Tag Archives: Vélo Francette

Voie verte: Clécy to Thury-Harcourt

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Most of our cycling of late has been local rides or familiar, favourite routes. But there’s one route we’ve been meaning to ride for the past two years – and now we’ve finally done it. Back in 2017, we were having our annual ‘staycation’, where we stop working for a week or two and have days out, exploring places close… Read more »

Down to the river

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For the past three years, pretty much since we got our e-bikes, we’ve been saying, ‘we must ride the towpath along the Mayenne’. Well, we’ve finally done it – and we should have done it long ago. It’s the best voie verte we’ve ever cycled. The Mayenne is a wide, lazy river. But there wasn’t much of it. This region has… Read more »

New greenways on the Vélo Francette

The other day I wrote about how we’d spotted a new voie verte (greenway) under construction. It was clear that this was a part of the award-winning Vélo Francette cycle route that runs 617km  from the Normandy beaches at Ouistreham (Caen) to La Rochelle. Although we walked only a small section of the new voie verte, I speculated that it might go as… Read more »

A greenway in the making

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Travelling home from the garage the other day (don’t ask – bloody cars) we were passing through Laubrière when something caught my eye. You don’t expect to find anything significant in Laubrière; it’s just a wide spot on the road. You couldn’t even call it a village. But clearly it was once rather more important. I knew immediately what I’d… Read more »

Vélo Francette – Europe’s best cycle route

It seems that the V43 Vélo Francette is not our little secret any longer. It has just been voted the best cycle route in Europe. Fiets et Wandelbeurs – a Belgian cycling and rambling organisation – has recognised the beauty and convenience of the route. According to Google Translate and a judicious bit of editing, the jury said something like:  “The… Read more »

Very slow cycling

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We’d meant to go cycling on Christmas Day. Or Boxing Day. But the weather gods had other ideas. And so the New Year came and I was itching to try out my new GoPro (thanks, Santa). Finally, half-way into January, we headed off to ride the Vélo Francette from Domfront. We’ve ridden this route before, although I was on my… Read more »

The greenway to happiness

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We’re very lucky. Not only do we live close to two of France’s major cycle routes – the Vélo Francette and the Véloscénie – but those routes also spend much of their time near us on voies vertes, or greenways. Technically, a voie verte is a route from which motorised traffic is banned. It’s reserved for walkers, cyclists (including people like us… Read more »

Ride report: Vélo Francette – Domfront to Forge de Varenne

The recently inaugurated Vélo Francette (VF) cycle route runs from Ouistreham (that’s the port at Caen to most travellers) to La Rochelle – a distance of over 600km. Our ambition on this ride was somewhat more modest. There’s a stretch of the VF that runs south from Flers to our local town of Domfront, which is where we started. It’s… Read more »