Day 3: Sat 1st July 2006

 

Ride: Bewdley to Heudicourt - 488 miles

 

Today was the day that everyone was to meet up at the hotel we'd booked in Heudicourt-sous-les-Cotes, south of Verdun. At 7.00am Chris B, Kyle, Chris P and Gaz finally got their tour off to a start and headed for Heudicourt with 488 miles of motorway and autoroute in front of them - 218 miles to Dover, P&O crossing to Calais, and then another 270 miles the other side. The first 150 miles were incident free and they were making good time until Chris P unexpectedly left the M25 and joined the M23 heading for Brighton!?! At the last minute Gaz and Kyle followed like lemmings but Chris B, who had no intention of getting off, sailed past towards Dover. After a 20 mile detour normal service was resumed and shortly before 11.00am, just outside the ferry terminal, everyone was reunited. No harm done and the ferry was made with time to spare but clearly one GPS between four might be an issue when riding through France.

Ride: Chamonix to Heudicourt - 356 miles

 

Meanwhile Phil was riding up through France. The idea today was he'd try out the route that had been provisionally mapped out for the ride down to Chamonix on Sunday, when everyone would finally arrive at the chalet. Heading first back over the Col des Montets and Col de la Forclaz to Martigny he picked up the autoroute for a few miles before exiting at Aigle for a ride up Route 11 past Leysin and over the Col des Mosses towards Chateau d'Oex, and then on past Gruyeres - home of the cheese - Bulle and then the back road to Fribourg through Corbieres, La Roche and Villarsel to Fribourg.

 

The first part of this section up to Bulle was very good. The roads were technically demanding in places with a number of tight downhill hairpins, but with beautiful countryside to look at.

 

Below is a view taken north of Leysin looking back down the valley towards Aigle.

 

 

From Fribourg Phil headed up through Murten, Kerzers and Aarberg to Biel. The roads whilst pleasant enough were interrupted by too many villages to get any decent pace on. Grinding through Biel, thankfully aided by his trusty GPS, he turned north onto the E27/A16 to Tavannes where he turned left onto the road through the Gorges de Pichoux - through Chatelat to Bassecourt. This road was delightful - beautiful countryside combined with technically difficult roads.

 

From Bassecourt he bypassed Delemont and headed up the D432/D41 to Ferrette. A very good road full of long sweepers. From Ferrette he headed up through Altkirch to Cernay with the intention of switching onto the D431/D430 over the Col du Silberloch and Col du Herrenberg to Gerardmer. However the road from Ferrette onwards was slow because of a succession of small villages along the road, all with a 50 km/h limit. He worked out that his idea of riding the D430 and D431 was going to have to be shelved so thrashed his K1200 up the N83 dual carriageway to Colmar where he headed for the D417 to Geradmer over the Col de la Schlucht.

 

Even with the holiday traffic this is a good road for a bike with a good surface and fairly predictable and well marked bends. The final bit into Gerardmer was shut for roadworks so Phil had to divert south a bit before reaching Gerardmer. He then continued on the D417 to Epinal - a truly good road for his bike with wide sweeping bends and where he could catch up some time. At Epinal he picked up the E23/N57 towards Nancy and from there headed for Toul and the north to Heudicourt where we had all planned to meet up.

 

While Phil had been enjoying scenic roads through beautiful countryside Chris B, Kyle, Chris P and Gaz had spent all afternoon storming down the A26/A4 from Calais. The ride was pretty uneventful and fuel consumption varied wildly according to speed ridden. The ride was broken down into manageable 90 minute chunks and stops were timed for when fuel was needed. However at one point Kyle did manage to drain the 17 litre fuel tank of his SV in 47 minutes thus proving riding faster will not necessarily get you there any quicker. Matters weren't helped much when Gaz saw Kyle pointing at his fuel tank - the universal sign for out of fuel - and took that to mean he wanted to race. Gaz promptly sped off, the others following, leaving Kyle to limp to the next fuel station. The result being the group became separated for the second time that day.

 

Phil arrived in Heudicourt just after 5.00pm, checked into Hotel du Lac de Madine, and waited for everyone to turn up. The rest of the group rolled up an hour later. It had been a long day in the saddle and everyone was pretty relieved to get to the hotel.

 

 

The accommodation for the night comes thouroughly recommended with a very good restaurant and reasonably inexpensive lodgings.