Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 11: Vaison la Romaine to Sault via Mont Ventoux

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This post recounts the eleventh day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 10: Grospierres to Vaison la Romaine.

The mood at breakfast was quiet. This was our day of destiny, our appointment with an ascent that truly deserves that overworked adjective: iconic. Ventoux was calling us. This subdued mood was very similar to that at breakfast before climbing Bealach na Bà on the Highland 500 in 2022.

As we ate on the terrace of our lovely hotel, Hostellerie le Beffroi, the sun was rising over the peaks of Provence. We set off over an hour earlier than usual so we’d have cooler temperatures on the 21 kilometre, 1,700 metre climb. (Ventoux is 1,910 metres over sea level, but we weren’t at sea level when we started, hence the ‘missing’ metres.)

The day’s route profile. Look at that gentle descent from Ventoux…

We were tackling the ascent from Malaucene, which was about nine miles from our start. Soon after leaving Vaison a large group of us missed the planned Peak Tours route to Malaucene. This was a classic case of group think: Pat was leading the way, and we followed him and ignored the Garmin beeps to turn left. To be fair, my Garmin had given me so many false turn alerts that I was almost conditioned to ignore them. As a result, we had a fast ride to Malaucene along a busy road. Some of the faster riders reached the town after us, having taken the ‘proper’ route. ‘What kept you?’ we joked.

We had a brief stop in the town to top up water and snacks. I could have bought a Ventoux jersey or teeshirt here, but I didn’t want to grab a memento of a famous ride before I’d even started it!

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Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 10: Grospierres to Vaison la Romaine

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This post recounts the tenth day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 9: Mende to Grospierres.

Not a flat day’s cycling…

What a day. One of the hardest of the whole tour, mainly because of the heat. Yet it was a ride full of extraordinary sights, including one of the world’s greatest canyons and our first glimpse of Mont Ventoux.

Preparing to leave Grospierres

Breakfast at Bastide de Verbon was the worst of the holiday, with a meagre offering. To make matters worse, the milk ran out. Literally: the hotel had none left. Fortunately guide Mick grabbed a bottle from the van to save the day.

We set off back down the gravel track and then along an old railway path, with walkers and dogs enjoying a morning stroll. We crossed an impressive viaduct over the Truyère, with a handsome stone road bridge alongside.

The next stage was on busy roads: we were now in tourist country, heading to the spectacular Gorges d’Ardèche, one of the biggest gorges in the world. This prompted cries of ‘wow!’ as we got our first glimpse of this extraordinary landscape. The presence of kayaks – on the river, on the banks and on car trailers – showed this was a playground for watersports as well as walkers and cyclists.

An early highlight was Pont d’Arc, a near-200 feet wide arch formed when the river Ardèche broke through a narrow escarpment on its meander.

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Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 9: Mende to Grospierres

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This post recounts the ninth day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 8: Saint-Flour to Mende.

If yesterday was an unexpectedly difficult day, today was the opposite. One of my favourite days of the tour.

We cycled into the centre of Mende, past the cathedral, before heading out along the valley of the river Lot.

I had a curious incident not long after leaving Mende. My left foot slipped out of my shoe, which remained clipped into the pedal. It was impossible to slide it back in, so I stopped to accomplish this. I’d been riding for a few days with my shoes very loose to minimise pain caused by my feet swelling in the very high temperatures we’d been riding in. Originally, when I started suffering on day four, I assumed it was because the cleats on my newish shoes needed adjustment, and tweaked them accordingly. I might have paused to wonder why this was only the second time in 31 years of wearing cleated shoes I’d suffered any pain, and that the only other time was also in very hot weather. It was guide Mick who suggested wearing the shoes really loose, and this solved the problem. I just needed to tighten them very slightly.

We had a 20 mile climb at the start of the day. But, as the day’s gradient profile above shows, it was generally a fairly gentle incline. The scenery was lovely, along the Lot valley, and as we cycled across the river at Bagnolls-les-Bains the church bells sounded 10am, just as the cathedral at Mende had marked 9am as we set out.

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Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 8: Saint-Flour to Mende

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This post recounts the eigth day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 7: Le Mont-Dore to Saint-Flour.

Viaduc de Garabit

Today had been billed as a recovery day: just 50 miles. That sounded good after two challenging but enjoyable stages. But it led us into underestimating today’s cycling. Those 50 miles included 4,500 feet of climbing, with the steepest sections appearing in the heat of the afternoon.

