When we were riding along the great rivers of Europe on the EV6 last year, we passed through small historic and picturesque towns every day. Here on the Atlantique coast, we are routed mostly along the coast or along sequestered paths for bikes. There are occasionally some small fishing villages, but mostly it’s the larger towns that have more cultural and picturesque settings.
We’ve been making good progress along the trip. The total distance from Morlaix to Madrid is about 1745 miles and we’ve ridden 1,094 miles so far. We have about 650 more miles to go, about 30 miles a day. It’s been pretty flat so far, and we’ll have more hills in Spain but we’re still on schedule to meet up with Katherine and Andrew in Madrid on September 2.
In these 3 days, we’ve ridden an average of 60 miles a day, and spent a fair amount of time on dedicated, mostly paved bike trails that seem like former railroad grades. While much more pleasant than the short sections we’ve had on busy roads with cars, it’s not as stimulating as riding through small villages.
Along the way, we stayed in an AirBnB near Marenne and a campground in Vendays-Montalivet.
We passed a few interesting sites too! One was a Transporter Bridge near Rochefort (not to be confused with Roquefort, the town famous for strong and tasty cheese), the last one of its type in France.
Also near Rochefort, the military museum complex and armory is amazing with a LONG building (375 meters!) that was built in 1666 to make ropes for the French navy, and which functioned there for 200 years!
Just after the armory at Rochefort, we stopped for lunch. We carry food with us, and so far we’ve not really wanted or needed to buy “sports food bars”. We carry apples, carrots, apricots, olives, tomatoes, etc along with some crackers or dense bread for snacking. Cheese and peanut butter are frequent additions to our lunches and snacks too!
We rolled into Royan and took the ferry across the estuary of La Gironde to the south side to continue our trip to a campsite in Vendays Montalivet that had a spot for cycle tourists! Yay!
In Vendays we encountered a very nice family from the region of France just across the border from Switzerland and knowing Neuchâtel in Switzerland well, where my mother was born and lived before coming to the US.
From there, it was 62 miles to Bordeaux, mostly on protected bike paths through pine plantations. We passed though some burn areas from a prior fire, but it must have been from a few years ago. There was no forecast for rain, but we had steady fine rain for a few hours during the morning and mid-day, necessitating a stop for coffee that morphed into a generous lunch. No dinner for us that night!
Entering Bordeaux was a bit chaotic with our main route being half closed with road construction. But it was still a marvel. It reminded both Chris and I of a movie set with its historic buildings and skyline. A short walk to get some provisions last night gave a glimpse of what is to come.
We are looking forward to seeing more tomorrow! Our place is just 5 minutes walk from the center!
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