Where time stretches: three days bikepacking the Alps
La Nesque Gorges
People ask me how I pick my travel destinations. The answer is I don’t, really. Or rather, I consider that two points a few hundred kilometres apart are close enough to take a scenic detour. Last September, I spent three days cycling in the Alps with my original bikepacking partner Agnes. With the convenient excuse of our joint attendance at a friend's wedding in the South of France, we plotted a three-day route in the Alps off the back of the celebrations, guided by four points: a wedding near Nimes, an interview by Mont Ventoux, a visit to the museum-house of Alexandra David-Neel in Digne-Les-Bains, and an endpoint featuring a night train to get back to Paris in time for work the next morning.
When people ask me how I’ve become mad about cycling, I should probably just point the finger at Agnes. In 2017, she asked me whether I wanted to cross South America on a bike with her. I said yes there and then and only stopped to consider the issue later. It was the adventure of a lifetime and a curse. Since that, I haven’t stopped craving adventure on two wheels. As explorer Alexandra David-Neel once said: ‘I just want to see what lies a little bit farther ahead’.
Day 1: 124km/1,800m Nîmes to Monieux
The last wedding guests left early on Monday, heading straight to work. After the beautiful ceremony had narrowly escaped a storm, the sun was now fully out and ready to make our adventure all the more pleasant.
We left the venue shortly after 9am, giving ourselves plenty of leeway to reach our destination for the day. I had a job interview with a cycle touring company near Mont Ventoux that day, which I had conveniently slotted into the schedule.
Your notion of time is different when you cycle all day. Three days of bikepacking often feels like a two-week holiday. I put that down to a few things. Our brain simultaneously slows down and collects a myriad of information. The pace of cycling allows one to soak in every tree, every view, every road surface. Needs and desires are intertwined and simple: eating, resting, pedalling. In between, you might warm up in a cosy pub or cool off on a lakeside.
It takes a cyclist to know that a fellow cyclist’s ETA being ‘late afternoon’ is a good estimate. You may typically average 20km/h on flat, but what if you have a mechanical issue? What if you have misjudged the elevation profile? What if your GPS has mistakenly routed you through private property and you need to take a last-minute detour? So many factors come into play, and you have to accept it. I was a care-free cyclist with a hazy notion of time meeting with someone who was working that day and may have meetings before and after me. I had to accommodate him by leaving early and giving myself plenty of leeway.
The first stretch of road featured flat olive groves and quaint houses, a lovely landscape I was keen to escape to reach the mountain views the horizon was promising us. Then we entered a succession of villages sitting on top of rocks, on the side of cliffs, or intertwined with a network of rivers and canals: L’Isle-sur-La Sorgue, Gordes, Venasque, Monieux, Sault. I had previously cycled and walked around Gordes, but seeing it from the other side of the valley made it all the more picturesque. Towering over and spilling down a rocky mountain side, the cream-coloured houses offer a strong contrast with the sky behind them, whatever the weather. Here and there, I could spot some of the red soil characteristic of the region and that takes its full colour in Roussillon, a bright red village where every wall is made of oxidised ferrous soil and surrounded by red and golden quarries. I had stumbled upon the ochre quarries of Roussillon two years earlier on a road trip, surprised to find myself in what looked like a miniature version of Utah’s Bryce Canyon, only with a stronger orange tint and framed by deep-green pines and holm oaks, offering an explosion of colours to hikers.
At lunch time, I was waiting outside a supermarket with the bikes when Agnès popped out her head to ask whether I fancied canned lentils for dinner. She was checking with me as she had run out of space so I would be carrying most of the dinner in my handlebar bag. Sure, I said. Then she came out with said lentils, but they were in a jar. I had space for them and we weren’t trying to minimise weight at all costs, but I thought it was a mad move. Agnes and I have always worked beautifully together as bikepacking partners, so I told her I did not expect her to cruelly trick me and I packed the damned lentils. Experienced bikepackers will know that an unexpected 300g can endanger a friendship.
