Velomobile Road Trip with Brigitte & Fritz (Day 14)

Day 14.

Cognin - La Chapelle

75 km | 1500 HM

First we wanted to go to Saint Nazaire to see the viaduct. The first 20 km were flat. Unfortunately, the viaduct was not so beautiful. The diversions was not worth it. From there we went back a bit and then into the Vercors, a limestone mountain range. The next beautiful place was Pont-en-Royans. There is a part of the village that is built on a bridge high above the water over one of the typical gorges of the Vercors. After Royan, the road climbed a bit and then continued flat until Laurent.

Behind Laurent the climbing began. Here one serpentine follows the other. You have to go through two short tunnels. The road is glued to the mountain and you quickly gain height. The sun was shining, the air was still cool and yet we quickly worked up a sweat. The gradient was often between 10-14 %. Such gradients can still be ridden to some extent with the Alpha 7 including luggage, if 6 KMH is enough for you. But we were always compensated with breathtaking views. At the Col de la Maschine (1015 m) you can look down on the Combe Laval. In order to get a closer look at the Combe Laval, we had to drive down a road for about 200 m. The road leads through many small tunnels underneath the mountain. Here it goes through many small tunnels under rock overhangs and along the steepest slopes. It is indescribable.

Then we drove back over the Col du Carrie. There, at an altitude of over 1200 m, we had finally made it. Now we could roll on to La Chapelle. The only difficulty now was to brake in such a way that the hubs didn't get too hot. For this we had water bottles to spray some water on the hubs every now and then. Once we still had to stop and wait for them to cool down.

In La Chapelle we went to the Municipal campsite. Today we were exhausted and tired.