Monthly Archives: August 2009

Cambridge to Les Gets the final map.

Posted on by
2

After much effort with dodgy computers I’ve stitched together all 10 days of my travel to Les Gets. Joost at Everytrail listened to their customers and have now enabled importing pictures from Picasa. So here is the trip with all the photos beautifully geotagged. The GPS data is down to street level so you can see every turn and mistake I made.

Unfortunately the GPS height data is very ‘noisy’ and Everytrail doesnt seem to have any statistical smoothing,  so the ascent/descent numbers are  wildly out. It says I climbed 57,653 feet and descended 56,402 feet :-( (Although the overall effect is not bad as it implies I’m at 1251 feet whereas I’m at 3800 feet) However, the trip profiles are correct.

The cyclometer displayed a distance of 779 miles and the GPS 801 miles, The boat covered 21 miles where i didn’t pedal :-) So pretty amazingly the correlation was spot on!

The moving average for the whole trip was 10.7mph and the overall average including stops when travelling was 7.9mph. So my biking is just over 3 times faster than me walking!

Here it is:-

Cambridge to Les Gets bike ride

Widget powered by EveryTrail: GPS Trip Sharing with Google Maps

Reblog this post [with Zemanta]

Be the first to like.
Unlike

I made it to Les Gets on my bike!

Posted on by
6

On the Tenth day I made it to Les Gets by 4pm. Two Cols climbed with  a total ascent of over 6000 feet (two Ben Nevis’s nearly) and a distance of 70 miles. Not bad at all, the total journey came in at 779miles.

The weather stayed fine so I managed to stay warm the N5 was not to busy so not as scary as I thought and the mega descent to Lake Geneva was great as the route is not used by trucks.

Now to work out how to get home! Here is todays trip:-

Day10 – Morez to LesGets

Widget powered by EveryTrail: GPS Trip Sharing with Google Maps

Be the first to like.
Unlike

Day9 Dole to Morez

Posted on by
3

A day in the Haut Jura. Dominated by the torrential rain and my freezing feet. They became blocks of ice on the descent into Morez through driving rain, my only thought became on how to get into a red hot bath asap.

I stopped at 61 miles with 1947m of ascent for the day. A lot of the trip was on the N5 not as bad as it sounds, as the carriageway is quite a bit wider than the D roads still it seemed funny to be finishing at 3.30pm.

Hopefully I can make it to Les Gets tomorrow, especially if I can get some plastic bags to wrap my feet in, it’s about 65 miles but with some pretty big ascents!. It’s Cathy’s last night in the apartment, so if I’m lucky I could get some food ;-)

Day9 Dole to Morez

Widget powered by EveryTrail: Share and Plan your Trips

Be the first to like.
Unlike

Day8 Langres to Dole

Posted on by
3

One week ago I was biking with Sally down the River Lee and the Regents canal with a wonderful welcome at Daphne’s. 647 miles later I’ve been cycling on my own down the Canal de la Marne a la Saône and Saône river and am now listening to screaming French kids at the Pizz Up restaurant.

Last night I stayed in the faded excellence of the La Post hotel in Langres with the receptionist who refused to budge on the €75 rack rate. Tonight it was a machine that charged me €32 for a key to my room at a F1 hotel in Dole with no power points in the room and vending machines in the corridor.

Today was lovely and flat apart from where the Balesmes tunnel was blocked to cyclists and I had to carry my bike up the steps and cycle down overgrown paths plus up a great hill. Tomorrow it’s The Jura.

And now to devour my Pom Pizz Up Plus at that centre of culinary excellence in Dole. Pizz Up restaurant!

Day8 Langres to Dole

Widget powered by EveryTrail: Share and Plan your Trips

Be the first to like.
Unlike

Day7- Vitry le Francois to Langres

Posted on by
1

One week from leaving Cambridge I find myself waking up in another historic city, Langres. My cyclometer says I’ve pedalled 563 miles of which 96 I did yesterday.

I’ve finally discovered the French canal system, yesterday I went from Brethenay to Langres on the towpath of the Canal de la Marne ala Saône although I strongly suspect I could have done the whole day on the canal, thus avoiding my major error of finding myself on a motorway :-(

I also experienced my first thunderstorm / mega downpour, arriving at the hotel like a drowned rat!

The French canal skirts around towns so to get to Langres you have to come of the towpath and climb up 500feet in 1 mile! Not pleasant after 95 miles with squelchy shoes..