We reached Mormoiron, where I was to meet my interviewer at his home, an hour before the agreed time. I rang the interviewer and asked whether I should wait or head his way early. He maintained our original meeting time. I caught myself being surprised that he really did have a regimented life. I had left ‘normal life’ six hours earlier and was already baffled by how time-bound people were when they were not out adventuring.
Agnes and I had two pastries each, as per our usual bikepacking diet. I cycled off to my interviewer's house while she presumably munched on a third piece of cake.
Just before getting to the house, I had to climb a steep gradient and give myself a breather. I will show up in someone’s place for a job interview in sweaty lycra and with dust marks where my sunglasses were – that’s normal – but I will not be caught panting because of a hill. We had a nice chat and a tea on his sunbathed terrace overlooking the lush green valley and the climb I pretended caused me no struggle at all. Who knows whether a job will ever come of it, but surely I get top marks for showing up to an interview for a cycle touring job on a laden bikepacking bike, a level of commitment that few CVs could convey. Above all, I was pleased that I had managed to slot it into my schedule. I love the idea that my adventurous life and my professional life are intertwined, that I do not have to escape every day to find adventure.
As we only had a few hours of daylight left, Agnes and I agreed that our proximity to the Mont Ventoux did not equate to a duty of climbing it. Many cyclists know their time over famous alpine climbs and would find it odd to cycle past the mythical windy and treacherous Mont Ventoux without ticking it off. Bikepacking, it is easy to feel that you are missing out on nearby legendary sites. However, you can’t visit everything at once, and that is the beauty of it. That’s what makes you want to come back.
Our journey took us through the Nesque Gorges instead, where we knew camping would be impossible due to the cliff sides and big rocky drops either side of the road. On this September day, we were warm but not uncomfortable. I imagined following this route in the summer, slowly climbing my way around the winding roads encased in boulders that soak up the heat of the sun. We reached the village of Monieux, the closest spot where we could find water. We had a sponge bath in the public toilet right on the main street, filled up our water bottles, and headed back down to the Plan d’Eau, a little lake downhill from the village.
Once we set up camp and made our dinner of cucumber, nuts and lentils, Agnès confidently declared ‘Ah, I’m glad we carried the lentils, it was a good call!’. She seemed so oblivious to her crime that I just nodded.
I like to camp in a three-people tent, even when there are only two of us. It leaves room for bags and turning around doesn’t involve elbowing your sleeping buddy in the face. It also allows you to sit upright as three-people tents are usually a bit taller, a fact I had not appreciated when Agnes proposed we trial her two-people tent. Maybe I just got used to luxury, but I am not sure I would recommend it. Changing my shirt involved a choice between pressing my face against the roof or hovering mid-way through a sit up, with my upper body tilted 30 degrees away from the ground. We had pitched up on the central island of the lake, linked up to the meadows by a shoddy wooden bridge. Finding a quiet, grassy and flat spot had seemed inconceivable two hours earlier as we were labouring through the gorges.
We soon fell asleep to enjoy a 10-hour night, typical of campers who adjust their routine to the rhythm of the sun.
Day 2: 113 km/1380m from Monieux to Thoard
Upon awakening, I brushed my forehead against the roof of the tent, forgetting how low it was. We quickly packed up our house for the night, with one idea in mind: breakfast. I don’t carry a stove on short camping trips, but I do enjoy a hot coffee in the morning, so my first stop is always a cafe. The ride to the cafe is usually a quiet one characterised by chilly fingers, pink skies and limited conversation.
After a wonderful morning feast in Banon, we agreed to try to find a place by a river for lunch, then head to Digne Les Bains for a dip in the lake just before a museum visit we had booked at the Alexandra David-Neel House. The riding turned out to be pretty tough, with one big pass to start with, and then two smaller passes, which proved testing for my legs. I often think that the second day of bikepacking is the hardest. On the first day, you feel fresh and energetic; you likely cover more distance than planned. On the second, you realise that repeating the exercise every day might prove more tiring than expected. On the third day, you settle into a sustainable rhythm.
