Cycling the Entre les deux mers

[Hagyvagy]

Hi All. I've just joined the chat as I've been reading some other posts with regard to getting bikes 'there and back' as easily/ cheaply as possible. So, 6/7 of us are planning this for May next year and having looked at the options we would probably choose to fly to Bordeaux with bagged bikes and stay a night there before beginning our ride. After reaching Sete we would aim to cycle to Montpellier to catch a TGV iNOUi service to Lille for a connection on the Eurostar back to London. Having done a fair amount of research on this already it appears that we would have to split up and take 3 trains because there's only space for 2-4 assembled bikes on each train. Luckily, the ones that involve a transfer in Paris are pretty frequent and we could all get to Gare de Lyon in time to cycle to Gare du Nord for the connection to Lille and an evening Eurostar back to St Pancras. However, I know that we would need to bag up the bikes as Eurostar are pretty strict when it comes to bikes.

Thoughts?

Cheers, Gareth

 

[wakemalcolm]

Hi Gareth,

The touring chat isn't huge on this forum. That's not to say that no-one will pop up with advice. If you don't get what you're looking for here, the cycling UK forum has a comparatively active touring sub forum.

Good luck!

 

[Dogtrousers]

FWIW I got off Eurostar in Paris (from London) recently and saw a guy carrying a bagged bike. He seemed to have just removed the wheelsand wrapped the lot in an old curtain.

 

[lifeonabike]

The three-train split is a real problem and slightly worse than it looks. On TGV inOui the assembled-bike spaces are sold per train, not per group, so with six or seven of you you're not only splitting across services, you're betting that all three still have space when you come to book. Reservations open around four months out, so for May 2027 that's roughly January - and the Montpellier-Lille services are the ones that go first.

There are two ways round it. The cleaner one is to bag the bikes at Sete or Montpellier and carry them as ordinary luggage for the whole return, which removes the space limit entirely and keeps the group on one train. That argues for lightweight covers you can carry for a day rather than hard cases.

The other is to finish at Narbonne or Perpignan instead and take an Intercites north. Fewer services, but more assembled-bike spaces per train, and it removes the Montpellier-Lille leg from the plan.

On the ride itself: the canal is flat and traffic-free, but the surface west of Toulouse is variable and gets soft after rain, so nothing narrower than 32mm. The prevailing wind is westerly, so Bordeaux to Sete is the right direction to ride it. And book Carcassonne early - with a group of seven it's the one night that will be tight.