#90 The Upper Rhône • www.eBiketraveller.site

The second half of my trip up the Rhône where it meanders and zig-zags east towards Geneva and Lac Léman was even better than the first half.

Thursday 21 April 2022. Lyon • Morestel |130 km|

[Cool, partly overcast; no wind. The Rhône meanders and splits all over the place along here, with the official designated Via Rhôna cycle track on both sides of the river in some places and though I managed to stay on EV17/Via Rhôna most of the way, I lost the river completely around Montalieu for the last 30-odd km and deviated far off to the south to the town of Morestel. Looking back at the map later (like, a year later!), I realised I must have missed the sign that said cross the river at Montalieu-Vercieu].

Heading north and east out of the city of Lyon following the river is easy, as the EV17 and Via Rhôna signposts are right where you’d expect them to be and so is the track itself. It’s slightly complicated at the Pont de Croix Luezet interchange (zoom in on the map above) because there’s an alternative track along the southern side of a canal that appears to be more logical, so just remember to go up and up again over the canal on the A42 bridge (safe enough as you’re in a separated bike lane) and follow to canal back in the other direction on the other side back around to the river proper.

After Lyon, you’re soon back into pleasant country alongside the river. What I found particularly nice apart from the scenary along here was watching the people enjoy their river sports around the town of Sault-Brénaz. Lots of well-supervised young kids and teenagers were out in their rented kayaks and rafts with all the gear, shooting the mini-rapids in both natural and artificial whitewater courses constructed in and alongside the river. It looked like it was an organised competition day. Maybe not.

I could have – and should have – stayed there, or at least enquired about doing so, as there were several nice-looking campgrounds to choose from. But I was too embarrased to impose myself upon such a large social group, and anyway I could see from the Bosch eBike map app that there would other camping opportunities further along.

I missed out on all these campgrounds because I had ‘lost’ the river altogether shortly after Sault-Brénaz and had wandered off into non-camping territory! I was still on a bike-path alright, just the wrong one.

The batteries were running flat by Morestel and the campground I’d been aiming for for the last 40 km turned out to be closed for the season (and didn’t look much anyway), so after first checking with the local Tourist Bureau and finding out my options were rather limited, I ended up staying at Sakura hotel in the middle of town. For €90, it was quite good value I have to say. What a strange out-of-the-way quiet French country town in which to find a genuine Japanese Ryokan-style inn! Quaint, immaculate and furnished in the Japanese style. Their €10 Poké bowl was great, and the 2 beers and ½-litre of rosé went down well too. But I didn’t sleep well – too stressed out wondering how I’d managed to wander so far off the river I guess.

Friday 22 April 2022. Morestel • (Satigny) Geneva |146 km|

[Sunny, then overcast, then scattered rain: a fairly typical European spring day. Quite a lot of quiet tarred secondary road in the afternoon, as well as the usual tarred and untarred (dirt) Via Rhôna standard cycle paths in the morning. A tiring day with a bit of climbing involved (1543 m)].

From Morestel I made a bee-line directly back to the Rhône again by the shortest route (Fear Of Missing Out, they call it). A few pleasant kilometers further on, I thought I knew better than believing the signposts that said cross the river at Seyssel to follow the Route du Barriage on the other side, and so instead I got rewarded with a lovely view and an exhausting 300 m climb up onto a ridge to the village of Usinens.

I started to run out of power at around the 130 km mark and so pulled into a carpentry workshop on the edge of a farming village in the middle of nowhere where they let me charge up for as long as I liked. They basically just tossed me the keys and went home, saying: “lock up when you leave”! I spent over an hour there.

The rural landscape gradually melded into semi-urban, with an almost continuous row of housing bordering the road now, and with the start of the glide path into Geneva airport overhead. Setting my Bosch GPS destination to the closest campground, I headed up out of the Rhône valley through a forest park into the adjacent valley of the River Allandon and came to Camping Cantonal Du Val d’Allondon at the bottom of a dank and narrow gorge, just past the Geneva outer suburb of Satigny and right on the French-Swiss border. It was quiet and morose but at least it was open and receiving visitors. But of sustenance there was none – luckily, I had on board a few patisserie items left over from my lunch stop and I didn’t starve to death.

Saturday 23 April 2022. Geneva to Basel |80km (of cycling)|

[It had rained all night and it was cold outside too. Not that it bothered me much in my snug little tent. It was drizzling off and on coming down into the campground last night but held off long enough to get the tent set up. Same this morning – mostly held off until I’d packed up everything and started riding – clearing showers anyway. It did rain again, quite heavily, for two hours after midday but I dried out soon enough and it cleared up for the rest of the day, though it was miserably cold all morning].

