France 9 day circular bike trip from Calais

[paulw1882]

Afternoon All,

Me and the missus are doing a 9 day (Saturday morning to following Sunday evening) circular bike trip round France in June and starting/ending in Calais.

Neither of us know much about France yet so was wondering if anyone has done anything similar or has thoughts/itineraries/tips they fancy sharing.

All thoughts gratefully received.

Cheers

Paul

[gspod]

A chap called Wapping will be along shortly, no doubt, to give you a load of abuse - I mean assistance :laugh:

He knows a lot about about short trips to France

[PaulinBont]

The Somme isn't far away if that's your thing, or the V1 and V2 sites? The Ardennes/ Ypres are also very near, depends what your interests are?

[Tramp]

9 days for a circuit :woohoo: ...your ass wont like you after 2nd day....

think of things you`d like to see and go there....france has many atractions for all tastes...in june in mid france it will be hot and getting busier...

http://www.bestbikingroads.com/motorcyc ... __804.html

this is normally very good....i prefer the D and C roads hate the motorways and major N roads ...

south of calais its boring till you get to the loire or limousin (thumbs) ...

why calais...? ferry to caen,cherbourg and back another way...

[Stray Dog]

Any of the Gorges worth worth a visit.
As Tram says, not much to see till Limousin
Unless as said, you're interested in the war sites.
And again I would stay off the Autoroute, unless you're trying to get somewhere in a hurry
My favorite place is the Pyrenees, but a bit of a jaunt in 9 days.

Dog

[Peirre]

All thoughts gratefully received.

Your initial question leaves lots to be desired, as you fail to tell us many things, such as what your preferences are to accommodation, how far your willing to ride before she's screaming at you to call it a day, what you want to see/visit, what you don't like or don't want to do and much more. There's so much info about but not all of it is relevant. So help us to help you, and narrow things down a bit.

[Agent Orange]

Just France???
Me, I would head east to Baden Baden, day 1, do the B500 skirt along Lake Constance into Austria via the Lech valley and head for Stanzach a lovely little village.day 2,Head over the mountain before Stanzach and head towards Hitlers Eagle Nest. Day 3,Back down towards Zell am Sea, over the Grossenglockner day 4, head for Bolzona via any passes in the Dolimites, day 5, forget the Stelvio head then for Films onto the Furka and Grimsel and Merringen (where Sherlock Homes died at the waterfall) day 6, from there find the Panorama Strasse and onto Frieberg area, Germany bottom end of the Black Forest, day 7, and Colmar and the through the Vosages onto
Troyes/ Reims, day 8,area and then Calais day 9.
There you go first and last days are 300 milers all the rest about 200 ish. Doable with some ace and I mean ace roads views and places to see. A bit of research and tweaking
Now that's top of my head. Can I come lol

[paulw1882]

Thanks for all the responses so far, very helpful.

Pierre - very good point. I think our preference is for villages/castles/coast/countryside rather than mountains and hairpin after hairpin.

In terms of mileage, the missus can normally handle a large miler on the first and last day (say c.300 miles) but normal days up to 200 miles suits her better

Cheers

Paul

[Scott_rider]

+1 for the Ardennes/Vosges in the east...the bit before you get into Germany/Austria/Switzerland

+1 for it being a bit boring south of Calais until you get to the Loire Valley...except of course for the war sites around the Somme.

If you want to give your Missus a taste of the 'shabby-chic high-life' for a few days then you could head over towards La Rochelle and the Ile de Re on the west coast...but it isn't cheap. Lots of rich Parisiens tend to go there as an alternative to the south of France as it's only 300 miles or so from Paris.

I like it there...and I'm neither rich nor Parisian

[PHILinFRANCE]

Don't bother , its hit here :whistle: