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Route Five - Tour of the Belledonne

For the purposes of this tour, the name Belledonne has been used in its widest sense to describe the westernmost ramparts of the true Alps between Albertville, Grenoble and La Mure. A closer look at the geography of the area shows that the Arc and Romanche Rivers divide the chain into three separate massifs – from north to south: the Lauzière, the Belledonne and the Taillefer. Three names that may be more familiar to keen cyclists and followers of the Tour de France are the Madeleine, Glandon and Ornon passes, all of which are found along the eastern flank of the Belledonne. Rising to almost 2000m, the Col de la Madeleine and the Col du Glandon are undoubtedly the ‘stars’ of the Tour of the Belledonne, however they are far from being the only difficulties in this short but strenuous five-day circuit.

Talk to any local cyclist/walker/skier and you will be regaled with stories of how wonderful the Belledonne is. At first sight it is difficult to see what could engender such enthusiasm, as there are few individually striking summits, spectacular cliffs or dramatic gorges; nothing that instantly inspires awe and admiration. This is probably part of the attraction; in a society that increasingly proposes instant gratification and where pleasures are correspondingly fleeting, the Belledonne offers the greatest rewards to those who take the time to get to know it well. Because it has avoided intensive tourist development and never been subject to the restrictions deemed necessary to protect neighbouring national parks and nature reserves, the Belledonne has retained an unusual degree of authenticity. As could be expected in an area that does not attract a lot of tourists, hotels and campsites can be few and far between and there is only a limited number of potential overnight stopping places.

The Tour of the Belledonne starts and finishes in Grenoble, the self-styled capital of the Alps. Whether or not you agree with such a bold statement, it must be admitted that Grenoble has a unique location, nestled at the foot of three different massifs: the Chartreuse, the Vercors and the Belledonne. Many major cities – of which Grenoble is undoubtedly one, being home to 700,000 people – are unpleasant to cycle around because of the amount of traffic on the roads. However, Grenoble is doubly fortunate in having a well-developed network of cycleways and in being surrounded by steep mountains that funnel most of the traffic along the valley floors. With the exception of one or two roads to the more popular resorts, as soon as you head up into the hills you will rarely be bothered by cars. For more information about Grenoble see the introduction to Route Four.

Day one starts quite gently, following the banks of the River Isère, mostly on cycleways well away from the traffic of the city centre. After about 10km, the rhythm abruptly changes as you leave the valley floor to climb up into the foothills of the Belledonne, but the hard work is soon rewarded with fantastic views of the Chartreuse Mountains on the opposite side of the Grésivaudan Valley. The road goes through a succession of traditional farming villages, following what the French call a ‘balcony route’ (a traverse across the flanks of a mountain with many good viewpoints along the way). However, the road is by no means flat; you will go over a total of four passes (although one, the Col du Lauteret, is so insignificant that it isn’t even marked on most maps) before getting to Allevard.

Although there is little sign of it today, for many centuries Allevard’s prosperity was based on the exploitation of iron ore from the nearby Bréda Valley, with the surrounding forests providing fuel for the smelters. Every visitor to Paris will have seen at least one example of Allevard iron as it was used to make the girders with which the Eiffel Tower was built. At the end of the 18th century, the focus of the town’s economy began to change with the discovery of the medicinal properties of the local sulphur-rich waters. Allevard-les-Bains is still a spa resort, but it had its heyday at the beginning of the 20th century when it attracted the rich and famous from far and wide. The Musée de Jadis (Museum of Yesteryear) should satisfy the curiosity of those who would like to know more about the history of this surprising and pleasant little town.

From Allevard, the route continues northwards to the village of Arvillard and then through the idyllically pastoral Vallée des Huiles to the Col du Grand Cucheron. Apart from the last 2.5km below the pass, the cycling is quite easy, allowing your legs to warm up gently after the previous day’s exertions. The slopes around the pass are very densely forested, but there is one small clearing at the top that gives an excellent view of the Lauzière Mountains to the north. From the pass, the road drops down into St George des Hurtières, a former iron, silver and copper mining village, although cycling through the forests and pastures that surround the village today, it is difficult to imagine it as a mining community. The harsh lives of the miners are vividly portrayed in the village’s excellent museum. From St George the road winds down to Aiguebelle, where you cross the Maurienne Valley before climbing back up to Aiton. After a short descent to Le Plan d’Aiton, 13km of easy cycling through the Combe de Savoie takes you to Albertville.

Albertville is a relatively new town which was built in 1856 at the foot of the mediaeval citadel of Conflans. For almost 150 years, this was just another anonymous small town, but, in 1992, Albertville was thrust under the international spotlight when it hosted the 16th Winter Olympics. The Games were a huge success for Albertville, but the biggest rewards, in terms of publicity and international tourism, went to the ski resorts of the Tarentaise Valley (such as Courchevel, La Plagne and Val d’Isère). The story of Albertville’s Olympic adventure is told at the Maison des Jeux Olympiques. Despite the large sums of money spent preparing the town for the Olympics, Albertville has little to attract passing tourists, but it is the only town in the area to offer a reasonable range of accommodation. However, Conflans, on the eastern edge of the town, is well worth a visit.

