“Where do the local cyclists like to ride?”
“What’s a route for a Sunday morning club rides?”
I always think about this whenever and wherever I am in France. I’d already done the two famous cols (climbs) near Sisterobn: the Signal de Lure and the FontBelle. So now it was time to find something different, perhaps a couple of rides with a little less climbing. This is hard to admit but … I’m not getting any younger and can’t ride 50 miles and climb 4,000 or so feet day after day after day. Well, I can, but there’s a price to be paid … and I was running up quite a tab of fatigue, and needed a couple of easier – yet scenic – rides.
And so, when in doubt, I consult the Michelin map and look for the smaller roads with the green on them. Greem = scenic. And Michelin sure knows scenic. And there’s nowhere around here that isn’t scenic.
Everywhere around here is either a valley, a ridge along a valley or a climb to the top of a col. So, there’s never gonna be a day without climbing, but there are routes that minimize the ups. Or so I thought – and hoped. I mapped out two such rides and both were spectacular.
Here’s the route for the first one, which was 35.46 miles and “only” 2,513 feet of climbing …
It was a counterclockwise loop … first, north in the valley along the Durance River, and a climb up to the little town of Claret and then south and back to Sisteron along a ridge road that had some ups and downs and was pretty darn scenic. Here are 3 videos that can describe it way better than I can in mere words …
Here’s the route for the second ride, which was 45 miles and 3,149 feet of climbing …
This was one of the most beautiful rides I’ve ever done. The first part was on a little road that ran parallel to the Sasse River, which runs into the Durance. And because I was riding “upstream” it was a steady, but very manageable uphill the whole way (maybe a 2-percent average). And, on both sides of me, over millions of years, the waters from the Sasse had carved our cliffs and mountains. And there were little stone villages on top of several of the hills.
At the town of Bayons I decided to head north and climb the Col des Sagnes. It was only a 5-kilometer climb but … it was one of the more intimidating 5-kilometer climbs I’ve done because … you could totally see where you had to go and it looked so darn steep. You could see all the S-turns that take you to the top.
Off I went, and it was a tough … two 7-percent kilometers followed by an 8-percenter. From the top, I decided to return the way I had come, rather than do a longer loop back to Sisteron. come. It was all mosrtly downstream and downhill and perhaps even more spectacular in this direction.
Again here are 3 videos …
I’m writing this from Aix, and tomorrow I head to Paris and then home.
The Biking France Blog 