Ok to take my mind of the looming pain of my tooth extraction I would like to seek the knowledge of the STW collective.

My brother has a house in Quillan in southern france. Its on the edge of the pyrenees kinda between Tolouse and Perpinngon (sorry for the spelling my mouth hurts and I am on 4 different pain killers, five if you include whisky).

So we plan to drive there in the summer as a weeks road trip with the family. Currently best value crossing looks like Dover to Dunkirk.
I don't mind it taking a while to get there and there will definately be at least one overnight stop involved en-route. So what do people reccomend as where to stop off, what little diversions to take on the way down etc etc. France is new to me as a touring destination so all advice is welcome. The general plan is to set of from leeds on the sunday afternoon, and be back in Leeds by the end of the following saturday (so like 6 days in total) with probably 3-4 nights spent in my brothers place.

All advice welcome as this is the first roadtrip for clan CHB.

I did Bradford – Perigeux in '95, went via Le Shuttle, so we drove from Calais. The route went something like this, if I remember correctly:

Calais – Boulogne – Abbeville – Rouen – Evreux – Dreux – Chartres – Orleans – Limoges – Brive-la-Gaillard – Perigeux, with an overnight stop in Dreux on the way out & Chartres on the way back. Fantastic cathedral in Chartres if that kind of thing floats your boat. Dreux was not much to look at but it was literally just an overnight stop.
Mostly fast N-routes rather than Autoroutes, so not much in the way of tolls, but the roads may have been upgraded since then

From Brive you'd carry on to Toulouse and then on to Quillan

just looked at the map, there are a lot of Autoroutes there now that weren't there then, especially the Orleans – Brive section

You can do it in a day. We do lille to Perpignan in about 10 hours.

If you do want to stop, somewhere like Bourge is about 1/2 way and quite nice.

Personally I would boot it down and then do your travelling using Quillan as a base. ie Les Angles, Ax les Thermes, Andorra are within striking distance of Quillan.

Get a Formule 1 booklet and when you are within an hour of needing to stop phone ahead and book a room.

When we drive to the alps we always figure out where we're going to be by 10pm and book a place there. There's usually a cheap good restaurant on the same site so we park, eat drink sleep and can be off again at 5am.

No idea where to stay on the way, but Quillan area is just looooovely! Are you taking bikes?

You can do it in a day once you get to France, yes.

Leeds to Dover is a good 5-6 hours on top of that – I wouldn't want to be driving for 16 hours in one go with just a short break for the channel crossing. That's why I chose to break at Dreux rather than keep going

Longest I've spent behind the wheel was 9 hours, Vancouver to Lake Louise. That's plenty long enough

You should seriously take the loop south of Paris via Rouen, Chartres and Orleans like john_drummer suggested. But, I would then take the A71 + A75 past Clermont Ferrand to Millau – Its a really nice drive and you get to go over over that little bridge – then on to Beziers(final bit opening up for this summer)

If I were to drive down from Yorkshire, I would consider one of the overt'night ferry crossings like Portsmouth to Caen and get a cabin. You could do the second part of the journey easily in a day even if not pushing it. France might be a bigger country, but the the transport network is second to none.

You didnt say if you were taking your bike!
have a look at the some of the trails around Quillan

Via the millau viaduct is a big detour

Orlean, Toulouse, Foix, Quillan is the shortest. Also the A9 from Bezier to Perpignan is a car park during the summer.

Via the millau viaduct is a big detour

Not really, an hour or so if I rightly recall, besides, the A9 isnt that bad on a Monday.

Thanks for the advice so far. Will look into pricing up sailing from Portsmouth. Dover to Dunkirk is only about £60 return. But Portsmouth would save on a hotel cost and also diesel, so may offset that!

Believe me, it is way more than an hour.

Also the sections of autoroute A6 before the turn to Quillan are pretty much always blocked during the Summer by traffic going towards Spain.

>No idea where to stay on the way, but Quillan area is just looooovely!

+1

how about sailing to Santander or Bilbao (from Plymouth I think)? very short drive from there… and you get a nice mini cruise thrown in too.

Unless the weather's bad, I'm told the Bay of Biscay is not very nice in bad weather 😈

Ferry portsmouth to Caen is £500, so I think thats out.
I looked at Santender, but thats ££££££'s

Trying to do this on a bit a a shoestring.

So a £60 crossing and an overnight in an Ibis wins over a £500-700 ferry crossing.

Whatever you spend on fuel in France, the tolls will be more…

Try here on the way down:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oradour-sur-Glane

I love it down there. A mate has a place above Quillan near Nebias.
The routes on the guide here are pretty good for starters.
http://cdt11.tourinsoft.com/upload/MEDIA_511cb426-f90e-4e0b-b1b5-465a91e99799.pdf
Theres also some awesome stuff on the IGN maps that isnt strictly legit like this decent into Quillan itself 🙂

the bar in the square at the bottom:

Dont forget the Blanquette de Limoux – much better than champagne.

I think Ive got some google kmz file ssomewhere, as well as a marked up IGN which I could photograph if you want. just email me.

stoner………..and your bike is parked outside another bar, by the river.

spent a week in that area (axat) last may with the roadbikes.
got pis5ed twice inthe very bar in your picture.
the landlord bloke is a big rugby league fan too……… 😆

and the river that runs down the gorge from axat to quillan is the onei nearly drowned in when whitewater rafting.

I didnt think there'd be a river deep enough for you ton… 🙂

Couldnt make it to Quillan this year as too much to do on the buildiing site so only went to Brittany. Normally the family and I like to get a month or so in the SW of France but Aude is definitely my favourite bit.

outside the bar stoner mentioned.

nice one ton. Lovely spot.

If you go again take your mtb! and drop me a line for some routes.

a few more pics of the area….cos it is nice

i love weeks away on the bikes. 8)

good snow!

one day:

the next:

wow!

+2 3? for a recommendation for the area, it's lovely. Really unspoiled and fantastic scenery.

We were there a few years ago:

more here:
=http://www.flickr.com/photos/richardstarkie/sets/72157594180857499/

looks likes the VTT routes around Montbel there mrsF.

Where were you staying? Chalabre?

Was the cliff shot with the red earth the bit to the NE of Nebias?

We stayed in a campsite up on a plateau above Quillan, but can't for the life of me remember the village, it wasn't Chalabre, although we did a couple of routes starting there