Velofrancette 2026 - Homeward Bound

 

Final Cycling Stats 

Final Cycled Route 

and return by train in pink

Travelogue 

We got up earlier than we needed to and when the bakeries had opened, walked around the corner to one of the nearest ones. We had pain aux amandes and coffee for breakfast, sat at a table in the boulangerie. I also bought 4 chouquettes, small pastries perhaps described best as "sugar puffs". At 30 cents each it seemed wrong not to give them a try.

With a 7 - 8 hour ferry crossing ahead of us, we decided to buy provisions for the crossing as well and on the way out bought two salmon and leak quiches (our favourite), two more pain aux amandes, a cheese baguette, and ten...yes, ten chouquettes ! That'll do, we thought.

After the nightmare of getting the two bikes up the tightly winding staircase yesterday, I decided to take the front wheels off before carrying each bike, held almost vertically, back down the stairs. This worked well. 

The ride to the port was only about 1 km and so we were there in no time and joined the queue of cars, vans, motorcycles and  bicycles. Check-in and passport control was very slow overall but when it came to our turn, we sped through. Who knows what it is that makes things so slow for other travellers.

On board, we settled in for the tedium of the crossing, Kindles, music and french food at the ready.

And it was tedious. But the supplies we so thoughtfully bought in France helped :-)

We finally docked in Portsmouth at 18:20. Cyclists were last to be allowed out of the parking deck unfortunately but once off the ferry and through passport control, we cycled mostly on cycle paths from the ferry port to Portsmouth Harbour railway station.

We'd bought rail tickets in advance but yesterday been informed by email that our train was cancelled. In fact it looked as though all trains on that line had been cancelled so we had to replan. Initially we determined we could get home using a total of three or four trains depending on which of two options we decided to jump on. We spotted a train in the station that would get us close to home with two changes i.e. three trains in total, and so got ourselves and the bikes onboard.

We arrived in Guildford. Not the station we'd planned to change at. But from information displayed on the train and announced as we came into Guildford, we realised we had another option. One more train and we'd be an easy, 20 minute bike ride from home. We made a snap decision and got off this train, pushed the bikes to Platform 1 and boarded a train that would take us to Epsom.

We were looking forward to getting home now. It felt like it had been a long day already.

The train did its job and got us to Epsom. We had to explain to the staff member that we didn't have a ticket for this journey but had simply been trying to get home after the train we'd pre-booked was cancelled. He smiled and opened the gate to let us through without even looking at our original tickets. Hooray!

We dropped into the small supermarket by the station for essentials.... like crisps... switched on the lights on our bikes and with M2 leading, cycled the final 5 km home.

That's it! Another enjoyable trip on our bikes :-)

Photos

Velofrancette 2026 - Trains, Trains, Trains

 

Cycling Stats

Cycling in Nantes 

Cycling Route So Far 

Travelogue 

Today we travelled north by train to St Malo on the coast. 

In fact, by three trains.

We were up at 5:00 so that we had time to drink coffee, finish packing, leave the apartment in a suitable state and then get ourselves and bikes to La Rochelle railway station to catch the 6:17 to Nantes.

The plan worked well. We arrived in good time and used the working (hooray!) lifts to get our bikes over to Platform E.

These trains have a single carriage that is designated for bikes and capacity is limited to six. You have to book and pay for a place for your bike, which we did. We were first in and got the only dedicated space for two bikes. That didn't stop a French woman jamming her bike alongside The Mule though, leaving very little space for people to squeeze past. As I was very obviously one of the cyclists and sat nearest to these three bikes, this earned me lots of dirty looks from passengers, especially the more rotund ones!

Meanwhile three other cyclists stored their bikes by the doors.

When the ticket inspector came it transpired that at least one cyclist hadn't booked and it took forever for the ticket inspector to sort this out.

When he came to us, I presented our tickets and bike reservation details. He smiled and I got the distinct impression that I was awarded a French attaboy. Attagarcon?

It took a little over 90 minutes to travel to Nantes and so we arrived just after 8:00. Unfortunately, our next train (to Rennes) wasn't scheduled to leave until 14:05 so we had lots of time to kill.

The station Pret a Manger supplied a decent breakfast and we used the time to look into how we could spend our time. It turns out that Nantes has a physical, actual, analogue not digital, green line painted along some of its streets and parks. Follow the line and you're led past the key sights.  So that's what we did, on our bikes. We stopped occasionally, including at the huge cathedral where we went in one at a time (the other minding our bikes and stuff) to have a look.

