8 days France with some off-road - suggestions?

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talljohn

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Planning a trip to France, setting of 27th March. Should be 4 or 5 of us on GSA, FS800, KTM 950 etc. Plan is to stay off the auto-routes and get in some nice roads, ideally with agricultural tracks/off-road etc.

Has anyone got any route suggestions, or knowledge of off-road/country tracks that may be fun?

Thanks,
 
France has an area of 260,500 sq miles.

Can you try to narrow it down a bit.

Here's a map:

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Well, I have travelled the West coast quite a bit, so I guess probably central or East. Was initially thinking of heading to Claremont Ferrand, however we are quite open to ideas...
 
Clermont-Ferrand and the surrounding area, especially between CF and Ambert and also down towards Mont Dore are superb.
The area towards Mont Dore is very steep extinct volcanoes, and a lot of it a National Park so it’s great for road work but may not be doable due to restrictions or it’s severity.
We have based ourselves in a small town called Cunhalt (pronounced Kai-ack) in the past at a very nice thee gite house. The owners are bikers and their Mum and Dad run the property in Cunhalt for them (they also own a Pub, which they run themselves in The Peak District).
There are a lot of forest , piste style, roads in the area that would be doable on a GS, there also a lot of more difficult stuff if you’ve the experience.
It’s not a long ride to get to either the Ardeche or over to the Cruse/Limousan areas from there. Both areas are also great for bikes.
There was a company, run by an English couple, just North-West of CF that did guided off road stuff with accommodation but I can’t find a link at the moment.

This is what the area around Cunhalt is like, you can ride almost every trail in the area you can see in the photos:

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There is a quad hire place in Cunhalt and the guy there is very happy to advise on where you can and can’t ride, he even has maps. You’ll need a fluent French speaker as he speaks no English at all.

It would be worth your while getting in touch with Bill at Mission Motos, he’s based a lot further south but has a great site with loads of links and also may have much more up to date info then me.

Here’s a link to his site:

http://www.missionmotos.biz/

Heres a link to a bike hire place in the area. They may help you as well:

http://www.tenerespirit.com/multimedia.php?id_media=102&titol=WR adventures in Auvergne
 
Spikehammer, Thanks a lot for all the info' that is most helpful.

John
 
There are a couple of French guys around and to the south of Clermont Ferrand and Auvergne areas who offer gites and randonees with training if required. I was recently in touch with Greg Fayard by email and he said if you speak a little french then there should be no problems on his coures / randos and in general the French guys offer alot cheaper services.

Try: www.gregfayard.com
www.crazy-tour.fr or for an English run business you can try www.dirt-tracksfrance.com.
If you wait a bit later in the year there is a rallye being organised in the Cevennes area, should be ok for GS's as the guy who is organising it rides a Airhead.
http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=399277&highlight=french+rally
 
A second + for Greg, couldn't find his web site addy earlier.

There is also a French Ladies Enduro Champion who guides people in the area, up towards Thiers I believe.
 
We run a B&B in the central Massif which has some of those excellent roads you speak of seen here www.motomassif.info

The region is renowned for its many off-road trails and you can pick up a Blue Topographical map of any french area and see the tracks you can ride. You could also use Garmin Topo maps to plan routes off road.

So if you find yourselves down this way why not look us up www.ridersrest.net we are about 30 k from Martin at www.dirt-tracksfrance.com though sadly he doesn't do accommodation ;)
 
Nippy Normans supply Touratech, Wunderlich, Desert Fox and many other makes of accessories.
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