Breakfast at the monastery wasn’t as good as dinner last night, with long queues for the coffee machine. (It’s curious how the French have embraced these automatic machines, which dispense various types of coffee. Once they’d have been appalled by the idea.)

But it was a leisurely start to the day: we didn’t set off until 9.30am. I wasted some of that bonus time as it took ages to transfer the day’s route (the GPX file) onto my Garmin. In the past, I’d have loaded every day’s route onto my device before the start of the tour. I must remember to do that in future.

The ride began with a freewheeling descent to Saint-Flour’s lower town. We cycled alongside the A75 motorway before peeling off for the first, easy climb of the day. The highlight of the day was cycling past the Viaduc de Garabit, Gustave Eiffel’s magnificent railway bridge over the Truyère river valley. Its parabolic arch, 165 metres wide, was the longest in the world when it opened in 1885, until Porto’s famous Dom Luis I bridge over the Douro surpassed it the following year. Eiffel also designed a railway bridge in Porto that’s very similar to Garabit, but his greatest monument is, naturally, the tower named after him in Paris.

Tim admires the viaduct vista
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Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 7: Le Mont-Dore to Saint-Flour

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This post recounts the seventh day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 6: Aubusson to Le Mont-Dore.

This was one of the toughest days of the tour, although worth it for the stunning scenery. We had a mix of several long climbs plus a rollercoaster, undulating ride during the morning. We tackled all this under an unforgiving sun. But, as I’ve said before, better that than torrential rain and no views!

The usual route out of Le Mont-Dore was closed, so we came back the way we entered. (Poor Donal and Monica followed the closed route, so had tackled a big climb before descending to do it all over again in another direction.)

The first few miles were one long, steep climb up the Col de la Croix Morand. This was fine, especially as we were fuelled and fresh.

It was a joy descending the other side, the road twisting and turning, with views of the stark volcanic peaks around us as we rode.

We had a surprise at the morning brew stop at 17 miles in. The last to arrive was Willie, usually one of the fastest riders. He’d missed a critical turn, and had to backtrack.

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Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 6: Aubusson to Le Mont-Dore

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In the mountains! Col de Guéry, near Le Mont-Dore

This post recounts the sixth day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 5: Argenton-sur-Creuse to Aubusson.

I’d been looking forward to today since studying the Channel to the Med route long before the holiday. I first visited the Auvergne in 1976 on a school skiing trip to La Bourboule, just four miles from today’s destination, Le Mont-Dore. I liked the idea of saying I’d cycled to the region from the English Channel.

The day started with breakfast at the hotel in Aubusson. I’d had sinking feeling about this last night, after we’d been asked to choose items on a breakfast menu. I ticked two baguettes as I suspected they’d not be large. I was right. There was no muesli or granola option, which concerned me as these really fuel me on long rides. But the food I had seemed filling, so I hoped it would be enough.

On the first, gradual hill I felt lethargic. It was easy to blame the breakfast, but looking back another poor night’s sleep was more likely to be the culprit, given this was the start of the day, and the gradient was hardly punishing, as the gradient profile above shows. Whatever the reason, I didn’t enjoy this early session, despite the pretty, forested route, so typical of the first half of the tour. But I felt better after the morning brew stop at Monteillaud, where another dog showed a keen interest in us.

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Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 5: Argenton-sur-Creuse to Aubusson

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This post recounts the fifth day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 4: Loches to Argenton-sur-Creuse.

Steve, Maureen, Willie and Alison at breakfast, Argenton (clockwise from top left)

It was a pleasure taking breakfast on the terrace at the Hôtel Manoir de Boisvillers. After the meal, I opened the shutters in my room and spotted the Aberdeen contingent, Steve, Maureen, Alison and Willie enjoying their petit déjeuner, and took the photo above.

If yesterday was an easy day, today proved the opposite. It was partly the combination of distance (76 miles) and an impressive 6,000 feet of climbing, but mainly because of the heat, which reached the mid 30s. This would be a theme for much of the rest of the tour, but I preferred that to the rain that other editions of this tour have endured. The route profile above tells a vivid story: the whole day we’d be gaining height as we cycled south towards the Massif Central, which we’d reach during tomorrow’s ride. The few descents were followed inevitably by steep, longer climbs.

We followed the scenic Creuse valley for much of the day. We started by recrossing the old bridge in Argenton, quickly followed by a very steep but short ascent to a road junction. Within a few miles we were back on the river’s east bank and climbing – the theme for the day. We saw a few castellated houses along the valley road, overlooking the Creuse. John remarked on them at the morning brew stop, leading me to say I’d caught them on video, as seen above. Much of this stage of the ride was in woodland, which helped keep us cool on the climbs.

