All bikes banned in Natural Park of the High Pyrenees

That is definitely true. Entire websites, particularly those sponsored or run by regional tourist agencies, have been redesigned and references to motorcycles dropped. In brief, the world is changing. The only real exception is the Wallonia region of southern Belgium, who are still promoting motorcycling in parallel to other activities.

That being said, Western Europe is still a vast area. Nobody is suggesting that the whole place is policed or indeed that bikes will be banned from the northern tip of Finland to the bottom tip of Spain. Just be vaguely sensible and don’t behave like a nob all the time or the restrictions (such as they are) will only increase.

Sardinia has joined in, albeit the use of motorcycles on the offroad tracks - something about it on the TET pages, but mostly foreigners conversing about it, so the translations are heavy reading. they are generally bemoaning the loss of their playgrounds in Sardinia though. Again, they are complaining about the minority who think it clever to ride as fast as they can, rather than as considerately as they can.
 
albeit the use of motorcycles on the offroad tracks

That has always been an issue in Italy. Offroading is mostly a gray area. There is no concept of BOATs like here in the UK.
 
We are forced into being "vanilla" Well, fuck them and all of their beige ways...I intend to leave as I entered...Covered in blood and screaming.

That’s odd coming from you, who regularly tell us how much you appreciate the silence and emptiness of where you now live. Maybe the loud pipe and “I’ll ride where I bloody well like and how I like” brigades, forced out of their usual playgrounds, will discover your patch. Nature does abhor a vacuum.
 
I have never been too sure how off-road riding works in France. Certainly big areas of the Verclause and the Luberon are closed to vehicles of all sorts, not just motorbikes and quads, often restricted due to the fire risk and to protect the natural environment as a whole. That being said, I know that I regularly see off-road bikes gathered up, so it must be possoble and indeed, popular. I guess there is some sort of balance between areas where it is allowed and areas that are closed to everyone, irrespective of the vehicle type.
 

Nice bit of online research there buddy!

That is definitely true. Entire websites, particularly those sponsored or run by regional tourist agencies, have been redesigned and references to motorcycles dropped. In brief, the world is changing. The only real exception is the Wallonia region of southern Belgium, who are still promoting motorcycling in parallel to other activities.

Oh I do love a bit of irony though - Lleida, the province in which the closures in question are located, is really really big on promoting what they call Mototurisme, promoting routes, engaging hotels and educating them, restaurants and other tourist facilities about what bikers need, e.g. places to put thier stuff while they visit the sites, safe parking, etc. ...

Anyway no one is going anywhere at the moment as in Catalonia at lest every managed natural space, National Parks, nature reserves, etc. are closed to absolutely everyone due to the horrendous fire risk we have at the moment, insufficient rainfall for 30 months creating a terrible drought - the reservoirs are too low for flying boats to land so limits the ability to put our forest fires in remote locations -, no snow reserve in the mountains, bone dry cold air form the North Pole - or so it seems to me walking my dogs at dawn! - strong capricious winds making ground based fire fighting difficult and dangerous ... and it's only April! :(
 
I feel the need to fight any restrictions regardless of if they directly affect me know, otherwise the powers that be will really ramp up this kind of thing on the basis of either "nobody objected to the last x ones" or "we managed to fight of the small number of objectors"

Yes, for most of us this has little or no affect on our future travel plans, but we need to try and reign this sort of stuff in and slow it down.

It seems every minority regardless of how small (or ridiculous) can demand rights and be granted them, and have most of the general population figthing for these rights, whilst the minority that is motorcyclists get nothing but disdain from the public.

A ban based on noise should be across all vehicles, I cannot except a ban on legal motorcycles as being acceptable, especially when it seems in many cases illegal cars are still to be welcomed!!!

Can you imagine any government banning cars on roads on the basis that some drivers have a loud exhaust?

Why not ban all vehicles from all roads on the basis that some drivers speed?

Its the same thing, a small minority of law breakers are causing a problem, so we will ban everyone.


TBH I don't know why they don't just leave us alone as we are a dying breed anyway, certainly in the UK the yoof are not really interested in bikes or cars, bike licencing rules make it pointelss and expensive to get a full licence for most, so give it a couple of decades and the average biker will be 70 years old and "bikers" close to extinction anyway.
 
Nice bit of online research there buddy!



Oh I do love a bit of irony though - Lleida, the province in which the closures in question are located, is really really big on promoting what they call Mototurisme, promoting routes, engaging hotels and educating them, restaurants and other tourist facilities about what bikers need, e.g. places to put thier stuff while they visit the sites, safe parking, etc. ...

Anyway no e is going anywhere at the moment as in Catalonia at lest every managed natural space, National Parks, nature reserves, etc. are closed to absolutely everyone due to the horrendous fire risk we have at the moment, insufficient rainfall for 30 months creating a terrible drought - the reservoirs are too low for flying boats to land so limits the ability to put our forest fires in remote locations -, no snow reserve in the mountains, bone dry cold air form the North Pole - or so it seems to me walking my dogs at dawn! - strong capricious winds making ground based fire fighting difficult and dangerous ... and it's only April! :(



Yes thanks for that , I originally intended to travel East to West from Perpignan , looks like I can pick up the N260 a bit earlier .
It’s only a slight detour
 
Yes thanks for that , I originally intended to travel East to West from Perpignan , looks like I can pick up the N260 a bit earlier .
It’s only a slight detour

Yes, get into Spain as soon as possible on the D115/C-38 then head northwest from Ripoll on the N-260 as far the top of the pass where you turn towards the La Molina ski resort, then follow the BV-4031 south to south-east to La Pobla de Lillet via Catsllar d'en Hug before heading properly west on the B-402 to Guardia de Beguera and the the B-400 to Tuixent where you need north to La Seu d'Urgell on C-462 all just to avoid the boring - and dangerous! - bit of the N-260 between Puigcerda and La Seu - all 49 kms of it instead of 145 ks on my route! - and by then you'll be wondering why I take a week to get along the Pyrenees :)
 
all just to avoid the boring - and dangerous! - bit of the N-260 between Puigcerda and La Seu - all 49 kms of it instead of 145 ks on my route! - and by then you'll be wondering why I take a week to get along the Pyrenees :)

What is Dangerous about it?

We rode most of that section in 2019, it is not all that memorable so possibly boring, but cannot remember any near death experiences either?
 

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What is Dangerous about it?

We rode most of that section in 2019, it is not all that memorable so possibly boring, but cannot remember any near death experiences either?

Well you're a lucky one - I've had horrible experiences of people illegally overtaking towards me around blind corners literally every time I've ridden or driven on that road, it being the principle route from the Barcelona conurbation to Andorra - head on collisions are the almost universal MO as seen from a very quick Goole, a local rag from last October that also mentions a biker killed earlier on in April ...
 
Well, I will take note and avoid it next time, plus it is always good to find the route less travelled over a busy section.
 
is there a map of this pyrenees "bike ban" anywhere??
 
is there a map of this pyrenees "bike ban" anywhere??

scroll up to post 67 where Simon quotes an earlier one - only the pdf works now

you are very unlikely to be affected, the area is small, affects very few sealed roads and none that go anywhere other than very remote hamlets.

The closest most people will get is riding along the C13 from Sort to Vielha as this road is just outside the western boundary.
 


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