Inward Route and Hotels - Plan A

On the way out I have planned the no toll route that basically is get to Rouen or nearby on the free sections of the motorways and then head across to join the N10 (or whatever it is numbered in each départmente) and head south or south-west. 

What about coming back?  Do I want to tread the same path? Or seek out a new one. First step fire up MyRouteApp and select Google Maps.

I am currently booked into the El Cid Hotel in Morella. It's about 43 miles from the circuit at Motorland Aragón. 

What if I change the El Cid booking and pack my meagre belongings into my panniers on the Sunday morning and head to the track and then use that 43 miles to head off to a new hotel on the way home?  

Something to ponder?

For now I am assuming I will be solo on this trip. If my brother Neill decides to join me then it will halve the cost of the hotels, and I'll have to change the sleeping arrangements at each hotel!!

So what does MyRouteApp come up with. Well. It depends on the map settings.  If I leave the default mapping as OpenStreetMap the route from Morella is via the motorways passing Barcelona, Lyon and Paris back to the Shuttle at Calais. Around 980 miles.

Change that to Here or TomTom mapping and it reverts to the motorway version of the ride down and around 960 miles.

Neill is adverse to paying motorway tolls and although I am also a bit averse it depends on whether I want to go faster and get somewhere more quickly. Coming home I tend to want to click off the miles.

To vary the suggested route I need to locate a first night overnight stop and get the waypoint in and then see what it does. Is there another no tolls route available? We shall see.

First night on the way back I looked along the N20 (and it name variants) as it is a north/south route. I found another Campanile hotel in Cahors that fits the bill. This means leaving the El Cid and heading up past Alcañiz (!) and to Lleida to the border.  The off putting thing about this is the Tunel de Bielsa! This may force a major re-think of the route as it looks a bit nasty from the write-up on that website.

Pause for thought!

Avoiding Bielsa makes it hard work getting to Cahors and so an alternative hotel needs to be booked. Also the mileage for the day would be too high given the conditions riding into the Pyrenees either side of that tunnel on very minor roads. 

I am looking at Montauban as the first overnight stop.  El Cid Hotel to Andorra is 200 miles.

In the end it may be better to scrap all idea of evading the toll roads until we get into France and see what that does to the overall mileage and possible cost implications.

The Pyrenees form a pretty decent barrier to north/south travel. So whatever route is chosen getting across will give limited options.

Outward Route and Hotels

I have been looking at the non-toll route to the El Cid hotel that will get me/us there on the Friday afternoon. 

Having decided on Option 1, ride both ways, I now have to decide how long to take and how long Claire will suffer me being away.  I was looking at a week away or in reality 8 days - two overnights out, three at the GP end, and then two nights back. 

If Neill comes along he might want to take longer and that will need some debate. I have booked the hotels in twin bedded rooms but if it is a solo trip, then I will see about changing to a double room and have a big bed just for me....

It's pretty much the same route I took way back in the 80's when I rode with my ex-partner to Biarritz for a week in a villa owned by a colleague at Reuters. We wanted to avoid the toll motorways and what was then called the N10 went all the way from the outskirts of Paris (where we got lost near Versailles) to the Spanish border.

Back then I was on the Kettle aka Suzi Triplo. I have an embarrassing photo somewhere of that trip.

But I digress. 

This time I fully expect to be riding Vera Strom.

I looked at distances and let MyRouteApp and Google work together to choose the route itself and then dip in and out to get a decent and achievable mileage and time on the road.

Day one may not be the longest day on the way out. It all depends on what sort of time we arrive in France from the Shuttle. 

I have booked a cheap Première Classe Hotel near Tours that night. Google reckons 308 miles from the Shuttle and 6h 18m riding time. Usual free cancellation etc terms.

Common architecture!

Over the years I have used Première Classe hotels many times. They are budget and they are often quite neatly placed near a Campanile hotel. Part of the same group of hotels but with a restaurant that is usually good value. If you are looking to stay somewhere luxurious with a pool then look elsewhere. The most we have stayed in one was two nights when we took the nephews to Futuroscope in the car!

Continuing south on the N10 (or its new designation) past Bordeaux and the Atlantic coastal dunes.

At Mont de Marsan, the suggested route takes a left turn and heads towards the Pyrenees. I have changed this as the choice of hotels between the fork in the road and the Spanish border is very limited. When I say limited I mean not many and none that match my budget!

Instead I looked around the Bayonne/Biarritz area and found a Première Classe near Bayonne. 

Google makes it a long day at 356 miles in the saddle. Around 6h 20m on the road. Not too bad before you factor in fuel and lunch/pee breaks.

Okay, it looks a bit in need of a clean up!

This Première Classe also has a Campanile in walking distance. Oddly it has no twin rooms, only doubles and a triple.  In the end I booked the triple. If I am on my own I can change to a double!

From Bayonne it's still on the N10/D810 to the border near Hendaye or so I thought. Google and MyRouteApp had other ideas  

From Bayonne we avoid the last bit of the N10/D810 and branch off southwards on the D932 and then D20 towards Cambo-les-Bains and then onto the border.

The third day on the road should be around 280 and a calculated 5h 20m on the frog and toad.

This route joins the original route at Zaragoza. It's a little further on my route but the hotels are cheap and cheerful but for overnight stops I'd rather save a few quid.

At the end of the day I/we should be in Morella and the El Cid Hotel.  

This is the rough route at the moment. It might change.... 😉