After some beer last night, me and a few mates have started looking at a ride from London to Paris.

Has anyone done this? we are looking at the avenue verte route. Thinking of doing it in 3days bike packing.

Sleeper from Scotland to London on thursday night, riding fri, sat and sun then eurostar back again.

Will welcome any input. we are more social cyclists, coffee beer and wine rather than mile munching. 100km a day would be a rough guide.

Cheers

Not sure Eurostar are accepting bikes at the moment.

Website here:

https://www.avenuevertelondonparis.co.uk/

There’s a guidebook too.

Very tempted to do it on my Brompton…

I did it in 24 hours, it was hard graft but good fun.
Conclusions were:
London to Dover is quite pleasant once out of London, but Kent is hillier than you’d like.
Northern France is rolling, which can be quite pleasant, but is hellish if there a northerly head wind…which is exactly what I got.
Parisian drivers are mental.

I’ve done Dieppe to Paris and back, twice, once with mates, once with my wife.

Don’t faff too much in Dieppe Ferry terminal after immigration, they lock the gates as soon as the cars have gone!

Day 1 is very flat and as a result, you can get saddle sore.

On one of the return legs we did the longer option out of Paris, I think it was a more interesting route if you have the time (I accidentally left a spare day before our return ferry which was meant we did the longer leg!)

The Avenue Verte into Paris follows the river and then the canal system, its not a very scenic route and you are confined to the canal-side whilst passing rougher areas. We got approached a couple of times, it can be a bit worrying when you have all your kit on the bike and limited options to cycle off if you are just with your wife.

We’ve only done that route once, the first trip and the return on the way out we took a more direct route through some lovely parks and neighbourhoods, much more enjoyable 🙂

The route below was river and canal in, direct route back out. The riverside bit around Le Vesinet is lovely but once you cross over I’d recommend making your own way into Paris rather than the canals.

I did l2p as an organised charity ride, I’d never done any real distance before and it was an enjoyable challenge. London to Dover was a pain, France was great.

Ride London to Newhaven and ferry to Dieppe, hotel in Dieppe, then early start and ride to Paris on some of the Avenue Verte. DM and I can send you our route. Much better than the typical Calais-Paris route and we avoided the dodgy areas described above. Although we did Dieppe-Paris in the day.