Annual Bike Ride - Day 5, Part 3

 I waited outside the Gare in Lons-le-Saunier with the bikes while Roger and John went in to purchase their tickets.  [I had already bought mine before we left Lyon.]  It took a while as Saturday travel was apparently popular this weekend - little did we know How Popular!

We rode about a mile to our accommodations in a decrepit-looking building.  Roger called the proprietor who gave him the combination for the key-safe so we could enter the unit.  It turned out to be a spacious ultra-modern apartment with all the bells and whistles.  

Our Building - Went through the Tunnel to Access the Unit

Living Area of our Apartment

We secured the bikes by carrying them up to the landing outside our door and locking the bikes to the railing.  As I am now an experienced carrier of bicycles on apartment stairways, I assisted in the process.

Friday night was to be the national Fête de la Musique where every venue imaginable has live music.  The street our building was on was closed to motor vehicles, but we were 75 yards or so from the nearest venue, so the night should not be too noisy.

We headed down the street to scout venues for refreshments and food.  We soon found a likely location and ordered beers.  Because of the expected crowds the menu was very limited.  We had selected a table to the side, so we had cover from the sun and less exposure to potentially really LOUD music.  While refreshing ourselves, we checked our meal choices, ordered, and watched people, including whole families fill up the tables in the street in front of the building.

Roger and John at our Table

Front of the Bar-our Table Area to the Left and Back, Vocalist in Blue Hat Right

The entertainment consisted of a talented female vocalist with accompaniment, who sang very well.  Some of her singing consisted of American R&B songs sung in English!

Poster for the Fête

After eating and having another beer, we headed back to our apartment as there was to be a Eurocup Soccer match on TV, with France and the Netherlands.  [Wound up a 0-0 tie.  Editor's note - soccer needs reform so scoring can occur.  Shoot-outs should not determine important matches.]  John and Roger watched a good bit of the match.  John had kindly purchased some wine and beer, so we had refreshments after we returned to the apartment.

John and Roger Watching the Match

Roger Preparing to Unwind

The next morning, we headed for the Gare.  Our train arrived and it was pretty full and got 'fuller' as we made additional stops.  We stood all the way back to Lyon.  

In Lyon, we unloaded the bikes and headed home.  At least there was no rain.

Another successful biking expedition!

Annual Bike Ride - Day 5, Part 2

After lunch, we began to encounter the first of many tunnels along the route.  One of the tunnels is a half-mile in length, but fluorescent lighting above made it fairly easy to navigate. 

We were in much different terrain now, with straight sections between tunnels, but not so much obvious flat farming activity - much more mountainous.  The slope still trended generally downward, so riding was very easy for the most part.

Entering One of Our First Tunnels

At one point, Roger who was in front, stopped quickly and warned the rest of us to stop.  He had come abruptly upon some stairs leading steeply down.  We carefully maneuvered ourselves down the stairs – at least they provided a steep bike ramp next to the stairs.  It would have been nice to have had some signage before coming upon the stairs.  We could just see someone who was not paying much attention shooting out into space.

Negotiating the Infamous Stairs

Once we got to the bottom, the reason for the stairs became obvious – there was a closed tunnel end right there, so we had been riding over the top of the tunnel.  Maybe the tunnel cannot be made safe because a cave-in has occurred?

Looking Back at the Closed Tunnel - Stairs are to Right

Note that all the literature on the circuit we rode this week has riders going clockwise - we went counter-clockwise.  If we had gone as recommended, we would have gone up the stairs.  Our choice did produce such an enjoyable, mostly down-hill day that David preferred how we actually did the circuit.

We then were riding along a right-of-way that had been carved out of the cliff.  It provided several good photo opportunities.

Looking Down on a Village from the PLM Route.

Lons-le-Saunier in the Distance from the PLM Route

We then came to the end of the PLM part of the route, where the old Conliege Gare has been made into a house.  There is also some interpretive signage explaining the history of the route and the old Gare.  Apparently, the cost to take the train round-trip Champagnole to Conliege way back when had been 2 Francs 50 centimes.

Conliege Gare - now a Home

Interpretive Plaque at the Conliege Gare

Detail on the Plaque

We then descended into Lons-le-Saunier through suburbs on neighborhood streets.  The decision was made to first head for the Lons Gare so Roger and John could purchase tickets for tomorrow’s train back to Lyon.  Then we would find our accommodations.

Annual Bike Ride - Day 5, Part 1

We packed up, straightened the apartment, and departed, leaving 30 euros as a thank-you to our hosts. 

