mmmmartin
Random geezer
- Dellzeqq has said he will not be organising a tour for The Fridays in 2014 so I offered to take up the baton, to which he replied: "Thank you". Some thought and planning has gone into it already, and members of The Fridays have already offered many constructive comments in conversation with me. I have also talked to Dellzeqq and to the CTC. My latest thinking is Caen to Bordeaux with days of 100k (-ish) - (Note these days are longer than our original thinking of Caen to La Rochelle.)
The purpose of this thread is to ask Friday-peeps their thoughts and to keep them up to speed on developments.
Please feel free to make comments, the more critical they are, the more the trip is likely to benefit, so fire away. The purpose is to have a good time next June, not to make me feel good......
I am acutely aware that whereas any trip organised by Dellzeqq is likely to have four dozen participants as a minimum, one organised by me needs to have every aspect completely nailed before anyone will sign up for it. So it needs to be transparent and inclusive or no one will come along and I will have a holiday on my own
This is where we are now:- Spain is off the agenda because Dellzeqq was keen on it and the consensus was that we ought to save it for 2015 when Dellzeqq might want to ride the recce and organise it.
- Returning to the Chateau Le Mont Epinguet is impossible because it is fully booked for the summer.
- A tour from Calais in a circle that included riding to Roubaix (perhaps via the famous cobbles) was given thought but more seemed in favour of this one:
Crossing France - the sea-to-sea tour 2014Here's the skinny, and it's all good................- We're going to cross France. From Sea to Sea. The Channel to The Atlantic. In a week. In style. This is the trip every cyclist has to do once in their life. In true Friday style we start at an iconic location - Pegasus Bridge, the first bridge to be captured on D Day, which will be a few days from the 60th anniversary (June 5). Then we ride to THE COAST (obvs).
- You can cross to Caen with Brittany Ferries for £68 return overnight with a bicycle (ish).We'll have a big van just like on LonJog for all your luggage so you can spent the week on your favourite lightweight racing bike. The route will have days mostly of 100k. Lunches and coffee stops will be in delightful French villages. Remember the last day of LonJog? It won't be anything like that, believe me. We can use the van to carry food sometimes so we can have picnics in the sunny French countryside. Those who want to camp can do so. The towns where we stop have a selection of hotels but they all have an Ibis, which is the standard in France for reasonableness. We ride across the fields of Normandy, cross the Loire and see the Atlantic coast. La Rochelle has to be seen to be believed. We either go through a town called Cognac
or cross a beautiful river called the Garonne on a lovely ferry to completely flat land and forests and ride into Bordeaux . We are now in the south of France and we finish on the Atlantic coast. And here's the clever bit. Because you won't want to fly with your bike (Trust it to airline baggage handlers? Pah!) we take it back to Caen for you, in the van. Just as we did after LonJog. You use the reliable, clean French train system to get you and your luggage (I'm looking at you, Big Michael) to Caen where you are reunited with your bike, we have a celebratory meal and get the ferry home. It'll be just like LonJog without the old A9, the rain, the food, the crap road surfaces and the Scots beer. And it'll be just like Normandy, with lovely countryside, pretty villages, good food, but with a different view every day. What's not to like?
- We might even go past this lovely bridge View attachment 27891 (let's hope that dodgy geezer in the pic isn't hanging around when we get there eh?)
- Dates - probably June 13 from Portsmouth and back on the night of Saturday June 21 (I think we want to avoid June 6 because it's the 60th anniversary of D Day and the whole place will be heaving with people.)
- I am aware that several have expressed a desire to go The Whole Way and finish on the coast of the Med. This is quite possible, obvs.
- Here's the money side of it:
- People could get themselves to Caen (same as they got themselves to Cherbourg) and a big van for a week would cost about €739. Kit in the van, folk make their own bookings at hotels same as on Lon Jog.
- This route is not known for hills so might attract more people than a hilly route (although Normandy south of Caen is not flat).
- At the end, we (by which I mean I) make the same wooden frame as we did on Lon Jog (Simon still has the bolts) and the bikes go back to Caen in the van.
- The European Bike Express (the easiest way to find out more is to Google it) runs double-decker coaches back from Bordeaux to the UK for about £150 single and puts your bike in a huge trailer. I have used it, it is good. It also runs a route from the south of France, back to the UK. Some might like to go for that. I have spoken to them and if when we book their coach is full they might - might - put on another one. It is more expensive than putting your bike in the Fridays van, though.
- Riders get the train (the French train system will easily take dozens of extra passengers with their small amounts of luggage) from La Rochelle via Paris to Caen for €50 to €80, then get the ferry home.
- COST: Distance for the van is 300 miles one way so fuel there and back would be a total of say £120, motorway tolls going back would be £30. So van hire is about £700. Driver get free hotel rooms and food (but no pay), call that £500 for a week. total van and driver cost is £1,200. Say we got 20 people, that would be £60 per head for the van and driver. £68 return on the ferry. So far the cost would be £130 for ferry and van. As for hotels and food, call that £30 per person per day on food and £30 per head per night for hotels, total cost would be about £650 for the week per person inc travel, hotels and food. That sounds to me similar to LonJog (without the torrential rain, obvs).
- You'd pay me £100 before the trip to cover costs of the van etc and at the end you'd each get a set of accounts with the money all added up and explained, plus a cheque for any money left over.
- DISTANCES: here's a possible route to Bordeaux http://bit.ly/199VQs0 Towns suggested for lunch stops are the small white blob.
- I have moved the route away from main roads and straight roads, which tend to have fast traffic.
- For the sake of argument I have put in destinations as Ibis hotels, owned by Accor which owns 1,547 hotels in France so its prices will be about right.
- I will ride the recce in May, let us hope with Gordon (assuming I can keep up with him, obvs) and we will carry our own luggage and pay for our own fares and hotels (recces are always self-funded, with the emphasis on fun). I may also drive it in the winter if I can find a good enough reason.
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and wet 
so not offer the chance to talk. Also, by December I would like to have the route almost finalised, with hotels identified, and coffee stops looked at and lunch stops pretty firm. 