Eventually we went back to the station, spent even more money at Prets and then sat in a park across the road, eating lunch and waiting.

It was eventually time for our train to Rennes so we found the platform and wheeled the bikes onto the appropriate carriage. The space for "max 3" bikes was really narrow and we only just squeezed M2's bike into it. Mine ended up by the doors, leaning against a partition. The train wasn't very busy so this seemed ok.

But then a couple of ticket inspectors appeared and explained that our bikes should be hanging vertically from three hooks that we hadn't noticed. This made sense but at the same time didn't seem to be the absolute rule that was being suggested because the information graphic in the bike space looked like this:

I.e. with three bikes shown with their wheels firmly on the ground. Without wishing to be an annoying, argumentative tourist.... I pointed this out and expressed reluctance to hang the bikes, placing lots of weight on a single wheel rim and the front forks. The response (in English) was plain and simple. "We don't care!"....."..but the train is not busy so your bikes can stay where they are!". Phew! Anyway, lesson learned. We'll watch out for hooks in the future. Neither of the other two trains had them. In fact all three used different bike storage systems.

In Rennes we had no time to do anything but wait for our connecting train to St Malo. Getting the bikes on and lashed to the wall was straightforward and it took less than an hour to get to St Malo.

It had been hot and sunny in Nantes and we'd sought shade to sit in. At St Malo, it started to drizzle hard! We put our rain jackets on and cycled the 2 km to our Airbnb apartment.

The apartment is on the first floor of an old building. Getting bikes up stairs is something I'm an old hand at. But these stairs were a nightmare, the worst I've encountered, even worse than in Angers earlier on this trip! 

I more or less had to carry the bikes vertically. M2's wasn't too hard. The Mule, which is heavier, longer and has wider handlebars almost got jammed and M2 had to help from above. But after much grunting and cursing, it was Mission Accomplished. To get The Mule out tomorrow, I'll be taking the front wheel off. Hopefully that will make turning the tight spiral easier.

That's it. Food and sleep are next. In that order.

Photos

Train #1 La Rochelle to Nantes

Breakfast at Nantes station

The start of our cycle tour of Nantes

The green line in Nantes 

Train #2 Nantes to Rennes 

The hooks we should/could have used

Except that....

Train #3 Rennes to St Malo 

Velofrancette 2026 - Ile d'Aix

 

Cycling Stats

Walking Route

Cycling Route So Far 

Travelogue 

Today is our final day in La Rochelle. We walked the city yesterday so decided that today, we'd jump on a ferry and visit the island Ile d'Aix which takes about hour and a quarter to get to. And that's what we did.

En route you get a close up view of a "fort in the sea" called Fort Boyard. It's an impressive building, originally created for defensive purposes, but has been more recently used as a prison and most recently as the location for a French TV show of the same name!

On arrival at Ile d'Aix at about midday, we immediately started walking along the coastal path. The majority of the hordes of tourists we'd travelled with or who has arrived on other ferries all seemed to head straight for one of half a dozen or so restaurants and sit down for lunch.

That said, on our 8 km walk, we were rarely alone. It's a small island and it's a wonder it didn't sink under the weight of all those tourists. There are plenty of homes on the island. It's hard to imagine it's a nice place to live in the summer.

On nearing the end of our walk, we'd become peckish and so sat down at a table outside one of the aforementioned restaurants. It was now 2 pm so there were tables free. We didn't want a meal so we just ordered a bowl of salad to share, two bowls of chips (french fries), a serving of homemade aioli and cold drinks. Our waitress also brought us a basket of crusty bread. This all went down very well indeed. And yet something was missing....

Ice cream! The restaurant had a number of awesome looking ice cream desserts available. M2 chose chocolate. I, M1, went for their best selling caramel version. No regrets. Delish.

We found a place to sit in the shade and read for a while and then walked to the quay where we expected to find our return ferry. It was absolutely heaving with tourists, definitely hundreds. And there was no information, despite there being multiple ferries coming and going. In fact, we nearly got on the wrong ferry! Luckily someone had managed to find out where our ferry would dock and so we moved to the right location and all was well.

We had a decent enough day but in truth felt that there was nothing special about Ile d'Aix.

We head north by train tomorrow.

Photos

The Hordes