A nice six day circular tour in Provence, including Mont Ventoux

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Lifted from Motorrad Freizeit magazine (find it on the Readly app) this is a suggested six day tour, starting and ending in Orange. As Orange is on the main north to south motorway route from Calais to Marseille, you could get there in a (longish) day or an easier two days.


It’s 1,400 km long, call that 870 miles. Over six days that translates to only 145 miles a day on average, so plenty of time to see things, stop for lunches and take pictures. Or just ride it in less.

Suggested direction to take:

Day 1 Orange to Eigliers

Day 2 Eigliers to St Michel L’Observatoire

Day 3 St Michel L’Observatoire to Figanieres

Day 4 Figanieres to Le Lavandou

Day 5 Le Lavandou to St Remy de Provence

Day 6 St Remy de Provence to Orange

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To download the tour in a GPS friendly package:

Go to the Kurviger webpage https://kurviger.de/en

Put the tour code as shown in the picture 2001MF01 into the tour code box, by clicking on ‘Tourcode’

Hit ‘Load Tourcode’

The route will pop up, looking like this:

https://kurviger.de/en?point=44.136...&avoid_unpaved_roads=false&layer=Esri Streets

Zoom in to copy it or hit ‘Export’. If exporting into BaseCamp for use on a Garmin device, I’d recommend exporting it as a track and working from there.
 
I follow your instructions as far as loading the Track into BC. But then hitting 'create route from track' crashes BC . Tried it 3 times with same result
 
It's a beautiful part of the World for sure, but do avoid the high season if at all possible. The urban areas get heavy with holiday traffic &, of course, they get a few wild fires up in the hills which can get a tad scary when the southerly winds blow.
 
I can now get the Track into BC. However, when I highlight the track and click on Create Route from Track, it just creates a route with the start and finish points in it. Am I doing something wrong?
 
I am not sure Paul.

What I do with tracks is simply trace over them. I put the route creation tool at the start point of the track (or wherever I want to start from) and B at the end or wherever I want to end. This gives me a single magenta line A to B. I then use the route shaping tool to drag the magenta line over the track. Why do I do it this way?

1. Because I know it works. At least any mistakes are mine, not someone else’s

2. Because some tracks take odd little deviations. Sometimes because the person that created the track went wrong (you can see them doubling back) or because they went to see their mum and left the device running or they go to a hotel I don’t want to stay at

PS It often helps to change the colour of the track from its BaseCamp default of grey. It makes it easier to see.
 
It's a beautiful part of the World for sure, but do avoid the high season if at all possible. The urban areas get heavy with holiday traffic &, of course, they get a few wild fires up in the hills which can get a tad scary when the southerly winds blow.

My parents lived for 25 years in Provence, up in the hills, overlooking the Luberon. A week or so after they bought the house, a wildfire swept over it, leaving several square miles looking like a hotter version of Ypres. To go there now, you’d never know.

The bit you maybe missed out is the heat of August when the mercury can - and often does - sit above 30 C for days or weeks on end, followed by an almighty thunderstorm, strong winds, some localised flooding and chunky hail, that stings like hell. But that that in itself should not put people off going at all. Just drink lots of water, sit in the shade at lunchtime and during any stops. You’ll not need your winter liners.

PS If the Mistral blows, it’s bloody cold. We had some days when we never eat outside.... Oh and it snows in February. A strange place, really. But lovely.
 
Should definitely take a blast up the col de Bonnete when you are so close, best pass in France....

:thumb2

The route takes you over it, I think. If not, it must be bloody close.

It does indeed !!

In which case, make sure you stop for lunch at the Halte 2000 between Jausiers and the Col summit :

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Probably my favourite lunch spot anywhere in the mountains.Been many times but this was with Ev last summer :

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Great food and a lovely waitress

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Looks like a great route. Will bank that one and try do it next year .Might have to alter/extend it as I don’t think I could ride through Castellane and not stay a night !
 
I’d happily repeat that trip again and again. Especially if weather was to be like we had that time.
 
It's a beautiful part of the World for sure, but do avoid the high season if at all possible. The urban areas get heavy with holiday traffic &, of course, they get a few wild fires up in the hills which can get a tad scary when the southerly winds blow.

Wife and I rode in the area at the end of May (UK Spring bank holiday) 2017.
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It was hot then but I wasn’t complaining at all.

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Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
My favourite area of France, did a few of the roads that great suggestion mentions. Great views from the fort at Mont Dauphin. You could base yourself at Eygliers for a few days and head off up some great roads from there.

I prefer to go there in September as if it's hot, it doesn't seem to get stupidly hot, and there seems to be less thunderstorms. Though the TdF of course fell foul of one this year :(
 


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