European holiday: cycling country

From a holiday diary I wrote in 2011L

Chambery is on the edge of Tour de France country. Technically this is all of France of course, but for the sake of the discussion I mean the bit of the Alps where the Tour most frequently visits, where most of the big name climbs are and where the race is often won or lost. It used to be that the race was always won or lost in the Alps or Pyrenees (depending on the direction of the Tour); the Tour would spend a week and a half trundling through the flat lands, have a few time-trials and then the 'Big Favourites' (to use my favourite commentary term) , after doing virtually nothing for two weeks, would decide the result up a couple of big hills. The 2011 race didn't quite run to this pattern, partly because there are fewer doped-up 'Supermen' (a French newspaper term) and also because the organisers have stuck in a few hills earlier in the route, and made some mountain stages much shorter. As this year's stage from Modane to the Col du Galibier showed, this increases the likihood that one of the 'Big Favourites' would attack early in the day. Drove the route of that stage on this day, as part of a circuit from Chambery to St Jean-Du-Maurienne, to Alpe D'Huez and back to Chambery.

The touring cyclist is spoilt for choice in St Jean du Maurienne; it is at the start of the Col du Telegraphe (leading to the Galibier), the Col de la Croix de Fer, the Col du Madeleine, and the Col du Glandon, all top level climbs. As the crow flies the climbs don't cover much distance and don't look like they would take a long time to drive, but of course they are very sinuous, with many hairpins. Drove up the Col du Telegraphe, a very steep road through the trees with many hairpins. The Telegraphe leads straight to the Galibier but irritatingly for cyclists the route drops back down one hundred and fifty metres into a valley before heading back up the hill again.

The northern side of the Galibier climb is called the 'Difficult' side. This is because it is the wrong side of a hundred metres further up and ten kilometres further along than the 'Easy' side. The intrepid cyclist faces a long slog up the valley, watching as the trees disappear and are replaced by meadows, with craggy peaks above on either side, still snow covered. Then - just as you think you've reached the top - the road turns right and zig-zags up the side of a wall of grass and rocks to the top at 2645 metres. Near the top there was a small tunnel boring straight under the top, but probably for the sheer hell of it, a small road had been built right over the ridge. Nearby was a small car park full of bikes; both motor and pushbike. The weather was sunny, and the view clear, but the wind was blowing hard and it was quite chilly.

Back down the hill at the far end of the tunnel sat a large wooden chalet building of the gift-shop variety. Inside, in that peculiar way of souvenir shops, was a selection of tshirts and fleeces, all of which weren't quite interesting enough to buy, and what looked like the entrance to a kitchen and a food counter. Unfortunately although they coined the word "Menu" the French have not picked up the Anglo-Saxon habit of making the menu large enough to read at a distance and sticking it on a wall behind the counter. Neither do they appear to believe in placing Coca-Cola fridges behind the counter to conveniently advertise both the available drinks and how many there are left. No, the continental way is for customers to extrapolate from visual or smell cues what might be available, to look around at other diners to see what they are having and wonder whether it is still served after a certain time, and to make a speculative offer to somebody who might be a waitress in the manner of somebody offering a price for a used car. To be fair to the Galibier Auberge they had placed a list of ''Pains'' outside on a small board, just far enough away to forget what it said when called upon to order in French.

(NB: edited out some more of my moaning at this point. It doesn't read well!)

There were more cyclists on Alpe d'Huez, as to be expected on the most famous cycle climb in the world, but it was surprising by just how many there were. There were so many it was quite difficult to drive up the hill without getting in the way of cars coming down the other way, especially in a right hand drive car with limited view. Nearly all of the cyclists were well behaved and mostly in single file, and the only major obstacle was a photographer walking out into the middle of the road near the summit taking and selling 'souvenir' photos of riders in case any wanted a memento. The resort town at the top was very crowded and narrow and at last there was a sign indicating what was going on; an all day bike time-trial event.

The next valley along the road from Alpe d''Huez led back north to St. Jean du Maurienne and was one of the most scenic roads I can recall driving anywhere, with tight and twisty tree-lined roads gradually giving way to rolling meadows. As if the natural drama was not enough the valley was also punctuated two large reservoirs in it, one at the foot of the valley above the small town of Monetier-Allemond, the other, much larger one further up the hill. Stopped for supplies at the SPAR in the village, after first parking optimistically next to a new-looking mini-mall development with a tobacconist. It turned out that in France a tabac is still just that; there was no food on sale. Either the owner has a deal with the SPAR not to sell food or he is missing out on much passing tourist trade). The village sat in the shadow of the grassed over lower reservoir barrage, landscaped to look inconspicuous. The road ran up in the ubiquitous switchback fashion up the barrage and off on an excitingly twisty but quite quick ascent to the higher reservoir. The top reservoir was a wee bit more dramatic and almost managed to look like a large natural mountain lake.

The top of the Glandon, above the tree-line but below the summer snow line looked much like a grander interpretation of North Wales or North Yorkshire; open windswept meadows overlooked by rocky peaks with long views along the road ahead. The road down the Croix de Fer was a bit more twisty and tricky with the additional problems of trying to pass slower cyclists without knocking off the faster cyclists. There weren't as many cyclists on these roads than on Alpe D'Huez, but there were enough to give me some practice in how to drive around semi-pro pedallers; obviously they are easy to overtake uphill (again a bit tricky with right hand drive) but going down some of them are as fast as cars in a straight-line, but not as quick to brake. It's a fine balancing act; one that a television car on the 2011 Tour de France didn't get right, knocking two riders off into a barbed wire field fence when the driver swerved around a low-hanging tree branch.