From St Etienne to St Vallier

by Daniel Heesch

In St-Etienne, I could not contain my curiosity regarding the imminent ascent to the Col de la Republique and was reassured that it was "assez facile". The facts, however, tell us that the climb is 10 kilometers long with an average slope of 7 percent. To get to the beginning of the climb you have to get to the top, that is the southern end, of the city. Strangely, whereever I look, I cannot see any mountains. Just as you leave St-Etienne-Sud, the road bends to the right and becomes incredibly steep and stays so for a good while. A few bends later and St-Etienne disappears from sight as you begin to climb up along the left face of a narrow valley into the Massif du Pilat.


For the next 5 or so kilometers, the road remains challengingly steep and not at all easy for my taste. At some point, there is a little information point on the right side of the road, with a few benches the ideal place for a quick break. One table has a very detailed map of the region, which is as I found out a "Parc Naturel", and is interesting to study (needless to say, at this point I would have found anything interesting that required me to get off my bike). It shows you every meter of the climb to the Col and gives you a fair estimate of what to expect from the next few kilometers.

As I gain height, the wind is gradually picking up. The wind is so cold that at Planfoy, one of two villages on the way to the top, I need to put on all the clothes I was carrying with me. Was this already the notorious mistral? Surely it could not be for it was a head wind and I was travelling east. But the wind was cold and the words of the Frenchman from the restaurant resounded in my ears: "...tous les directions". A few kilometers after Planfoy the scenery widens and you begin to cross a densely forested plain. As yet, there are no stunning views to take in.

Around 4 kilometers before the summit, I found myself crawling uphill in the lowest gear, fighting for every inch and barely able to balance the bike. Not that it was particularly steep, but the fierce wind, the low temperatures up here and the much steeper slopes a few kilometers earlier seemed to be taking their toll. And yet, what ultimately prevented me from conquering the Col with more dignity was nothing but my faltering morale, even though it seemed at that very moment that it was simply a physical impossibility. Along came another cyclist, out of nothing, and judging by his speed he was evidently seeking to disappear from sight as swiftly as he had appeared in the first place. Incidentally, he was the first cyclist on a racing bike I saw since leaving Paris. Cycling as a sport does not seem to be practised much other than in the south of France. "Salut" he said and like a bird he flew past, effortlessly and with grace, making me feel as if I was going backwards. That's what I needed. Within a second, I decided to keep up with him which would have seemed ludicrous to me only a moment earlier, but it worked, and magically so. Together we speeded up the climb and it was only when the road had begun to flatten that we found the breath to talk. "Je suis un cycliste d'été" he observed almost apologetically. A summer cyclist? Well, I was evidently lucky for had he not been, I would certainly not have had a chance to stay at his wheel.

The climb concludes with a wide left curve at the end of which the green sign of the summit comes into sight. I had reached with 1,161 metres altitude the highest point of the trip. It also marked its mid-point. Or rather, it would have, had I made fewer mistakes as I continued my ride into southern France during the second night. There and then, crossing the line was a very reassuring moment, even though I had originally planned to arrive at St-Etienne at the end of the first day and to reach the roof of the trip a few hours after midnight, in the very early morning hours of the second day. As things looked now, I had missed my initial target by a massive 12 hours! How could this have happened? Had there been a mistake in my calculations or had I just been that much slower? At the Col, I had been on the road for around 32 hours and my board computer displayed something like 480 kilometers since Paris and an average speed of around 25km/h. In other words, I had been cycling for 19 hours with 13 hours of rest. That figure struck as unbelievable but if you make the sum it all makes sense. The 3 hours in the restaurant in Nevers, the 2 hours outside the church in Digoin, an hour in St-Etienne, plus the innumerable small breaks along the road, they all add up to something. Could I have done with less than that? I believe the answer is yes. One could interrupt the journey strictly for the purpose of replenishing food resources, for doing some stretching and taking off the pressure of all those places, without whiling away hours in cafés, but to spend longer was often too great a temptation. Even though I maintained good discipline whilst I was on the bike, during the breaks I overindulged, and without any shame at all.

1,160 meters is not the altitude where the air gets thin, but high enough for the temperature to drop to what might have been around 10 degrees Celsius. Shortly after the Col, a road branches off to the right, one that would lead you down to Tournon. We continue on the main road towards Bourg-Argenthal. It does not take long until you get into the descent. And what a descent! Around 10 kilometers with an average slope of 6 per cent and wide curves which you can fly down without using your brakes. You quickly drop down to 720 meters to the village Annonay where the road flattens. For a while the road criss-crosses what is an extended plateau until you reach its edge with spectacular views towards the Alpes and down into the Provence. From here, a second descent starts which finally leads you to the very bottom of the Rhône valley, around 300 meters further down to St Vallier in no more than 149 metres above sea level. The most remarkable experience on the way down is the continuous rise in temperature. In Andance, down at the Rhône river, the temperature is in its thirties and the contrast to the situation a few kilometers back could not be greater. The wind blows unabatedly but now has a distinctly southern direction. There could be no doubt that this was the Mistral, and that it was going very strong today.