“Rides to Fit YOU, Picked Fresh Daily”
Weekly tours: Introduction Our Format Dates & Prices
Special tours: Fully-Custom Tour de France Cyclosportives
Our regular bike tours in France are in the Rhône-Alpes region in the southeast, spanning the départements of Drôme and Isère. Although our home base in the Royans-Vercors is a national heritage site visited by tourists, the area remains relatively unknown, even within France, and yet to be discovered by cyclists from English-speaking countries.
Since we design your week day-by-day while you’re here, as the week progresses, we don’t have a fixed itinerary to publish. Instead, in the Rides section below we summarize some of the many choices of destinations available to us, from gently rolling Côtes-du-Rhône wine country to cliff-hugging roads along spectacular gorges, to WWII Resistance memorials in the Vercors plateau, to almost-Mediterranean Drôme-Provençale to famous Alpine passes of the Tour de France.
Endorsements from some of our past guests are on our home page.
We ride on quiet secondary roads that have very little motor traffic. What few motorists you may encounter you’ll find much more bike-friendly than in North America. They don’t regard bikes as children’s toys which should stay off public roads, nor consider cyclists to be some weird, alien them dressed in sissy, outlandish spandex. Cars wait patiently until there’s ample room to pass, they don’t try to beat you to a turn to cut you off or pull out right in front of you from a side approach. A honk is a courtesy alert that someone’s behind you, not an aggressive threat that they’re coming through so you’d better get the !@#$%^ out of their way right now or else!
Dynamically customized for you. Because we stay at one home base the entire time, we aren’t obliged to conform to a rigid, predetermined itinerary. Instead, we observe and listen to you, check the wind, weather and road conditions, take into account local events of interest, and each morning (or the previous evening), choose a route or destination of suitable interest, length and terrain. Here are some of the possible ride destinations and/or places along the way that we may visit.
L’Hermitage — very gentle rollers
Côtes du Rhône vineyards, castle town of Tournon-sur-Rhône, Valrhôna chocolate factory & Chapoutier wine-tasting room in Tain l’Hermitage, scenic Routes des Belvédères & Corniche du Rhône.
Drôme des Collines — modest hills
St. Antoine l’Abbaye, early Gothic abbey, pilgrimage site for sufferers of ergot (wheat fungus) poisoning, also known as St. Anthony’s fire. Along the way, visit a remarkable outdoor model Railway Garden or see walnut oil being made at le Moulin à Huile de Léon in Chatte.
Gorges — dramatic, but gentle
Spectacular, but the roads follow gradual grades. Combe Laval. Grands Goulets. Gorges de la Bourne & Choranche Grottoes (15% grade for the first km after the turnoff from the D531 road). Gorges du Nan.
Vercors high plateau — varied
Memorial to the Resistance at Col de Lachau. Museum of Prehistory, Resistance Memorial at Vassieux en Vercors.
Climbs in the Royans-Vercors — challenging
| Col de… | Elev. (m) | Col de… | Elev. (m) | Col de… | Elev. (m) | Col de… | Elev. (m) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| la Baume | 1,475 | la Croix | 1,029 | Lachau | 1,337 | Proncel | 1,100 |
| la Bataille | 1,312 | l’Echarasson* | 1,146 | la Machine | 1,053 | St. Alexis | 1,222 |
| Carri* | 1,202 | l’Herbouilly* | 1,352 | la Portette | 1,175 | Tourniol | 1,145 |
| Chalimont* | 1,374 |
* = On the 2005 Tour de France Stage 15 route
Classic Tour de France Climbs — challenging
Alpe d’Huez, Col du Glandon & Col de la Croix de Fer: Rides up these classic Tour de France ascents start about a 1½ hour drive away. See our Tour de France page for photos.
Drôme Provençal — varied
Just south of the Vercors plateau and bordering Provence are lavender fields, olive groves, oak groves hiding black truffles, the tower at Crest – said to be the tallest in France, Clairette de Die sparkling white wine made in the Drôme river valley … all just a short drive away.
The snapshot below from Google Earth shows the terrain around our home base in the Royans-Vercors (Pont-en-Royans). The village is just above the transition between a river valley formed by the Isère and Rhône rivers to the west, and the Alps to the east. The purple lines are some of the many rides in the area, spanning a every range of difficulty from easy spins to rollers to long-but-gentle grades to challenging mountain passes.
Royans-Vercors – vertical scale magnified 3X
