Day minus 2

Satuday 8.15am 4 club members picked up by the Baxters Cycling Trips van at Grantham station, the 5th member stays in bed waiting for the van to detour to Creeton to collect bike, luckily its on the way, so the correct Ferry is caught at Dover and the first night is spent at an alright Camponile at Reims. Don’t ask why Reims, its  not on the way to the ride start.

Day minus 1

Drive all day to another Camponile at Hendaye just on the Spanish Border south of Biarritz airport where the 5th member arrives by luxury jet. Receive route maps and carnet cards for the Raid Pyrenean which is to follow as close as possible the French/Spanish border from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean 720 kms with a bit of hill climbing in less than 100 hours.

Day 1.

5 club riders plus Enduro John from Scotland dip their digits in the Atalantic at Hendaye and begin the ride at 9.30 Monday morning. They promptly get lost heading out of town but 30 minutes later are on their way.

Relatively easy run in with only one significant climb up the Col d’Osquich (392m) followed by a lovely sweeping descent on well surfaced roads

98 miles, moving time, 5.57.31, average 16.5mph, 2009m ascent, 1775 descent.

Arrive at the Alysson Hotel Oloron-Sainte-Marie around 6.00pm in time for a swim, beer and good meal, excellent hotel, all good so far.

Day 2.

Leave around 9.00pm with a more serious day ahead, a mix of busy main road and pleasant rural roads for 50 km before hitting the 12km Col d’Aubisque (1709m), which was OK. The top was very misty but an excellent cafe on the top served a cyclists lunch and everyone was happy (including the chamomile tea drinking pussy) and warm for the descent over the Cole de Solor.

From the bottom its almost straight into the 20km climb of the Tourmalet (2115m). Half of this seemed to be in mist, which was a mixed blessing as it  hid the severity of the climb, which kicked up with some nasty ramps near the top. The mist briefly cleared at the top to give some tantalising views before closing in and with the cafe shut everyone put the wintergear on from the van for the descent.

This was probably the low point of the trip, a steep descent, rain, visibility down to 25m, roads being resurfaced and avalanch tunnels. Luckily the next hotel the Hotel les 2 Cols (interestingly rural and very welcoming) at Campan was at the bottom of the hill and a couple of hours later after hot showers food and drink, everyone was feeling more human but realising this wasn’t an easy ride.

91.0 mile, moving time 7.30.35, average 12.1 mph, 3608m ascent, 2982m desccent

Day 3

Its raining steadily as we slowly get ready to leave and its nearer 9.30 by the time we head out straight onto the 12km climb of the Col’D’Aspin (1489m) which was relatively steady with a rapid descent on damp roads before almost immediately hitting the 18km to the Col de Peyresourde (1569m) which was another long steady climb The promised cafe at the summit was shut due to being hit by an avalnche during the winter. Another a wet descent into Luchon for a late lunchwhere a Menu du Jour at €13 looked attractive as it was still raining.

4 courses later including as much Onion soup as you could eat and we rolled steadily down the main road at 3 pm with 65 miles to go and 4 cols to climb, thinking was that such a good idea?

A quick 20km up the main road and with the sun coming we turned onto a pleasant back road over the relativley small Col Des Ares (797m), Cole de Bech (715m) and Col de Buret (599m) although the cumulative distance and constant hills were starting to take their toll on the group with more frequent regrouping stops. We hit the final hill of the day the 10km Col du Portet D’Aspet (1069m) passing the Casartelli memorial at the bottom, in memory of the Olympic champion who died on the descent in the 1995 tour. This was possibly the nastiest climb of the week, with some 17% ramps really stretching the group but everyone ground their way up eventually.

After a quick descent during which the only puncture of the trip was quickly repaired, there was still over 50 km to the Hotel the last stretch up a very scenic river valley where with 5km to go the back-up van picked up its first passenger, leaving the other 5 to roll into the hotel Le Maxil at Massat at around 8.30 for a very quick shower and meal. Another nice hotel although the 50m walk to the rooms was some what taxing after such a long day.

104 miles,  7.40.29 moving time, 13.6mph average, 2734m ascent, 2923 descent.