David's Kitchen Bed

David and John Ready to Leave Friday Morning

We headed back to Champagnole for three reasons – we needed to find the start of the next leg [more later], needed some coffee and pastries, and John needed to have his bike’s brakes looked at. 

We first had some coffee and pastries, and John took his bike to a shop up the street.  David looked at his maps trying to figure out where the start for the next leg of our ride began.  Across from the bike shop was a Tourist Office which did not open until 10AM.  David checked in at the bike shop to see how things were progressing – the repair guy had no experience with hydraulic brake systems, so progress was slow.  David went back to the bar where we had coffee and chatted with Roger, bringing him up to date, while we had another coffee.

10:00AM arrived and David went back to the Tourist Office to enquire about the PLM Velo Route.  The extremely helpful woman made copies of two maps – one showing how to get to the start of bike trail, and another a map of the complete trail.  Another "unhelpful, rude French person".

Preparing to Leave Champagnole

As mentioned before, the PLM Velo Route is the right-of-way for an old branch of the Paris-Lyon-Mediterranean railroad, which just happens to be the same company that built the old Gare de Brotteaux in Lyon.  The route goes straight to the outskirts of Lons-le-Saunier, and is 35km long, paved, and well-marked, with only a few pieces requiring traveling on roadways with cars.

John finally returned with his bike, with new brake pads on the offending wheel.  As we prepared to leave, a man pointed out to John that his derailleur mechanism on his back wheel was not completely assembled.  So, back to the bike shop where the best that could be done was to ‘fix’ the system in a middle gear until it can be seen by someone who could make proper repairs.  The man in the shop certainly tried, but unfortunately was out of his depth with John’s high-end bike.  This stage of our trip did not require any real climbing and mostly trended down a gentle slope, so the lack of gears would not be critical.

We set off and, with the map, easily found the start of the PLM route.  We started off on a beautiful, paved, empty, scenic trail.  The only negative was a bit of intermittent rain sprinkles.

Roger on the PLM Velo Route

John on the PLM Velo Route

Beautiful Bike Route!

More Great Biking Territory

We made good time, stopping once to try to shelter from a downpour and put on rain gear.  

David Trying to Stay out of the Deluge

We got off-track once, but soon found our way back to the route.  We detoured a kilometer or so to stop for lunch, where we managed to eat outside and not get wet.  After lunch, David put his poncho away, as the weather seemed to be improving.

We had lunch at an interesting restaurant in the town of Doucier.  Doucier is in an area of glacial lakes, and the near-by Lac de Chalain is the site of remnants of prehistoric dwellings built on stilts along the lake shore.  The restaurant is called Le Pic Vert or the Green Woodpecker and served an assortment of regional dishes and also crepes and galettes.  It is open only from mid-April to mid-September, and there were lots of folks having lunch inside, along with a few other hardy souls outside.

Rose at Le Pic Vert

Because there was so much we saw and did Friday, I will create another couple of posts in order to fully tell the story.

The Annual Bike Trip - Day 4

We arose the next morning and had breakfast at the hotel.  We discussed planning our route and trying to avoid having the GPS directing us onto unsuitable dirt/mud/steep/rocky trails.  The weather looked threatening – gray, occasional drizzle.

Breakfast Thursday Morning

At one point we stopped to check our route and got into a conversation with a retired meunier, or miller in the town of Charbonnay.  [I may have the town name incorrect – cannot find it online.]  He and David discussed flour-milling a bit as years ago David had worked at a flour mill that stone-ground its flour.  The GPS continued to sometimes ‘suggest’ that we go off in another direction, but we managed to stay on decent but narrow paved roads with few cars.

For about 45 minutes before Champagnole, we had spatterings of rain, but the speed of the bike meant we were pretty dry by Champagnole.  We found a sort of food-truck type of restaurant with semi-permanent covered seating in the square at Champagnole in time for lunch.

Lunch at the Food Truck

We fell into a conversation with some folks at another table – the man said he had recently vacationed in Belize but “everyone was on strike – just like in France”.  At John’s suggestion, the three of us shared fondue, with bread chunks and Gruyere cheese.  We enjoyed it with a bottle of Chapoutier Côtes du Rhône that unfortunately had been stored in the refrigerator, and so was cold.

After lunch, we headed off for the small town of Ney, about 2km away, where our Gite was located.

The weather began to further deteriorate after we arrived at our Gite, a nice ground-floor apartment with two bedrooms and a roll-away bed.  Since David had gotten first choice of sleeping arrangements the night before, he wound up on the roll-away in the kitchen.

