Off to a wedding near Clermont-Ferrand at the end of June then having two weeks on holiday.

I know the Massif Central is literally a massive region but can anyone recommend good areas for biking? Looking for a mix of techy singletrack for me and some less techy touring routes for the wife.

Northern half of the area would be good if poss, probably going to see the TDF end of stage 5 and/or start of stage 6 as well.

Interested too. Not been able to find anything about from bike packing type holidays.

We had a couple of days around Chambon sur Lac last summer, it’s about an hour to 90 mins from Clermont Ferrand. Ask at the local tourist offices and you can get a map of VTT routes. The ski station at Mont Dore does uplifts in the summer I believe. A nice area, think of a drier Peak District or Yorkshire Dales with more trees and greater elevation.

They grade the routes green, blue, red but these seem to be based on metres of ascent per kilometre so it can be hard to figure out what to go for. Think XC riding rather than UK trail centre. There may be some of the latter but we didn’t find it.

Some towns/sectors are “sportive” rather than “famille”but until you are on them you don’t know what you’ll be doing. The routes we did were more farm track than single track but even so there were sections similar to Potato Alley, certainly needed the dropper and to pick your line. Navigation can be tricky – you have to keep an eye out for the VTT symbols, these are basically 100mm square post-its 😯 but there’s one for on route and one for off-route at important junctions.

I’ll try and dredge up more memories if I can.

2.5 hr drive from Clermont-Ferrand and I’ve never been but I saw it mentioned on here a while back.

http://www.tourisme-entraygues.com/fr/loisirs/documents/espace-vtt-ffc-gorges-lot-truy.pdf

2,5hrs south of C-F
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/route-guideride-report-france-tarn-cevennes-big-post-pic-heavy

We had hols there this year – bike and canoe.

Most of the trails we downloaded as gps were on viewranger. – and most were farm track and woodsy. Have a hunt, there is lots, and use the french vtt to search.

Super Besse is superb. – good trails, uplifted, massive choice. It also links up to other hills and routes – although there were some no vtt signs around on the popular ridges that we walked. Do go. A mini alpine resort. 8)

The canoeing was just superb – tepid water, hot weather, great rivers and awesome ice creams.

We stayed at a tiny village, up on the hill, outside Perrier, and in the 40*c heatwave it was a blessing to be cooler at night.

Not a biking route but while you are in c-F check out salvation Jane pub and let beef café.

Spent some time at Mont Dore a few years back. There are some tracks, but def the best were the following the walking trails in the area and grab a top map and have a look.
As someone else said, the tracks can range from boring double track thru to spincter clenching downhill runs.

It’s a nice area and nice to get up in the hills away from the heat down in Clermont

Local tourism office has this http://www.sancy.com/activites/detail/6845/le-mont-dore/espace-vtt-sancy

Just bookmarking

Ski resort Le lioran is good for mtb in the summer .

La Bourboule used to have a dh track in the early 90s , not sure if still there .

if you can understand french look on velovert.com , forum and choose the region , auvergne , limousin etc…

I am from millau , 2 hours south on the A75 , excellent riding , lots of outdoor activities like canoing , via ferrata , international cntre for paragliding , olympic size swimming pool , and lots more .

Excellent thanks folks

http://www.creuse-oxygene.com/france/espace-vtt-ffc-gueret-34.htm

1hr 45 from Clermont but there’s an awful lot of VTT trail.

It is a fabulous area, that deserves more IMO. I had no idea that central France was so mountainous /hilly/littered with walks and trails.

That and the wine and a warm week or two may have clouded my judgement….

Before the a75 was built, roads were very bad. Former French president Giscar d Estaing is from Clermont-Ferrand and he insisted that the a75 remained free of charge to attract more people to the area.

Tick