Today I’m hoping to stay on the canal to near Dijon then subsequent days will see the serious climbing beginning. First the Haut Jura to Geneva then up to Les Gets

Day7 Vitry Le Francois to Langres

Widget powered by EveryTrail: GPS Community

Be the first to like.
Unlike

Day6 Bourg et Comin to Vitry Le Francois

Posted on by
2

Today’s 82 miles was spent cycling through Champagne. i made an early start at 7am to get the hills out of the way before the heat of the day. As it was I had a great day with a lovely tail breeze. I passed the final cemetery at Marfaux, a curious one in that the German graves are adjacent to the British ones on top of a hill.

The graves were soon replaced by the Champagne vines, which set my mind wondering if we had a deal going that meant their was no fighting in the vineyards,l

Outside Epernay I met up with the girls who came over on the same ferry as me and are cycling to Florence, they suggested I should bike long the valley to Chalons, certainty much easier! I got into a rhythym and continued to Vitry Le Francois the last 10 miles on a  canal towpath. The town is full of flats and young kids.

I’ve now pedaled 467 miles in 6 days. Here is todays gps trail:-

Day6 Bourg et Comin to Vitry le Francois

Widget powered by EveryTrail: Share and Plan your Trips

Be the first to like.
Unlike

Day5 Ham to Bourg Et Comin

Posted on by
Reply

A ride through Picardie in the plus thirties.
I started late as I was still trying to plot a route without to many hills. Not to successfully I might add, I have this suspicious feeling that the French canal system would get me through France on the flat! However, the few towpaths I’ve seen have varied in condition from excellent (Aisne canal) to diabolical (Quentin) so more research needed.

Plotting a route is very tricky as today I discovered one of the ‘white’ roads had detoriated into a forest track alsio White roads have steeper gradients and the villages are far to twee to have anything like a coop etc.

The opposite is true on ‘yellow’ roads you suddenly find it’s been upgraded and it’s now an artic racetrack :-(

Today was a gruelling 53miles on White roads.

Tomorrow it’s Epernay where I might be tempted to take the afternoon off if I can find a suitable hotel. The accomodation and meals are proving to be expensive, currently burning up the best part of £100 per day! (that’s the race Steve, to get to Les Gets before the money runs out) Oh, how I miss Ecuador!!

Another cost element is that there is no open wifi here – some ridicolous French law thar makes you liable to jail if someone uses your connection for nefarious purposes – so I’m using the £3 per megabyte O2 rip off cellular rate.

Early start tomorrow to beat the sun!!

Day5 Ham to Bourg et Comin

Widget powered by EveryTrail: Geotagging Community

Be the first to like.
Unlike

Day4 Heslin to Ham

Posted on by
2

Another long day of over 90 miles with over 1200merres of ascent – yep it’s very hilly and you can only admire those poor sods in WW1 who fought every inch of the way. Every village and every hill has it’s own immaculately kept soldiers cemetry. Anyone who critizes the EU should come and take a look at what occurred in it’s absence.

Is it me or is it real that tractors are getting bigger each year? There were truly some monsters out today doing the harvesting – looks a good year for corn.

Met a fellow cyclist who started in Geneva. This is his website
A very thirsty day, drank well over 4 litres of water, juice & beer plus necrarines etc.

Top of legs well hurting now, hopefully the pain will gradually go before the big hills!

Day4 Heslin to Ham

Widget powered by EveryTrail: GPS Trail Maps

Be the first to like.
Unlike

I thought it was going to be flat – Day3

Posted on by
4

When I plotted the route from Cambridge to Les Gets it all looked very flat apart from the bit around Geneva. I now realise that’s an optical illusion :-(

Today I cycled from Calais to Hesdin and am now totally knackered since it involved a cumulative climb of over 1100 metres :-(   over a distance of 50+ miles. I will obviosly have to plan my route more carefully and avoid areas  that have suspicious names like Les 7 Vallees :-(

Sally will be pleased to know my legs are now aching…..

Heres today on Everytrail:-

Calais to Hesdin (Day 3)

Widget powered by EveryTrail: Geotagging Community

Lets see how I get on tomorrow!

Be the first to like.
Unlike

London to Dover day2

Posted on by
3

A great day for biking with a nice breeze behind me most of the way. Managed to do 103miles. Which is probably first time since I was 18!

Managed to do a nice circular tour from Tower Bridge to Greenwich :-( plus discovered the Medway tunnel is not for cyclists! Both events leading to quite a few extra miles and time.

Following the GPS track on the Garmin is proving tedious especially on dual carriageways when it’s impossible to do a u turn! The unit seems to take about 50 yards to let you know it’s the wrong way ;-( should ne ok on French minor roads though.

Now on boat to Calais! Hopefully can find a room for tonight!

Day2 London to Calais

Widget powered by EveryTrail: GPS Trail Maps

Be the first to like.
Unlike