Lausanne to Aigle (60 kms)

We got on our bikes to complete the second leg of Route 1. Deciding to incorporate our day's ride with a night of camping, we drove to Aigle to set up camp in the local caravan park. Rather than take off from Lausanne (the point where we last finished) we chose to ride downhill from Aigle to Lausanne and then caught the train back to our campsite.

It was a fantastic bike path, taking us through apple orchards, alongside the River Rhone, through forests, along the lake, up through vineyards and finally into the very hilly city of Lausanne. It was a hot and humid day, with a tropical downpour of rain as well. Hardly the weather we expected to encounter in Switzerland!

This section was about 60kms and we completed it in about 3.5 hours. More photos available on Flickr.

Geneva to Lausanne (60 kms)

Entering ourselves in the June 12 CycloLeman bike race was the inspiration we needed to start our ride along Swiss National Cycling Route 1. The race offered riders three options of varying distances. We took the shortest one: 60kms from Geneva to Lausanne.

The roads were kept safe by officials and it was a challenge to get there fairly quickly. There was a nice tailwind and we made it to the finish line ahead of the recommended time for slow riders, in about 2 hours and 20 minutes. After the race we had lunch at the 'pasta party' put on by race organisers then caught the train back home. More info on http://pjgardner.blogspot.com/2005/06/geneva-to-lausanne-cyclotour-leman.html

In non-race conditions, this section of Swiss National Route 1 takes you away from the main roads by following back streets through quaint Swiss villages. It involves a bit of climbing to get up and away from the lake road.

Nine National Cycling Routes

The Swiss have 9 national cycling routes with a total length of over 3,000 kilometres.

We're going to start our cycling adventure by tackling Route 1 from Geneva to Andermatt (the pink line from the bottom LH corner of this map). It's a total of 309 kms and rated at a 'low' level of difficulty.

Our plan is to do the trip in small sections whenever we have a free weekend, taking the train or car to start off at the point where we finished last time. At first we plan to ride about 50kms each Saturday and Sunday, camping overnight.