Route des Grandes Alpes

[bvddobb]

We did the Route des Grandes Alpes last week. A fantastic route! You should all consider it!

We were a bit early in the season (the route normally opens mid-June), so the two highest passes (Iseran and Galibier) were still closed and we had to take detours via the Madeleine and the Croix de Fer, respectively. But they are also great!

A great advantage of being early in the season was that is was still very, very quiet on the roads. Some motorists and cyclists here and there, but nothing like we understand happens in high season. (They told us: 2000 motorcycles crossing a col each day, in 14 hours that is 140 each hour, more than one every 30 seconds... not our idea of fun! The guy manning some stall on a col said he was wearing ear plugs all day then!) Some campsites were also still closed, but we could find enough that were already open.

The tour is easy to do with a VW van. There are some small roads here and there and some narrow bridges (3.2 m, with a 90 degree curve to enter), but nothing undoable. We don't know what will happen when the big white giants start popping up on some of those roads in high season, though...

Here is a little video we compiled, to give you a feel for it:

 

[Shaun]

Great little film
although i did struggle with the sub titles a bit

We need more of this sort of thing to combat the negativity on the site at the moment

 

[Andy]

I did this on my BMW K1200 motor bike 8 years ago. Great route with fantastic views.
In places is a 12 wall to stop you going over the edge of 500 foot drop !

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[teeboy]

That looks awesome - we did the light version of this earlier this year - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Route_Napol%C3%A9on - and we only did about half of that.

Did you do the full route?

Think it is something we would need to do without kids - after the 40th alp they do get a bit bored

 

[bvddobb]

In places is a 12 [inch] wall to stop you going over the edge of 500 foot drop !

But most of the time there isn't anything at all... ! So you need to drive carefully. We noticed quite a few small memento's on the side of the road for motorists and cyclist that went over the edge, apparently...

Did you do the full route?

Yes, we did the full route from Thonon-les-Bains on Lake Geneva to Menton on the Mediterranean.
Although with two slight variants, because the Iseran and Galibier weren't open yet. And we did detours up and down the St Bernard because that opened when we were there (quite a ceremony!), and to Alpe d'Huez.

Think it is something we would need to do without kids - after the 40th alp they do get a bit bored

We took 7 days, 100km of driving a day only, to allow for enough time to get out, for lush picknicks, to walk around and visit small villages, waterfalls, gorges, castles and forts and what have you. No need for kids to get bored, enough to see and do along the route.

 

[Andy]

In places is a 12 [inch] wall to stop you going over the edge of 500 foot drop !

But most of the time there isn't anything at all... ! So you need to drive carefully. We noticed quite a few small memento's on the side of the road for motorists and cyclist that went over the edge, apparently...

Did you do the full route?

Yes, we did the full route from Thonon-les-Bains on Lake Geneva to Menton on the Mediterranean.
Although with two slight variants, because the Iseran and Galibier weren't open yet. And we did detours up and down the St Bernard because that opened when we were there (quite a ceremony!), and to Alpe d'Huez.

Think it is something we would need to do without kids - after the 40th alp they do get a bit bored

We took 7 days, 100km of driving a day only, to allow for enough time to get out, for lush picknicks, to walk around and visit small villages, waterfalls, gorges, castles and forts and what have you. No need for kids to get bored, enough to see and do along the route.

I did it on my own so took it steady. Loads of bikes overtook me very fast. Seem to remember going down a gorge/cave somewhere.
Also did whole route, 9 days uk to uk, 5 in alps. Was a great trip, highly recomended. Did route napoleon north.

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[KernowLad]

Superb!

Just been to Brittany and it was lovely and quiet; unlike here which was rammed with tourists!

We have a month in Europe from 28th July and I'm wondering if we should do some Alps stuff in it; I'd love to see them in Summer.

 

[Andy]

Great video, bought back memories of my trip. Wow still a lot of snow around. Road surface has deteriorated a lot since I was there.