The third stage of the tour takes you south-east along the Tarentaise Valley to the foot of the Col de la Madeleine. Most of the traffic through the valley uses the RN90 dual-carriageway, which was built for the Winter Olympics, so the other roads tend to be very quiet. Once again the day starts gently with less than 250 metres of height gain in the first 20km: a good warm up before you attack the steep initial slopes of the Col de la Madeleine. The climb to the Madeleine is long (25km), but the gradient is quite variable and every few kilometres there are flatter sections where your legs can relax a little. From a tourism marketing point of view it seems to be very important for a pass to be at least 2000 metres high, so a prominent signpost at the top announces ‘Col de la Madeleine 2000m’, despite the actual height being only 1993 metres. The fact that the pass does not quite make the 2000-metre mark does nothing to spoil the view, especially when it can be enjoyed from the terrace of one of the col’s roadside cafés. From the pass it is downhill all the way to La Chambre: a superb but quite technical 18km descent.

La Chambre is only 2km from the foot of the Col du Glandon, the second big climb on the circuit, so your legs have much less time to get warmed up. This is a much stiffer challenge than the Col de la Madeleine, as, apart from 1km through the village of St Colomban-des-Villards, the gradient is unrelenting and the steepest part is right at the top. Up to St Colomban, the road rises through dense forest, so the views are limited. Above the village, the trees thin out allowing you to appreciate the fabulous countryside around you. Unusually for such a high pass, there are no cafés or refreshment stands at the top, so, outside the holiday season, when the camper vans have gone home, the Glandon has a very wild and isolated atmosphere. If you are in desperate need of refreshment, don’t worry, there is a café on the south side of the pass, a few hundred metres from the top. However, you can’t afford to relax too much as the hard work is not all over yet: the descent is broken by two short uphill sections. The first, alongside Grand Maison reservoir, is not too difficult, but the second, going up to Le Rivier d’Allemont, has an average gradient of around 10%. To look on the positive side, these two uphill sections mean that the descent will take longer, giving you more time to appreciate one of the most beautiful valleys in the northern Alps. The view of the Grand Pic de la Belledonne from just before Le Rivier d’Allemont is particularly impressive.

Day four ends at Bourg d’Oisans, one of the gateways to the Ecrins National Park. Bourg d’Oisans is a pleasant place that has developed as a tourism centre whilst retaining the charm of a traditional French provincial town. Every year the town is the venue for a major international mineral fair that attracts collectors from all over the world, so it is not surprising that the Mineral and Wildlife Museum should have such a good collection of crystals. Bourg’s proximity to so many famous cols (such as Glandon, Croix de Fer and Galibier) has also made it a honey-pot for cyclists. Many of the hotels do special packages that include the sort of substantial breakfast that is so essential before a long day on the bike. The magnet that draws thousands of cyclists to Bourg d’Oisans is Alpe d’Huez, perhaps the most famous mountain stage of the Tour de France. Route Six includes a circuit that starts with the climb to ‘L’Alpe’.

The final day of the tour takes you back to Grenoble via the Col d’Ornon and the Valbonnais, a much more pleasant alternative to the direct route along the very busy N91. Although this stage is very long, once over the Col d’Ornon most of the cycling is easy; there are no more long or steep climbs. For me, the Col d’Ornon also marks the boundary between the northern and the southern Alps. There is no sudden change in the landscape, but there is a subtle change in the atmosphere, which now has a sunnier, more relaxed Provençale feel. The atmosphere changes once again as you get to La Mure, once an important regional crossroads, but now struggling to come to terms with the decline of the coalfields just to the north of the town. La Mure was a strategic centre during the religious wars of the 16th and 17th centuries, first as a Protestant stronghold and later as a Catholic base for the conversion and persecution of the Calvinist heretics. You can learn more about the town’s history, from prehistoric times to the mining era, at the Musée Matheysin. However, if you would like to get a real feel for what life was like for local miners, the place to visit is the Mine-image museum at La Motte-d’Aveillans, which includes an impressive reconstruction of a coalface.

Once past La Motte-Aveillans, the road goes down over the River Vaulx and then up onto the Corniche du Drac, high above the River Drac. The views from here, across to the Vercors Mountains and the tower-like Mont Aiguille, are superb. A 10km descent takes you through the mediaeval village of St Georges-de-Commiers to the valley floor and the industrial complexes around Jarrie. Despite appearances, the enjoyable cycling is not over yet; after a short sprint along the RN85, you leave the factories behind to climb out of the valley and up to the village of Champagnier, from where there is a fabulous panorama across Grenoble to the Chartreuse. Champagnier is only a few short kilometres from the suburbs of Grenoble and the cycleway that will lead you back to the city centre and the end of this superbly varied tour.

GETTING THERE

By car
Grenoble is 870km from Calais

By plane
Via Lyon St Exupéry
Bus: Shuttle bus every hour.
Train: To take the train you have to cycle to La Verpillière (see Appendix 1 for route details). On average, there is a train to Grenbole every hour and the journey takes around an hour and ten minutes.

Via Geneva
Take the train from the airport to Geneva central station (Cornavin). From Cornavin there is a train to Grenoble every two to three hours, either direct or via Culoz and Chambéry. The direct journey takes around 2hrs 15mins.

Via Chambéry
Directions to Chambéry station are given in Appendix 1. There is a very frequent train service from Chambéry to Grenoble with trains every 20mins to one hour, depending on the time of day. The journey takes around 45mins.

WHEN TO GO

This tour can be done at any time from early May to the end of September. In October, it is usually too cold to cycle over such high passes as the Col de la Madeleine and the Col du Glandon and they are closed from mid-November to early May. At the beginning of May, even if the roads are officially still closed, it is usually possible to get through on a bike.

MAPS

Michelin: Local – Sheet 333, Isère, Savoie
Michelin: Regional – Sheet 244, Rhône-Alpes
IGN: Top 100 – Sheet 53: Grenoble, Mont Blanc