The waterside lunch spot never came, so we settled for a quiet area at the foot of the Pénitents des Mées, vertical formations like I had never seen before. I was surprised that I had never even heard of them. Next to the towering conglomerates of pebbles, we shared a melon, a giant babybel, some pasta, hummus, and the feeling of having overeaten.
The Pénitents in Les Mées
A shallow climb then took us to a lovely blue lake in Digne, which is probably crowded in the summer, but on this autumn day we only had to share it with one dog. We even had some time to lounge on the lakeside before heading to town.
Motivated by tales of incredible courage and determination from a woman who travelled around Asia with little to no resources, we left the museum to head to a supermarket five minutes away, chose a dinner from a seemingly infinite range of options, whipped out a little bit of plastic that saved us the hassle of bartering, and set off to find a scenic spot for the night.
A bendy field became our garden for the night. L-shaped or bendy fields are a personal favourite of mine when cycle touring on a road bike. They offer easy access and are invisible from the road if you pitch beyond the bend. I only sleep well if I know I am invisible from the road.
I pulled out the wild lemon thyme I had stuffed in my handlebar bag earlier in the day and sprinkled it onto our antipasti. Foraging is a mindset, not an event. If like me, you know some plants, but not many, you have to be on the lookout constantly to glean anything at all. Just after lunch, we had taken a wrong turn and found ourselves on a major road. We stopped to jump the security barrier and rejoin our route via a gravel path. As I leant down to cut some thyme, Agnès turned around and asked me what I was up to. ‘Wow, this has to be lemon thyme, I have never gathered it wild before!’, I said, beaming, as the fast traffic just behind me made it difficult for Agnès to hear me.
Our semi-foraged antipasti from Aldi tasted delicious accompanied by a view over the reddening Alps.
Day 3: 108km/2,220m from Thoard to Gap
The third day was our hilliest day and would include a beautiful few kilometres of gentle gravel. We did not take a straight or easy way to Gap: we agreed to treat ourselves to another lakeside afternoon on the Serre-Ponçon lake, about 20km before the finish. We had a few mountain passes on the way and we knew that there wouldn't be many shops and restaurants, which was confirmed to us by a local at our morning boulangerie stop.
We had spotted a village 57k in with two restaurants, a perfect halt after a lot of climbing. Both restaurants turned out to be closed. I made a note to stop trusting Google Maps in small mountain villages. Luckily, Agnès and I are seasoned bikepackers: we had secured an ‘in-case-of-emergency lunch’ while buying breakfast. Before a flat stretch, I removed most of my clothes to dunk them in a fountain and act as a cooling system for my overheating body and we took our bakery lunches out of our saddle bags to eat them while riding to the next town. This was a great move: no time wasted thanks to the eat-and-ride technique, and we arrived at a lake-side restaurant hungry and excited for lunch number two rather than exhausted and famished.
From there, we had six kilometers to go to reach a beach. Serre-Ponçon is actually a reservoir; we had to climb all the way up to the dam to then freewheel our way to the lake side. We flapped around in the water like children, daring each other to poke a snake. We hunted down the employee of the waffle shack, who in this final week of the season, had few customers and spent most of his time hanging out with the watersports rental team. I joked that Agnès should consider marrying him. He lives in a nice place and makes great waffles; what more could she want? She looked as if she were seriously considering the matter for a moment.
We cycled on a main road most of the remaining 20km between the lake and Gap. In retrospect, we should have booked our night train from Chorges instead to spare ourselves the entry into a big city
The train back to Paris was uneventful. Just like that, over the course of a night, we went from dipping in mountain lakes to the bustling city life. As soon as I set foot on the platform, I started mourning the mountains.
