rang the hotel and they said they had no rooms, but when checking online booking.com said they had one left, so we booked that way. Why go to all the trouble of trying to speak French and save them money when it's easier to book online?
Pontivy is a lovely riverside town and we are looking forward to going out to get something to eat.
Well I didn't get to report day 3 as we stayed in an amazing B&B which was an old church where the whole of the original floor plan had been made into a swimming pool!
We spent hours in there, then went for Moules and Frites at the local restaurants and we sampled far too much of the artisanal cider!
The ride itself started to get more and more interesting, as the days have gone on as we have now passed the damm that was constructed in the 1920's which cut the canal off.
It took two and half days riding to see our first boat.
We've now been cycling around 92-95km a day.
Day 4, we have cycled over 100km and I've taken my good lady out to the best restaurant in town...
She fancied a dirty McDonald's!
I very rarely eat them and had to send both my potato chunks and burger back for a second attempt at getting something hot!
If I weren't starving I'd have told them to stuff it. I hate cold food, I hate sending things back to the kitchen and I really really do not like eating food once I've complained about it and it's gone out of my sight!
We've seen horses and mules all travelling along the canals with hundreds of other cyclists doing similar to us, it's quite funny as we keep having Hare and Tortoise races with the faster couples with identical racing shirts!
We just plod along and they keep blasting past us every now and then!
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Does that pool carry on under the floor? Hard to tell!
Swallows and Amazon's
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Retro caravans
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Lunchtime
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Big barge
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Drink stop
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Fisherman
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Beautiful view
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How did they know we were coming?
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Le Grand Depart
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No the pool stops at under the balcony,
It was a B&B we stopped in, it was a converted church old school, it was an amazing place.
Had the biggest table I've ever seen too. Will find photos.
Massive table legs!
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Massive slate top to sit on top of the legs.
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I think that table is about the same size as my kitchen/dining room!
Looks like a great trip. Enjoy!