London - Paris - at snails pace! Help needed please

[rich p]

It seems like a bit much for a 7 year old to me but good luck

 

[crisscross]

Thanks rich p for the comment, totally understand.

(Lazy) Jack amazed us last year by not dropping out at all during our L2L ride which averaged 30 miles off road each day.

He was only supposed to do 10 each day but insisted on doing the whole thing.

We will probably only be doing 40 -50 each day this time on decent surfaces and he can go in the car whenever he wants.

Although it is more likely to be me !

 

[Arch]

The Avenue Verte is really lovely. You have to ride on the road a bit to get to it, but drivers in France are so much more considerate. Once on it, it's lovely. Ex-railway, so virtually flat. Tarmac like ironed silk. There are places where it crosses little back roads and you are meant to give way, but in my experience (ridden it twice now), there is virtually no traffic on these roads, so with a good look each way, you can generally just ride across, and the 'barriers' at these points, which in the UK would be just wide enough for the tyre and one pedal, are hardly barriers at all - we were all on recumbent trikes and had no problem at all getting through.

There is at least one little cafe/ice cream hut on the route, but you can also detour off into villages along the way to find a cafe/tabac for coffee or orangina.

If you're riding it at the weekend, it'll be heaving with cyclists, families, walkers, rollerbladers etc - so expect to take it easy and say "bonjour!" a lot.

If you go to the end (or at least where it ended two years ago when I last did it, it's about 30 miles (I think), and pitches up at Forges les Eaux, where we stayed in a perfectly nice good value Logis hotel. Can't remember the name.

Beyond the Avenue, in the direction of Paris, I don't know, as we were heading south. But my experience of riding on quiet back roads suggests that most of it will be lovely. Drivers really do take care and pass wide, and the only hoots you get tend to be 'hello!' hoots. I imagine if you have kids with you, they'll wave and shout 'Allez!' and so on.

 

[crisscross]

Hi Arch, that's a lovely post - many thanks.

Everyone seems to think the French are more considerate to cyclists which is good news.

Apparantly an Avenue Verte is supposed to link Dieppe and Paris in time for the Olympics but that may just be a pipe dream.

We will be doing the ride in a school holiday so expect more traffic on the paths.

Thanks for the advice.

 

[Arch]

Everyone seems to think the French are more considerate to cyclists which is good news.

Well, based on my experience (two fortnight long trips in a group of recumbent riders), it's true. If a car passed closely, you could almost guarantee it had a GB sticker. French drivers, by and large, pass well over on the other side (even oncoming cars moved over to the verge away from us), and wait patiently for a chance to do so. We made quite a sight, 9 of us on velo couches, and people in their front gardens or walking in villages would wave and shout 'allez' and 'chapeau!' (hats off to you!).

Going back for another fortnight this summer. Can't wait!

Apparantly an Avenue Verte is supposed to link Dieppe and Paris in time for the Olympics but that may just be a pipe dream.

Oooh, I'll look forward to that. I think it had expanded between the first and second time I went (two years apart).

 

[arallsopp]

French tarmac is so much smoother than British, and the drivers really are exceptional. I lost count of the amount of times I watched an overtaking frenchman give me a full lane's width, normally whilst cresting a hill with him in the oncoming lane. They even indicate and everything.

Avenue Verte is a lovely start to the French side. Make sure you've got a route planned to the start, as its a bit of a pain to find. Once on though, absolutely marvellous. Watch out for dogs around the old stationmaster's cottages, and you'll be fine.

 

[andym]

The major problem I have with British drivers (or at least when I'm touring in the countryside) is that they won't pass me even when I think there's plenty of space. These national stereotypes are simply silly: the vast majority of drivers in the countries I've ridden in (Britain, France and Italy) are courteous and considerate.

 

[Arch]

The major problem I have with British drivers (or at least when I'm touring in the countryside) is that they won't pass me even when I think there's plenty of space. These national stereotypes are simply silly: the vast majority of drivers in the countries I've ridden in (Britain, France and Italy) are courteous and considerate.

I don't know that they are silly - anecdotal perhaps, but my own experience is what I rely on. Perhaps it's because in France I'm on holiday, but it just feels nicer to be cycling over there. I'm not saying that all cycling in the UK is bad, there are plenty of considerate drivers, there just seems to be a higher proportion of them in France (and of course, roughly the same population in a much bigger area, so less traffic).

And there's no doubt that there's a different social feeling in France. Walk into a cafe or small shop here and say a general hello to everyone, and you'll get odd looks, yet that is commonplace in France - I've seen a couple of what looked like salesmen stop at a little cafe I was in and shake hands with everyone before sitting down. There's a human scale to things that we seem to have lost in places.

 

[crisscross]

It seems that there are 2 pretty disimilar routes into Paris, one fron the North East along the canal and the other through forest areas to the West.


The both seem to meet near Beauvais.

Please has anyone any first hand knowledge of either?

Thanks