Col de l’Iseran appeared in stage 9 of the 2007 Tour. Formerly, the highest road in Europe, 2007 is the 70th anniversary of the opening of the road over this legendary mountain pass. The gift shop t-shirts still claim it to be the highest. Still, at 2,770 metres (9000 feet) it is [...]

My Fat Cyclist Jersey arrived and i was thrilled to christen it by riding up the Cormet de Roselend, a beautiful climb that was part of Stage 8 of this year’s Tour de France via the classic north route via Col du Meraillet.
Fat Cyclist is a terrific cycling blog run by the Fat Cyclist - [...]

Col du Galibier via Col du Telegraphe is the biggest climb in France in terms of altitude gain. I can get to the base of Telegraphe from home in an hour forty-five - as it starts right next to an autoroute - sweet.

What a great Bastille Day. Doreen and I cycled up the Col de la Colombiere to watch the Tour de France. People and cyclists everywhere and hot!
We rode up with Brian - his first week in Geneva and already cycling mountains. Martin and Barry took the train from Geneva and bravely [...]

For the French long weekend, we drove to Provence staying in the beautiful medieval town of Avignon.
Friday I cycled up the legendary volcano Le Mont Ventoux. I have cycled ventoux before but never from the Malaucene side. This route is almost exactly the same difficulty as the more classic Bedoin route (21 [...]

What a trip.  Our most ambitious cycling vacation ever.  Our first visit to the Southern French Alps.  Eight big climbs in 8 days. Every one a legendary Tour de France route.  Hard work but really fun.   it was a  dream of mine to climb Bonette (the highest road in Europe) and Izoard [...]

   
The last day of vacation.  Climbing Alpe d’Huez is a great way to end a great trip.  I woke up early and descended to the bottom of mountain.  I tried to ride a few flat kilometres to warm up before the ride but it is the biggest travel day of the year and so I [...]

5th big climb in five days as our Southern Alps adventure continues.  This may be the most scenic Col we have ever ridden.
Starting from Barcelonnette in the South Alps this little sinuous road climbs along side a cliff high above a steep canyon and then hairpins over the mountain towards the mediterranean 100kms [...]

Today I cycled up the Col du Glandon and the Col de la Croix de Fer (23 km climb and about 5,000 feet vertical) to watch the second huge Alps stage in the Tour de France.

This was the 2006 Tour de France stage when Landis hit a wall - the day before his “miraculous” comeback.

Through most of the 20th century, the Col de l’Iseran was known as the highest road in Europe. While no longer quite the highest, it literally goes over the French Alps near (and well above) the ski resort at Val d’Isère. It had been a dream of mine to climb this Col since a ski [...]