As the evening came on, the weather further worsened and since none of us wanted to go out in the rain, it began to look as if we might be reduced to granola bars for dinner.  Then our hostess showed up with a homemade clafoutis for dessert.  She then found out that we had no dinner options and announced she would fix us a dinner, over our protestations. 

Dinner Before we Dug In!

John and David Toasting Our Rescuers

David's Bottle of Arbois Red

Roger and John Enjoying Dinner

After 45 minutes or so, she and her husband appeared with lentils and vegies, pasta, and with a dish of a fried eggs on a ground beef patty for each of us, called, David thinks, oeuf à cheval.  David broke open his bottle of Jura red wine that he had bought the day before, and we had quite the meal.  And the French are so rude, stand-offish, and unhelpful - right!

Our Great Thursday Hosts

Total for the day – 45km.

The Annual Bike Trip - Day 3

The next morning, after breakfast at the hotel, we headed down to the train station.  The train we were catching is known as the “Ligne des Hirondelles”, or Line of the Swallows.  [At this point Gérard had decided to return to Lyon as he had been feeling under the weather.]  Unlike most of France’s railway system, it is not electrified and is not fast.  Instead, it consists of a couple of cars, each of which has a diesel engine so the train can go in either direction.  It is really a remnant of the days when many small towns had train service that stopped at each town.  It also crosses old stone and masonry arched viaducts and passes through myriad short tunnels as it winds its way through the mountains from town to town.  At one town, the train stops to load and unload passengers, and then switches to another track leaving town to continue the journey.  The whole trip was very scenic, but we were so enthralled that apparently nobody took pictures.  I did manage to get a couple of photos off the system’s website. 

Crossing an Updated Bridge

Crossing an old Masonry Arched Bridge

We finally reached Morez where Gérard caught a train to start home, and we changed trains to continue on to Pontarlier.  Upon arrival, we assembled ourselves in front of the station to continue on our way.  The day’s trip was quite short, and aside from a short visit to another dirt road, fairly uneventful.

Preparing to Leave the Gare at Pontarlier

Explaining about the Railroad and Gare at Pontarlier

We arrived in the small town of Malbuisson, a tourist town sited on a lake terrace above Lake Saint-Point.  The setting reminded me a bit of the Canadian Okanagan area.  In addition to tourism, Malbuisson has one of the last cheese factories to produce Comté cheese in the traditional fashion in big copper cauldrons.  Comté is Anna and my favorite cheese is also apparently the best-selling cheese in France.

On the Road to Malbuisson

We checked in at the hotel – our room had more-or-less separate sleeping areas for each of us.  We made dinner reservations at a near-by restaurant and then had a beer on the hotel terrace.  We then did a bit of resting and unpacking.  After that we walked along the roadway towards our dinner restaurant and checked out the menu.  David went across the street and bought a bottle of local red wine called Arbois, made with an obscure grape variety called Poulsard.  This grape produces light-bodied and a bit lighter-colored red wines.  He always tries to sample at least one local wine on these bike trips.

At the appointed hour, we walked down to the restaurant for dinner.  The dining room was quite full, with all kinds of groups, including what appeared to be extended families.  We had a pleasant dinner before walking back to our hotel while attempting to get some evening photos out over the lake. 

Our Dinner Table

Roger Pointing at my Lamb Shank Dinner

Above is a somewhat blurry evening shot of the lake from near our hotel.

Aside from Gérard’s departure, it was a fun an interesting day – only 19km for the day, but the train ride and varied scenery and terrain made it a great experience.

The Annual Bike Trip - Day 2

Tuesday morning we went up to the restaurant and had a light breakfast – mostly coffee and pastry in some form.  We finished packing and loaded our bikes, setting off on a level road around part of the lake.  We soon found difficult going as the road began to climb steeply out of the valley where the lake is. 

In fact, we soon came upon signage informing us that we were ascending an 11% [!] grade!  That is extremely steep – even with electric-assist it was a challenge getting up the 3+ kilometers that we had to negotiate before the road became a bit more-user-friendly.  We all managed it OK.  We stopped a couple of times to admire the view back down to the valley and the lake, and to catch our breath.

View after the 11% Grade

Coming up the grade from Chancia - not the 11%

Looking Down on the Lake at Chancia

Hotel in Saint-Claude

Protest Banner across from Hotel

Bikes Temporarily Parked across from Hotel

Refreshments at the Hotel after Arrival

We then had some more ups and downs, including one stretch where my bike registered 55km per hour.  It is certainly somewhat satisfying to know you are covering distances rapidly, especially after the day before, and the steep climb out of the valley. 