I was cold, wet and hungry and was soon hunting a nice patisserie, but it took a 20m ride into the built-up environs of Geneva, passing in and out of Switzerland and France the whole way, to find one. And a very nice nice one it was too – the best yet, I’d say, in all my travels.

I even ordered in French and got exactly what I ordered, though to be honest pointing at the actual goodies behind the glass and reading off their labels probably had a lot to do with my success. Rather prim and rather gruff the behind-the-counter folk were, and so I figured I had finally arrived in Switzerland (that’s before I realised I’d already been passing in and out of Switzerland since yesterday), but no, I was wrong – the patisserie Le Fournil de la Fontaine in Ferney-Voltaire, is actually nestled in a quiet little 100m pocket inside France. Such is the non-border here between France and Switzerland. But I’m still sure the dour staff were Swiss though.

Well fortified after munching down on a variety of hot and cold bakery snacks, I set off for what turned out to be a really nice day’s riding. I’d worked out that I’d already effectively bypassed Geneva on the western edge of the city and so GPSed myself towards Lausanne at the other end of Lac Léman.

This was a simply-enough made, yet major, decision since had I gone east here, it would have meant going around the eastern shore of Lac Léman then continuing along the Rhône to it’s source, and hence across the mountainous terrain of Switzerland to meet up with the Rhine headwaters at Rheinquelle. That would added an extra week’s cycling to my journey at least and as I was kind of in a hurry to get to Scotland to time my arrival with my daughter’s free time from university, I decided to abandon that plan and go the quicker westerly route. Such were my ruminations while scoffing down some nice pastries next to the fountain outside Le Fournil de la Fontaine.

After getting going again, I soon realised from signposts that I was very close to CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research. I’m a bit of a science nerd and I was quite chuffed to discover afterwards that I’d ridden right over the top of the 27-km diameter underground ‘race track’ of the Large Hadron Collider’s particle accelerator.

The well-heeled shores of Lac Léman did not disappoint and certainly looked very well-heeled in a James Bondish sort of way.

I was still on one of the official routes of the Rhône cycle route EV17 anyway.

The headquarters of FIFA, the International Federation of Football Associations that governs the world of soccer, is along this stretch of lakeside too. It’s a very ugly building and here it is if you don’t believe me. What were they thinking? Maybe you’ll like it.

The HQ of FIFA, Lac Léman, Geneva

The intermittent rain became more of a downpour during my cycle ride along the shore of Lac Léman, and I didn’t fancy the prospect of hauling myself up into the Swiss Alps at the other end of it, so I made the decision to catch a train to Basel at the first opportunity.

It was easy enough buying a ticket from the machine at Morges station; that is, once a nice Swiss family helped me by doing all the hard work of sorting the best itineray to get there for me. And it ‘only’ cost €67 – for myself, that is, but then had to fork out another €58 for Ziggy, my bike. For just a 2½-hour journey! Who says Switzerland aint expensive.

From the quiet comfort of my railway carriage, the Swiss countryside rolling by looked exactly like it should, that is, like a Toblerone advert: lush hillsides populated by contented cows wearing cowbells, with the occasional picture-perfect chalet-syle farmhouse.

It was overcast and threatening rain when the train slid into Basel Hauptbahnhof at around 6 pm. I got Ziggy to GPS me to what turned out to be a lovely campingplatz situated on the left bank of the Rhine (though unfortunately 10km upriver from Basel at the village of Kaiseraugst, and I was heading downriver).

It’s called Camping und Schwimmbad am Rhein and was very friendly, tucked away anominously as it was behind a derelict industrial site. €22 for power, shower and pitch right on the river bank, and another €40 for dinner of hamburger and 3 large steins of beer, all while mingling with the locals at the campground’s amiable canteen/restaurant/bar.

It was calm and so beautiful and tranquil sitting there gazing out at the swift-flowing river only metres away, and at the happy stork families nesting on a row of poles right next to the tent, right up to and beyond sunset at around 9pm, and I didn’t pay much attention to rigorously securing all the tent guy ropes before turning-in.

But at 2 am a vicious storm blew up with torrents of lashing rain and teeth-rattling winds and I had to get out and re-peg the fly properly to stop it flapping itself to pieces. Lesson learned.