Last week we went off on an adventure. Lugging our bikes up and up and up, we got hot, sweaty and hungry. The reward? Some of the most excellent singletrack in all the land!
The Queyras Regional Park is an area in the Hautes-Alps of France. I’m going to stick my neck out here and suggest that very few non-French MTBers will have heard of it, let alone know where it is. So if you’re still reading this, perhaps you’re scratching your head asking “where on earth is she on about?!”. Here’s a handy map:
Got a vaguely better idea now? Yes? Ok. Good.
If you’ve been for a little look around the rest of The Inside Line website, you may have noticed that we’ve said that the Queyras is our new favourite place to ride. Trails of sublime quality with fantastic scenery all around you. Perfect. And what better way to discover more of the area than with a point-to-point ride? So that’s what we did. We invited a couple of friends – Rob Forbes and Anthony Pease – to come along too.
In the Spring, one must be patient for Winter’s failing grip to at last give up, and so we waited until mid-June. Until the 17th in fact. With accommodation booked, bags packed and bikes ready to go: our Day Zero had finally arrived.
Our first little bit of excitement came quite early in the drive down. The relief of arriving in St Michel de Maurienne at 4.48pm, less than 15 minutes before they closed the road up to the Col de Galibier for a time-trail race, was palpable throughout the van. Phew! Any later and we’d have had to wait at least 2 hours before we could continue to our accommodation for that night which was still a fair way to go. Just before Guillestre we discovered a pizza van, a van so popular that we had to wait almost an hour for our order to be ready. Whilst we waited, we visited at a fort, saw the Hand of Titan, and stood in the eye-socket of the Angry Face, a rocky outcrop that really did look like an angry face! Our pizzas were finally ready and when we opened to boxes we realised we really didn’t need one each. They were huuuuuuuuge! We all agreed: that’s lunch for Day 1 sorted then!
The following day we drove to our start point in Abriès, bikes out, bags on, helmets in position: WE ARE GO! Day 1 took us over the Col du Malrif and down to Les Fonts. The catch was the 1300m of ascent, 800m of which would involve carrying the bikes on our backs. Or pushing. Previously David and I had done the ascent to the Lac de Laus, so it was nice to be able to mentally compartmentalise each part of our climb. Section 1: the pedal to the Bridge of no Sides (this became its title for the rest of the week, despite the fact that there are loads of bridges with no sides!) for a slice of pizza.
Section 2: the carry to the lake. There we planned to go for a swim. Section 3: the final carry up to the col. We seemed to reach the Bridge of No Sides in double quick time compared to last time. Our first slice of pizza was quickly despatched and we didn’t hang around long before commencing the hike-a-bike of section 2. There was the lake to get to after all! After an hour and a half of solid plodding, bike perfectly balanced on my back (yes, look mum, no hands!) I arrived at the lake. The boys had all beaten me to it and I was informed that it was waaaaay too cold to swim. Nevertheless I got my socks and shoes off super-fast and paddled in. They weren’t wrong! Almost immediately I had leg-freeze. Ooof!
We spent some time there enjoying the rest of our pizza and the stunning surroundings, feeling mildly jealous of the family who’d used a couple of lamas to bring their picnic/tents/children’s toys up with them! Setting off around the lake, I was last and passing a large group of walkers, I got a round of applause and a “félicitations!” as I passed! This was not to be the last time… and upon checking with the boys later, it seems this treatment was reserved only for girls 😉 . Pretty quickly bikes were on our backs again for the relatively short ascent up to a very snowy looking col. Behind us, the group of walkers were hot on our heels, and naturally we were keen to stay ahead of them. As we reached the snow, we noticed that they’d all stopped to watch our progress up and over the cornice: Ok! The pressure’s on! No one fall now! Luckily there was a good boot-pack and gaining the top of the col was relatively easy. Hoorah!
Whilst we readied ourselves for the descent, the first of the walkers reached us. Imagine our admiration as we looked round to see two women, probably in their late 70s or early 80s, making short work of the snow, well ahead of the rest of their group. Chapeau! I do hope I’m still messing about in the big mountains when I reach their age. They were a little flabbergasted by these crazy mountain bikers who’d carried their bikes all the way up here, and so we were requested to pose for a picture!
Now to the descent. There was some snow. Actually, there was a quite a lot of snow. Looked like we were in for our very own 4-rider version of the Megavalanche! We made our way down the first few loose rubbly turns and then David took the plunge off the rocks. He managed a few metres before his front wheel dug in and he was off. It was deep and soft! I watched as Rob headed out to the right in search of thinner snow. He didn’t find any but he did do a brilliant tripod job, weight right back, and got a fair way down. I had a right giggle managing to keep both feet up and weight right back, my bike kept going surprisingly well, with only a few stops to knock the heavy snow off the wheels. Pease got royally stuck at one point, actually having to dig the front wheel out – no amount of pulling would release it from the snow! We reached some dirt, only to find that it was so full of melt water that it was more like quick-sand! Sinking in with every step, we ran quickly to firmer ground and carved our own turns down onto a proper bit of trail.
After a brief pause, Rob set off hopping and poppin like a spring lamb, with David in hot pursuit. I tacked onto the back and followed down – this rocky, tech-flow trail was really quite good fun! It wasn’t that steep, but just enough gradient to keep us going. There were some great sections right alongside the river, and some cheeky little “up’n’overs” that kept us on our toes, trying not to get in the way of the person behind! Near the bottom we passed a couple of young chaps, and promptly fell off right in front of them – well, I think just David and I did anyway! The embarrassment! Haha! And at last, we rolled into our refuge for the night, the Refuge des Fonts. We were given a warm welcome and the option of a couple of different rooms. Compared to the refuges I’ve stayed at in the Savoie (usually in winter to be fair), I was struck by the cleanliness of the place, and the fairly “recent” looking beds. Nice!
It was only 4 o’clock so the boys got straight to work on the beers. To their delight, there was a plentiful supply of a local ale, La Tournante. Blonde, Ambrée, a Genepy flavoured one, and more – plenty of variations for them to try. About an hour later the old ladies arrived and glasses were raised, saluting one anothers’ acheivements that day – they told us they’d made short work of the snow, following in our tyre tracks. Good skills! That evening we enjoyed an excellent 5 course meal (if you count a plate of lettuce as a course anyway!), before heading off to bed. Day 1 done and dusted. Reflecting on the day, I’d definitely enjoyed it, but I felt ever so slightly short changed – for all of our effort that morning, we’d only had one descent. It was definitely a very fun descent, but I just felt like I wanted more. I fell asleep wondering what tomorrow and the rest of the week would bring.
Read about Days 2 and 3 here!