Route Recce 2009 Loire Challenge

Extra Mile Trustees Rob Oakley and Preston Ayres have checked out this year’s route, hotels and gala night plans. Here is Preston’s report.

We have a great and extremely picturesque route of 517 miles. This is the longest challenge yet but that is because we could find only hills and undulating roads and no mountains, so we added a few miles. You will marvel at the views in the September sunshine of many chateaux and rivers. Here is a little more detail.

On Thursday 16 April we left Bedford in Rob’s trusty (?) Mercedes S class on this year’s recce. Over 4 nights in September we intended to use just 6 hotels so the plan was simple:

Thursday – ferry across the Channel to include dinner before a midnight arrival in Rouen;

Friday – check out the three Rouen hotels, plot routes from each to Novotel start, drive and record the Friday route, dinner at Novotel, Le Mans;

Saturday – ditto for two Le Mans hotels and Saturday route with dinner booked for 8pm at the venue for the gala night and stay at Novotel Amboise (which will house us all for both the Saturday and Sunday nights);

Sunday – check out the Sunday loop in the Loire valley and dinner at Novotel; Monday - drive home via the wine supermarket to replenish supplies that had dried up over the winter.

Pity it didn’t go quite to plan!

Thursday Last year many will recall it was a fire in the tunnel that caused travel disruption, this time it was the French fisherman on their seemingly regular blockade of the ports. Replace planned ferry and dinner with tunnel and KFC takeaway. At least we made Rouen before the bar shut.

Friday (Rouen to Le Mans 171 miles)

We managed to increase the number of rooms at our Novotel base which enabled us to reduce the number of hotels to just two in Rouen (and now five in total). We also know our way around having started the 2006 Dordogne Challenge there. Without much delay, we set about checking the route. With many thanks to Graham Brown (of G-SADD team 4), we had a draft mapped out looking for the green marked picturesque roads and as many arrows as possible showing hills.

Northern France can contain many miles of straight roads and open farmland. Not so for 2009. Most of the roads used are in wooded areas with bends and undulations (and a few climbs). We pass through many typical French villages, remarkably quiet, typical French architecture, fascinating roof lines and buildings - restored…..and inevitably some un-restored ones.

At 123 miles we visit St Ceneri le Gerai, surely one of the most beautiful villages in France and well worth slowing down for a mile or so just to take in the breathtaking views. Following this we traverse the Alpes Mancelles west of Alençon, not as high as the main Alps but a worthy challenge towards the end of the day.

We rate day 1 as the toughest cycling day of the challenge this year.

Saturday (Le Mans to Amboise 179 miles)

Having smelt burning at the end of the previous day, our fears were confirmed with the failure of the air suspension pump on Rob’s Merc. To cut a long story short, the Merc was transported to the local dealer and the remainder of the recce would be carried out in the slightly smaller confines of our hired Peugeot 207. Add to our problems the fact that our visit here coincided with the influx of thousands of bikers for the Motor Bike 24 hour race, by the time that we had sorted our second hotel at Le Mans, we started the route recce at the rather late hour of 1pm.

The day’s route – within 5 miles of the start you are imagining yourself doing 200mph down the famous Mulsanne straight – possibly a little less on your bike. We sweep right at Mulsanne corner and continue between the permanent Armco for the run down to the heavily banked Indianapolis left-hander and onto Arnage. The race track turns sharp right at the Arnage corner cross roads but we go left here and seek the tranquillity of the French countryside.

Next we frequently cross and run alongside the river Loir and pass through dozens of apple orchards, all in full blossom in April – will they be picked by end September to avoid scrumping? At 78 miles we pass through the forest of Pontmenard and the next 25 miles are interesting and on fairly narrow roads; we will be expecting patience and care from leap-frogging vehicle drivers as they pass their fellow cyclists.

At 121 miles the views of the Usse chateau are fantastic – we turn left in front of the chateau and it is imperative to look back as we travel away.

We leave the banks of the river Loire to detour to the south of Tours and return to the river for an easy last 6 miles into Amboise. The small sting in the tail is the final 1.6 mile climb from the riverside to the Novotel (which I can assure you looks down onto the chateau at Amboise, beautifully lit up at night)!

At 179 miles, this is the longest day, but doable with time for a shower and aperitif before dinner at the hotel. Our late start today meant that we had to cut and run with 20 miles of Saturday route to check on Sunday. We adjudged that our 8pm dinner booking to check out the gala night location was important to keep. The food and wine were both local specialities and very pleasant and the setting very different from previous challenges – this one is in a cave! Don’t accuse us of lack of variety.

Sunday (Amboise to Amboise 167 miles)

Today is a tour of the Loire valley and surrounding area. The first 50 miles are undulating leaving the remainder as not too demanding on day 3 muscles. (By now all cyclists know not to believe me totally when I say the terrain is “flat” or “not too demanding”).

First magnificent building of day 3 is the chateau at Montresor (after 36 miles). This is viewed from the narrow streets of the village where you may spot Dr Nigel Brookes in the Café de la Ville.

At 50 miles in Luçay we found the inevitable road closure to accommodate the local Sunday market (and about a mile detour). Other major chateaux for today are Valençay and Chambord. The latter is imposing standing in the grounds of its own Parc. We hope that our arrows will be acceptable here; maybe the riders should remember the route at the two junctions just in case. Just before Chambord we have found one particularly picturesque very narrow lane where we are advising the vehicles to by-pass (unless cycle speed is acceptable).

The river Loire is so beautiful that the last 25 miles of route run along its banks. This includes cycling through Blois, which we consider quite acceptable from our previous experience of visiting this city. When I say the last 25 miles, I exclude a repeat of that final 1.6 miles up to our hotel.

We hope that our innovation of returning to the same hotel for Sunday will be deemed a success. Finish in the hotel car park, no finding a new hotel, no booking in at reception, no packing and unpacking – this makes a final day cycle of 167 miles no problem. Indeed, this is the longest day 3 cycle in all our 7 years, but the least hilly (here I go again).

Sunday evening entertainment is all in Amboise but for ease we have arranged coaches to take us first for a wine tasting (and an opportunity to buy) and then on to the Caves des Fouees for our gala feast (which Rob wanted to describe as a Troglodyte dinner!). The coaches will return us to our hotel where we are planning to arrange a bar extension.

Summary

We anticipate you summarising the Loire Challenge as a wonderful cycling experience, an excellent tour of an attractive part of France and yet still a challenge.

Two nights at Amboise leaves a return drive to Calais of about 5 hours, perhaps plenty of time on the Monday morning to explore Chenonceaux (which is built halfway across the river Cher) and is only 5 miles away. In case you are interested our journey home was hire car to Calais, carry all luggage/maps/paperwork onto ferry as foot passengers, taxi from port to car hire firm in Dover and another hire car back to Rob’s house in Bedford. Dedication to duty, eh.

The plans are in place so roll on September and as Bruce Forsyth might say “keeeeep cycling”.