We made such good time that we arrived in Saint-Claude a bit after noon and had lunch at our hotel for the night.  There were no dirt roads and we saw no cars on some stretches of road.

Saint-Claude is an interesting old town in a scenic mountain setting.  It had been a center of pipe-manufacturing, as in smoking pipes.  It also had a gemstone cutting industry.  There are shops in the area offering tours and sales of such items.

The banner in the photo above is protesting plans to close most of the hospital services locally - like everywhere, the French are having difficulty maintaining complete health services in smaller towns.

Gérard decided that we should shorten tomorrow’s ride a bit after the strenuous parts of the past two days, so we went into Saint-Claude to the train station to buy tickets to Pontarlier.  We had to use a machine to buy tickets and could not get the machine to show us Pontarlier as a destination.  So, the other folks used their phones to purchase electronic tickets.  As I did not have a smart phone, Gérard bought a ticket for me.  While we were in town, we had a drink and looked around for a place to have dinner.  We did not find anything very appealing and went back to the hotel for dinner.

Lunch at the Hotel

Aperitif in Saint-Claude

Nice Dinner at the Hotel

Distance for the day was 35km, but a good bit was challenging.

The Annual Bike Trip - Day 1

Planning for 2024’s week-long bike ride began months agon when Roger emailed a suggested itinerary in France’s Jura region to me, Tom, and Gérard.  The plan was to take the train to Lons-le-Saunier and then immediately bike to a lake near Chancia, then to Saint-Claude, to Labergement-Sainte-Marie, to Champagnole, and finally back to Lons-le Saunier where we would stay overnight and catch the train back to Lyon. The route suggested is very mountainous in some parts, so even with electric assist bikes, we would be challenged at times.  Roger’s wife Dominique did her usual great job of finding us pleasant, low-cost accommodations.  Meanwhile, David did a bit of research on the route with regard to the sights and the history of the Jura region and also the towns where we would be staying.  During this research, he discovered that while most of the trip would be sharing roads with cars and trucks, the last leg back to Lons-le-Saunier was mostly along a very scenic paved, car-free old railroad right-of-way.  More about this later.

David, who does no bike-riding at home, did lots of practicing around Lyon; Roger and he even did a two-night trip down the Rhone Valley on the ViaRhona, as documented in earlier posts.

Unfortunately, Tom Papa had a house purchase pending and felt unable to participate this year.  We filled out the Group with John Robbins, a retired physician from California, and an experienced biker.  We all met at about 8:00AM on Monday June 16 at Gare Part-Dieu to catch the 9:41 train for Lons-le Saunier.  Everyone appeared on schedule, posed for the obligatory photo by Anna, and boarded the train for an uneventful hour and twenty-minute trip.  Arriving in Lons-le-Saunier, we unloaded our bikes, put our various types of bike-bags on them, and went down the street for a few blocks and stopped so Gérard could get his GPS oriented for the day’s trip.

The Happy Group about to Board the Train

About to Start from Lons-le Saunier

Unfortunately, as mentioned in other posts, the weather has been very unsettled in France this spring – lots of clouds, drizzle, and some rain.  Certainly, with the proper gear rain can be easier to handle on a bike than extreme heat, but it does make the experience a bit less enjoyable.  This first day fell into the pattern – drizzle began soon after departure from the train station.  At one point, as we worked to ascend a hill, Roger looked at me and said, 'why do we do this to ourselves'??

We set off through town – there was lots of uphill.  At one point we got on to a very steep, muddy, rocky logging road where we actually had to push our bikes for a kilometer or more.  At one point my saddlebags fell off and I did not even notice it.  Luckily for me, Roger who was quite a ways behind picked them up.  [I definitely owed him a couple of beers for that!]  All of us struggled mightily with this section, but we finally got to the top and stopped so everyone could regroup.  The road, while still dirt, was much better, without a steep up-hill section.

On the Road to Chancia

Taking a Short Break

The Ever-Present WW I Memorial in a Small Town

We finally arrived about 4:15 PM at our ‘camping’ facility on Lake Coiselet outside Chancia.  It turned out to consist of cabins that were fairly nice – no bath towels, soaps, or shampoos, however.  Luckily John had some shampoo and small soap and most of us at least had a small towel.

Our Cabin for the Night

Having a Beer after Arrival at Lake Coiselet

The Resort Setting - Lake Coiselet

The place had a swimming pool and restaurant, so we were able to have a beer and then a nice dinner.  The restaurant had a TV, so some of us watched the Euro Cup soccer match where France beat Austria 1-0.

Total distance for the day – 58km or about 11km per hour.  Pretty slow and a testimony to the rigors of part of the route.