Читать книгу The Loire Cycle Route. From the source in the Massif Central to the Atlantic coast онлайн

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Flat-bottomed barges like this reconstruction at La Charité-sur-Loire (Stage 11) once carried goods downriver

The route

The 1052km Loire Cycle Route starts in the Massif Central mountains of central France, then heads north to Orléans (only 100km south of Paris) before turning west to reach the Atlantic at St Nazaire. En route it passes through the French regions of Rhône-Alpes, Auvergne, Bourgogne (Burgundy), Centre, and Pays de la Loire.

Our route (Stage 1) starts at the Loire source on the slopes of Mont Gerbier de Jonc in the Monts du Vivarais, a northern extension of the Cévennes range. From here the river is followed downhill, threading its way through a series of gorges between the puys (volcanic cones), crater lakes and basalt plateaux of the Massif Central before following a voie verte (rural cycle track) along an old railway line to reach the pilgrimage city of Le Puy-en-Velay (Stage 2). The volcanic landscape continues (Stage 3–4) with the route climbing in and out of the gorges and crossing more basalt plateaux. After Aurec the route crosses the edge of the Monts de Forez (Stage 5) before descending into the Forez basin. A final forested ridge is encountered, an outlier of the Monts de Beaujolais (Stage 6), before the route crosses the Villerest dam to reach Roanne, the end of the mountains and the beginning of navigation in the Loire Valley.