Euro Velo 8 - France (Barcelona to Montpellier)

[digitaldog]

Anyone done this route?

Eurovelo site is vague with information, other than large parts of the route are still in development.

Don't enjoy too much riding in traffic, so hoping to mostly find quiet roads and traffic free paths. Would be travelling on a road bike.

[Audax67]

A few years back Montpellier had a bad rep for yobs throwing bricks at cyclists. We routed our 2012 Strasbourg-Perpignan gallop round to the south of it because of that.

[digitaldog]

That's nice. Haha. I'm not really interested in Montpellier itself - I'll be heading north on Euro Velo 17 after that. Probably similar to your trip actually? Would be interested in how you found the route and traffic on the roads. Did you follow Euro Velo at all?

[Audax67]

Heading north you'll have the Mistral in your face if you're not lucky. We rode down with it at our backs and had a wonderful time. Friends tried it the other way and gave up at Montelimar. Mind you, they both had the runs as well.

I don't know EV17, but from their site it looks similar to our route back to front. I've tried attaching a PDF of our trot but this editor refuses it, so I've put it on http://www.lembach-cyclotourisme.fr/joh ... Header.pdf. Let me know once you've downloaded it so that I can delete it again. It's in French with a few arcane codes in the comments:

RP = rond point = roundabout
ÀG = à gauche
ÀD = à droite
td = tout droit = straight on
dir = in the direction of
ZI = zone industrielle
PC = piste cyclable

Normally I leave out "rue" & just include the name.

Re roads & traffic: we rode mid-August. South of Tavel we had a lot of holidaymakers, but our trip down the Rhône was quiet because we tackled it at the weekend. During the week the D6086/D86/D1086 (all the same road, different départements) is full of lorries wanting to avoid the péages on the A7. With empty roads and the Mistral to propel us, it was a dream.

I put a gallery on here: http://www.pbase.com/johnewing/strperp

[digitaldog]

Thanks for that. Downloaded the PDF.

[Audax67]

Hope it helps. I'll leave it up a bit longer. I also have the GPX if you need/want it.

[passereau]

Hi, I travelled on parts of EV17 last year as part of a separate itinerary between Valence and Avignon. I used planning tools like [url]GeoVelo|http://www.geovelo.fr/ride-sets/10/Via-Rhôna[/url], which has all the long distance routes in France, as well as a guide for it. The route is very quiet and on that strech it runs rather close to the regional train line. On that stretch it is also very flat.
In the Gars, from the north, the track stops and merges with country lanes which I found very quiet until Pont-St-Esprit. After that going south, it uses the road following the Rhône which can be busy with fast traffic at commuting hours. I used instead the country lanes going to the villages of Vénéjan and Chusclan, but with a bit more climbing.
In France, quite a few more major roads have plenty of room on the side for pedestrians and bicycles to cycle on. At least in the plains. In the hills and mountains, it gets tighter. As said elsewhere the N-roads (old national roads) are used by lorries to avoid the motorway charges. and in Summer by a lot of campervans. Although the speed limit is due to lower from 90 to 80 km/h, so that might change things a bit in the futur as trucks need to keep to schedule ?
When I did it, the summer wind was blowing south to north, not the perdominant Mistral -- north-south. So you might be lucky.

Not sure this is of interest to you: Summer is the Festival periode in that part of the world: Avignon stages a major theatre festival, Arles or Usès music, Montpellier Dance. And it is a touristic destination. So it can get rather busy, and expensive, in the main cities.
Summer temperatures do go up in the afternoon in the 30-40°C -- and during a "canicule", do not lower much at night. A good idea to start early and take a nap in the shade. watch when the shops are open -- in a rural area like the Gars or the Drôme, they often close most afternoons, and Sunday and Monday.

In all I found that strech very accessible and pleasant.