8th September 2020

The Route des Grandes Alpes was established in 1911 by the Touring Club of France and has subsequently become a popular route for sports cars, bikers and cyclists.  It starts near Lac Leman and finishes in Nice, covering 750km and a total of 17,000m of ascents through several French National parks running through the Alps close to the Italian border.  We will be cycling from Ste Foy to Nice covering around 550km and 13,000m ascents – gulp!!

We aimed for an easy start – just 23km and a 950m ascent to Val d’Isere.  It felt much tougher with fully laden panniers, even though we packed light – weighing clothing on the kitchen scales .  The traffic was not much fun with heavy lorries overtaking and heading for building and road works up in the resorts.  The worst was cycling through one of the road tunnels – work has been going on for several months digging a huge trench for connecting cables between Val and Tignes.  There was such a dense cloud of dust that it was impossible to see the road or even Jono’s rear bike light just ahead.  The noise of monster diggers was massively amplified by the echos.  We emerged, gratefully, into the sunshine, with mouths full of grit and ghostly white.

It was lovely to see the road open out to the flower filled verges of La Daille.  We were just in time for a sunny lunch at La Casserole, opposite Le Petit Danoise – a favourite late night spot in the ski season.  We spend tonight in luxury at Hotel L’Avancher, where we have stayed on the pre-Christmas ski trip for 20 years🤪⛷😀.