If any one finds themselves in Départment 65 in France and wanting an ideal day ride this little known route is one to go for.
It's one of my favourite rides with plenty of places to stop for coffee etc. It's a dead end route and you'll ride back on yourself..well worth it though. It had just been resurfaced so the going is excellent if you want to go for a snort.
Of course the free GPS route to share can be downloaded in the link below if you so desire.
If your GPS doesn't show the full title enter Héas or Gèdre and you'll get there.
The turn for the dam mentioned later is the only T junction on your way and is signposted 'Barrage' is French for dam.
https://www.wikiloc.com/wikiloc/view.do?id=17547950
I rendezvous with Christophe at his house and take an easy ride to the mountains stopping first at Pont de Napoléon at Luz Saint Sauveur where Christophe takes a few snaps as do I with my 'phone.
The sign says don't walk on the flowers....... :blink:
We ride on stopping at another wee bridge to take in the scenery and to decide whether we should go to Gavernie or Troumouse first.
We decide Truomouse as we can check the dam out there too en route and if we have time then we'll ride Gavernie.
A camera doesn't do Troumouse justice. It's a vast, enormous wall of cliffs and you ride on past the café to the parking higher up, where the wall continues (the road was snowed in).
Camping cars are not allowed and in summer you'll pay a couple of euros at a booth to ride the twisties.
With only a narrow 15cms wide strip of tarmac, bordering rock and a drop we ride to the where the road is blocked with snow for a few snaps
We drop back down to the junction of the dam....at this point I've spotted a couple of cute furry Marmots scurrying around. I threw stones at them.
We take single vehicle wide twisties to the dam.
This would make an ideal day walking trip too if you're into that.
We ride back down and turn right to head to the Cirque de Gavernie too as we've time.
Another massive circle of cliff face
From here on up to Gavernie ski station to see how far we can ride before we're halted by the snow.
The end.
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