Barcelonette to Embrun: Feeling as Big as an Ant - French Alps 2017 - CycleBlaze

June 7, 2017

Barcelonette to Embrun: Feeling as Big as an Ant

Our hotel in Barcelonette held its breakfast buffet in the bar and it was a beehive of travellers preparing for a day of adventure when we showed up at 8am. We loaded up on everything they offered (fresh hard boiled egg, croissant, bread, butter, confiture, yogurt, cheese, orange juice, coffee, cereal and banana), then headed on our way under sunny skies towards Embrun. The road descended for a long while as it hugged the rushing alpine torrent of the Ubaye River.

Road heading out of Barcelonette.
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Good shoulders are typical of this size road.
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The rushing river was carrying a lot of silt, judging from its colour.
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Orchid.
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The Tour de France and the Etape du Tour will be on this route in July. That translates to 'new pavement ahead'.
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Water rushing towards Lac Serre-Ponçon.
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Rose.
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The scale of the landscape is growing bigger and grander by the day and we stop regularly to soak in its beauty. We spotted a cycling/walking trail on the opposite side the of the valley that was once a railway and which passes through some very long tunnels. It would have been incredibly cold in the tunnels and naturally, pitch dark. As it was, we passed through two tunnels on our way to the lake. We carry powerful head and tail lights with us for this purpose, a lesson we learned the hard way on a previous trip to France. In a nutshell, we entered a narrow curved unlit tunnel that was about 200m long and we both scared the b'jesus out of ourselves by the time we emerged into the daylight. Now we are always well lit.

First view of the Lac Serre-Ponçon.
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This tunnel had one way traffic. Glad to have our powerful headlamp and tail lights.
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Beautiful view of the artificial lake.
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Eventually the Ubaye river empties into Lac Serre-Poncon, formed in 1961 by the damming of the Durance River and the submerging of an entire village in the process. We rode to a 1025m summit along the eastern shore where we learned that the damn is the largest hydroelectric facility in France. The lake itself is about 20k long and is a gorgeous alpine aqua colour with many campsite on its shores, all deserted right now. The surrounding mountains rise between 2500 and 2700 metres. We spot the occasional birds of prey enjoying the updrafts and today it was a beautiful red kite. Words really don't adequately describe the beauty of it all. We took lots of photos.

View back to the earth dam that was built between 1955 and 1961.
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The lake is home to some beautiful campsites.
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Shot taken from the Belvedere. This is one of my favorite photos on this trip.
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Mystery totem pole. More research required.
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It doesn't get much more beautiful than this.
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After the summit the road wound down along the mountainside and gradually descended to the lakeshore.

Looking across at the bridge over Lac Serre-Ponçon.
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Les Desmoiselles Coiffees, which we call hoo-doos.
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It was not much further that we passed the north end of the lake and crossed a high bridge over the wild waters of the Durance river as we entered Embrun, our destination for today. Embrun will be a host city for this year's Tour de France.

The Durance River as it passes by Embrun.
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Today's ride: 55 km (34 miles)
Total: 869 km (540 miles)

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