Hi,

Anyone done any riding in this part of France, me and Mrs Bedwas are going in June and were thinking of taking bikes for some rides.

cheers

some nice riding around Mur De Bretagne. there is a offroad trail from pontivy to Loriant on the south coast.
been 3 times and always take the bike and find some nice stuff to ride.

Not seen any specific xc trails as such, but there are xc marathons in the area. I found out about them at the local Mairie. Pontivy in my case.

Thanks both, really intersted in the off road route from Pontivy to Lorient. Do you have any more info?

Where abouts are you going as it’s quite a big place? I live in Saint Malo and the local riding (within 30mins) is okay for a quick blast but, TBH I normally use my CX bike locally. If your coming around this area I can tell you more.

There are a few “trail centers” dotted around see here.

As you’re coming in June see if there is a randonee near you here as these are usually excellent.

Thanks for the good links, my mum is living near Ploermel so we’l spend a couple of days there and probably head for the coast nr Benodet. We’ve spent some time riding Alpes Mancelles north of Le Mans and that was great with some excellent red routes.

Within 30min of Ploermel is Saint Thurial (just off the N24) which has a nice route going around the town with a fantastic bit through some woods with a quarry to play in.

A bit further a field is Pont Rean which has some great riding around a small gorge (follow the GR route or contact http://www.boelvtt35.fr/ for a GPX).

There is some good riding in the Forêt Paimpont (there is a few circuits on http://www.utagawavtt.com/) although the best bits (that I know of) are cheeky.

I’ve also heard good things about Saint-Malo-de-Beignon but I’ve never ridden there.

I stopped at the Ty Nadan camp site a few years ago which is near Quimperle. There were some great routes which led straight form the site and followed the woods along the valley (even a bit of ST).

They have a national cycle route which is marked by a red & white stripe painted on kerbs, trees and lamp posts and it goes through woods, villages, towns, farmers fields etc. You can just keep going and going. I found some amazing trails which led to broken stone bridges crossing streams past abandoned farm house which looked likes scenes painted by Monet… down into Quimperle, une cafe ole, follow your nose back. Fantastic.

Buy some maps though… got very lost at least once.

As an aside I’d recommend the little restaurants in Ste Marine on the other side of the river to Benodet, bistro place and also a very cute Creperie. Benodet is quite a large place now),I’ve spent a lot of time there whilst sailing in the area and we’d always favour the pontoons on the Ste Marine side. Note sure about riding access but I’d do some research around headland at Pont du Raz and there are some quite sizeable hills and beautiful countryside around Western part behind Brest.

I agree with the maps. You can get IGN 1:25k maps in supermarkets and bookshops and, whilst not as accurate as the OS (what is?), they show some good detail. I’ve followed all sorts of routes in Normandy with them and been greeted with lots of ‘bonjour cycliste’ and never ‘ger owf my land’.

Thanks, for all your replies lots to research before i go, good advice with the maps have found myself “lost in France” before.