A feature of French towns and villages is the mairie, which is the rough equivalent of a town hall in Britain. The difference is that all but the tiniest hamlet has a mairie, reflecting the importance of local government and identity in France following the French revolution in 1789. This is where the maire (mayor) oversees his or her patch. You inevitably see the French tricolor flying proudly from the building, but they seem to be as deserted as the communes they oversee.

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Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 4: Loches to Argenton-sur-Creuse

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A lovely destination: Argenton-sur-Creuse

This post recounts the fourth day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 3: La Flèche to Loches.

After our ride briefing in front of the impressive Best Western hotel in Loches, we were soon negotiating the handsome streets of this historic town. I wish I’d had the time to explore last night – that’s one of the downsides of such an intense tour.

Enjoying this easier day

This was the easiest day of the tour: 51 miles, and more significantly just 1,762 feet of climbing, most of which would feature before lunch.

It was a pleasure to call out, ‘Bonjour!’ to dog walkers and others we passed, in my ‘finest’ French accent. We also saw many tractors, a reminder that France is still a hugely agricultural country, unlike Britain. (No wonder those farmers still hold the power to break presidents and prime ministers.)

Our morning stop was at a pretty location next to an old bridge, which we’d cross immediately after the break. Our route instructions asked us not to lean our bikes on the flowers – mine was resting on a sign, not the blooms surrounding it! We went without a hot drink as the hotel in Loches had filled the flasks with cold, not hot, water… But soft drinks proved just what we needed on another hot day.

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Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 3: La Flèche to Loches

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This post recounts the third day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 2, Bagnoles de l’Orne to La Flèche.

The Loire at Langeais

At first glance, this should have been a fairly easy day, given we’re all more than capable of cycling 80 miles. The route had a lot less climbing than yesterday, and the weather was set fair. As it turned out, the session after lunch was a struggle thanks to that cyclist’s curse, a pesky headwind. But I’m getting ahead of myself…

It was tricky getting out of La Flèche, and we had to squeeze past the cars clogging the narrow streets of the town centre. But we were soon crossing the bridge over the Loir, which was lined with handsome buildings. We passed few typical French villages once again, although these seemed less prosperous than those in Normandy. The countryside was also flatter, as the route profile suggested.

We were in for a treat at the first brew stop at Noyant. Guide Fernando had donned a ‘Coffee and Croissant Club’ apron, and was rolling banana slices in coconut. He’d also sliced kiwi fruit and oranges, which went very well with my morning coffee. This stop was next to a church with a war memorial commemorating those from Noyant who died in the world wars and also in Vietnam and Algeria, the two great colonial wars of independence that led to the collapse of the French fourth republic in 1958.

The next section was a delight, and I made good time along wooded roads towards the town of Langeais, with a dramatic chateau at its heart. We stopped to take photos here before winding our way down to the mighty Loire – the real one, and not the Loir from La Flèche. (I got the two confused on the highlights video at the end of this blogpost.)

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Cycling Channel to the Med, Day 2: Bagnoles de l’Orne to La Flèche

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This post recounts the second day of my English Channel to the Mediterranean cycle tour in France with Peak Tours in June 2025. Read Day 1, Ouistreham to Bagnoles de l’Orne.

Today was our first long day in the saddle: nearly 80 miles. Unlike yesterday, most of the climbing was in the morning. Fortunately, I was still fresh, and climbing reasonably well. I still had a slight twinge in my leg from the Bryan Chapman audax last weekend, but that disappeared without me noticing over the next day or so.

Sunday cycling

It was a pleasure weaving through French villages that were as quiet as you’d expect on a Sunday morning. (I’ve always been puzzled by the absence of people in these small communities.) They were characterised by distinctive churches – typically very different from those in Britain – and often handsome stone buildings. Our first brew stop was opposite a large church in the village of Saint-Cyr-sur-Pail.

The landscape was one of soft, rolling hills – we’d see a great change as the tour unfolded, and we reached the volcanic, mountainous land of the Auvergne. The climbing meant a slow average speed, but the compensation was a gorgeous lakeside location for lunch at La Plage (the beach) at Sille-en-Gillaume. I grabbed a coffee from the bar, and took my lunch to eat on a picnic table overlooking families enjoying their Sunday swim in this lovely lake, and chatted with the others.

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