France here we come!
Stats
Today's Route in England
Today's Route in France
Travelogue
Hills
Rain
Traffic
More rain
More hills
Lots of rain
Traffic
Even more rain
Ridiculous amounts of traffic
Ferry!
Yes! That's right. It's Day 1 of our 2025 bikepacking trip :-)
Today was a day of two parts. We cycled to Newhaven on the south coast of England and then caught the 17:00 ferry to Dieppe in France, arriving at about 22:00. From there we cycled a few km to the small town of Arques-la-Bataille where we stayed in am Airbnb apartment.
But back to the beginning.
M2's brother (M2B?) came to ours bright and early and wished us a bon voyage. He's a cunning linguist. And he's to be credited with the photo of us getting ready to set off, too.
Within a few km the road started to climb. What the? Already? This was the response from our legs. Neither M1 or M2 are very well prepared for this year's trip and there's a good chance there will be further negativity from our legs. No matter. We ignored them and continued to climb on what should have been quiet, narrow country lanes but per the trend in SatNav Britain, is a shortcut for cars and therefore horribly busy. Drivers were well behaved though so there were no problems.
An hour or so into the ride, it started to rain. M1 was already wearing a lightweight "race cape" and for a while that seemed good enough. But the rain got heavier and we stopped and both donned our waterproofs.
At Redhill the traffic was shockingly bad and we had to dismount and push our bikes along a pavement for 100 metres just to be able to move at all. We suspect the cause of the congestion was "the school run", a great British tradition whereby children are chauffeur driven to and from school, causing roads to clog up twice a day.
Another hour on and it was pouring down. Freshly waterproofed shoes failed to hold back the downpour and feet were and still are wet.
The traffic got worse and worse, perhaps peaking at Haywards Heath. "Should have got on a train" became the mantra and perhaps in the future, we will. Cycling in England sucks. It's official.
We stopped for coffee in Haywards Heath and M1 had a flapjack. We marvelled at the volume of traffic there was at about 11:00 and wondered if the rush hour was any different.
"I can't wait to get to France!" said M1.
On we cycled. About 10 km from Lewes, the sun came out, the rain stopped and we found ourselves cycling on delightful, quiet country lanes. At last! Cycling in England doesn't suck! Not all the time anyway! Maybe 98% of the time, yes, but that's not all of the time! :-)
We rolled into Newhaven at about 14:30 and waited patiently to be allowed to board. We were the only cyclists. Until we weren't. About 20 road bikers all turned up together at more or less the last minute. They were apparently all cycling to Paris together to raise money for charity. They had nothing to carry and a support vehicle. That's right. A support vehicle! Sacre bleu!
The crossing took four hours. Chips were eaten. That's frites to you.
At Dieppe we disembarked and switched on our lights. It was 22:00.
We rode through dark streets and onto a long cycle path, heading for sn Airbnb place we'd booked a mere 9 km away.
And that was it. Day 1 was a bit of a soggy slog but we've started and we're in France!
Photos
Arriving at our Airbnb accommodation
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