Day 4

The weather still looked good but there was a general weariness as only 5 riders headed out of the village and straight into the 12 km climb of the Col de Port (1250m) which was actually quite a nice climb. After the descent there was an unpleasant 26km stretch of busy main road to Ax Les Themes during which several riders were questioning their ability to carry on but arriving in Ax and after a good cafe stop, breakfast had at last digested and things were looking a bit brighter.

Ahead lay the second biggest climb of the trip the 18km Col de Pailheres (2001m) and the weather was now also the hottest so far. The lower stretches followed a pretty wooded river valley before leading out onto more open hills with some quite steep ramps leading up to the ski station and a final unexpectedley steep section to the summit. at last there were some clear views of the surrounding mountains many still with a covering of snow. There was also a small herd of horses looking for any opportunities to grab food. The descent was a beauty with some very tight hairpins at the start followed by some fast long straights with strong cross winds making for interesting bike handling.

We manged to grab a late basic lunch of charcuterie and bread at a small cafe on the way down, although some Italian motor bikers seemed to be trying to eat all the bread before we could get any.

The scenery seemd to change but there were still 2 more climbs in the final 60km on more rural roads, that obviously the tour didn’t use as the road surface wasn’t so good. The 8 km Col du Garavel (1256m) and the 10km Col de Jau (1506m) which now were beginning to seem like relativeey short climbs. The latter being well graded but the last 5km was in ever increasing mist with the conditions at the top requiring wet eather gear to be donned,

We soon dropped out of the mist and there was a really nice descent through some picturesque vilages and a deep gorge with castle on a promontory in the middle. The hotel was at the bottom of the descent in Prades, it was probably the worst hotel of the trip in terms of rooms and food but it did the job.

91 miles,  7.15.14 moving time, 12.5mph average, 3460m ascent, 3751m descent.

Day 5

Bright sunny day for the final 90km downhill to the Mediterranean and onto the finish. A relatively early 8.30 start to make sure we made the 1.30pm cut off time and led out by our now recovered 6th rider we rolled along at a good pace down a busy main road before turning of onto quieter roads to hit the coast at St Cyprien in time to find a nice cafe in the harbour at Port Vendres.

Thunderstorms had regularly been forecast all week but there had been no sign of any and we just had 20 km to go up and down the coast road to the Spanish border at Cerbere. As we got closer the sky got darker and we got hit by the lot, thunder, lightning, heavy rain with 10km to go, it wasn’t cold so riders continued on one at a time when they decided they couldn’t get any wetter, so it wasn’t quite the sprint finish into town that had been envisaged, but everyone made it with an hour to spare. Luckily it stopped raining while we changed and packed the bikes into the van, before retiring to a restaurant for a celebratory lunch on the sea front, during which biblical amounts of rain fell from sky.

57 miles,  3.21.52 moving time, 16.9mph average, 473m ascent, 761m descent.

After that it was 3 hours up the motorway in heavy Friday night traffic for an overnight stop at Nimes, with a late night on the Red Wine watching highlights of an exciting stage of the Criterium de Dauphine.

Day plus 1

2 riders left us to return home by luxury jet whilst the rest of us face the long drive back across France. We did have a detour to pick up some wine at a Cave at the bottom of the Ventoux and then drove over the Ventoux watching hundreds of cyclists grinding their way up on a Saturday morning. More heavy mist at the top but at least we got the idea.

The final stop was at the same hotel at Reims as on the way down.

Day Plus 2

An early start and quiet Ferry crossing saw us back in Grantham by 4.30.

An excellent trip well organised and led by Jonathan of Baxters Cycling Trips who handled the logistics well and left us to get on with the riding as we saw fit, just giving the occaisional nudge when we need to get a move on. We weren’t really jealous of the jar of Jelly babies in the back of the Marmot Tours van!

The route is a challenge but manageable with a reasonable amount of training, bottom gears ranged from 36×28 which is probably about the highest you can get away with, to 34 x 32, which should handle anything. The climbs are generally not steep and they are generally well surfaced but they do start to drag after a while. It also helped that all the riders were of a similar ability so it wasn’t too difficult to regroup on the climbs.

Those taking part were:

Rob Johnson, Tony Mendham, Simon Cocker, Phil Atherton, Chris Sammler and Enduro John from Scotland who fitted in well despite being the only foreigner.