Road Ride Report Col de la Bonnette

In 2008, Jeanine and I took our single road bikes to France. That's a change from the usual routine as we usually take the tandem and tour for about 3 weeks to a month around the country.

This time we got our time share in a small village above Canne called
Mougins. Pretty nice digs too although I think we were the youngest people there.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mougins

The goal is to ride as much as possible. The two biggest goals of the trip are to ride the Col de la Bonnette and Mt. Ventoux the second week when we are in Provence.

We wanted to get back at a reasonable time since the host and chef of the time share was making Bouillabaisse with fresh fish from the street market in Nice.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bouillabaisse

We drove towards the Maritime Alpes and parked in the public lot.
We filled our pockets with sweets from the boulangerie.


Then we began the climb to the highest pass in Europe. Well, so the locals say anyway.

"A signpost at the foot of the climb[2] makes the claim "Col de la Bonette - Restefond, 2802 m above sea level, highest road in Europe". This claim is incorrect for various reasons. The actual Col de la Bonette rises to 2715 m, but there are three Alpine road passes whose altitudes are higher: Col de l'Iseran (2770 m), Stelvio Pass (2757 m) and Col Agnel (2744 m). There is also the road to Veleta (Sierra Nevada), Spain (near Granada) which reaches 3392 m[3][4] however not a through road. The road around the Cime de la Bonette reaches an altitude of 2802 m, but this is not a "pass", but merely a scenic loop. It is, however, the highest asphalted road in France and is the highest through road in Europe."

I believe this is looking back at the village we started in






Here the trucks that are over sized are not called 'wide loads'


There was plenty of fresh water on the way up






and a few(actually only two) boarded up villages




One thing about the french, they love their food and they love to eat it out doors


As some of you know, my partner, Jeanine is not one to say;"Hey! Lets go climb a bunch of mountains in France". Still, she killed it!
She has a triple on her Litespeed and we put on a mtn bike rear derailleur and a 30 or 32 cog set before we left on the trip and she was good to go. I toughed it out with a 39x27 and it was OK for this but killed me on Ventoux. Col Bonnette climb averages 6.5%.

The road started with a fairly gentle 2 to 3% climb for awhile.
Then it ramped up a bit to 5 and 6%


We are going somewhere up there to the left
Well, really on the road that cuts in left and then it circles around.





Man I love this stuff!


Looking towards the Italian Dolomites



This is the carve in the mountain that goes up left. It's the steepest part at 15%. I went to help Jeanine but she said no, she wanted to do it on her own. She did. Her eyes were bleeding but she did it.


We took a walking path to the tippy top and saw France and Italy from one peak!


Looking down from the top, we could see the road to the right that we came up and the road going left heads off to Italy. Maybe next time.


This was also at the top. No clue what it means.


I'd love to say the downhill was incredible. OK, it was incredible. Aside from the fact that we were losing daylight and it was now 42 degrees.
Neither of us was dressed correctly for the weather but we took off and descended like banshees. My body was shaking from the cold and a couple times I thought I'd lose my grip on the bars.
Jeanine was miles ahead of me. The lower we got, the better the temps got. Funny though, I was warm when we got farther down and J was freezing so I gave her my vest and that helped her.
We arrived back to our car and the village in the dark.
All we could think about fresh fish soup. The village was closed and we were starving.
Driving the Alps in the dark...'nuff said.
BUT!!! We did make it back just in time!

 

Nicely done RR Liz. :clap:

That's what I mean when I mentioned about going on trip. I'd like to hop on a plane and go someplace like France, Italy, Switzerland or Spain and ride. Road or dirt, doesn't matter cause it'll be good either way. Thanks for sharing. :wave:

That's what I'm talking about. Great shot!

 

+++ What Gene said - thanks so much for sharing such a great trip! (knew those images from your test thread would make perfect sense at some point )

Maybe someday I can talk my other half into getting out there...

 

Cool ride. Inspiring

 

Now that's getting your CLIMB on!!!

and people complain about the little asphalt climb at Noble I make them do to earn the downhill, snicker, snicker!!!

As always, awesome RR and pics Liz!

 

Awesome RR Liz, thanks for sharing. How's the healing going?

 

She forgot to mention it's like a 60 mile long climb!

 

Amazing! Thanks

 

Thanks for asking. I'm doing OK. On the spin bike and slowly getting better. I wish the same for you! [-o-]

Mike, it was 60 round trip. :wave:

 

Your 30 miles is like my 90. Climbing freak

Great RR, almost makes me want to go up a hill....almost...for now, I'll let you go and just gaze at the pics when you get back.

 

O snap! Awesome pics!

That ride looked epic! !

 

Damn, with that scenery and the right gearing and food id be happy! The flowers in the village make it look like nice start temps? Although up hi I'm sure it was chilly.SICK.