Day Seventy Seven: Mayenne to Domfront

June 12, 2017

We picked up where we left off, in the sense that we had quit 4 kms before Mayenne. So we had 4 kms of the same peaceful river, field, and cow scenery that we have been enjoying the past couple of days.

Peaceful morning on the now familiar canal

Weirs and locks. The canal ride was very pleasant.

Our favourite view of bridges, with calm water

As was the case with Chateau Gontier and Laval, we did not really go into Mayenne, which did look interesting, if a bit up hill. Rather we shifted from the Mayenne river to a rail trail that forms the continuation of the Velo Francette.

One more look at Mayenne, and we were out of town

The rail trail was in fact much like the tow path except that it lacked, of course, the water. The rail trail also felt a little more remote, in that there were far fewer people on it and very few touring cyclists. The lack of people is no doubt related to the weekend being over, but it does seem that this bit is less used by cyclists. In fact, none passed us going north, and anyone on the trail north anywhere near us would eventually have passed!

One other little cue about remoteness came in the form of a family of minks (or other form of weasel) that were on the path. The mother hustled three babies away, leaving two to scream at us. But she was soon back and ordered them off the path too.

The rail line that was the basis for the trail was built between 1860 an 1874. Operations largely stopped in 1970, but some part of the service hung on until 1987. Most of the track is gone now, replaced by the trail, but a short stretch remains. On this in summer it seems you can rent a self powered rail car and pedal a few kilometres on it.

The rail trail ran about 20 kms, passing by a few towns before ending. I would like to say that the shops in the towns were closed (this being Monday!?) but actually we did not find any shops. In the whole day, we did not for example see a single bakery, closed or otherwise. We had been running on food from our bags since before supper last night, and got pretty hungry.

A blurry shot because of low light, but how about these guys!

In this warning sign the car looks positively jolly. The cyclist - not so much.

We continued to rely on cherry trees, in the absence of any stores. The yellow cherries are edible like that, but when fully ripe they develop a red blush.

Lunch stop in Fraimbault. The town is a "four flower" flowered village - a very high rating. But though there were a fair number of flowers we have seen much more impressive displays elsewhere.

Lots of brown and white cows here have eye patches - like this cute baby.

Now that we are pretty much really in Normandy we notice how all the houses are made of stone. Stone houses with flowers are particularly attractive. Here are a few:

Hunger was soon to be only one of our problems as the route began to go wonky on us. The first problem came as we ran into a Route Baree (Road closed) sign. We guffawed at this, with our usual comments that maybe the road had been worked on some months ago, or the workers will all be in the cafe, and suchlike.

Well the workers may have been in the cafe, or may have left months ago, but they left a long stretch of road covered a foot deep in loose gravel, side to side. We found a 2 inch slightly passable bit on the side and pushed our bikes through this for a good bit. After a while a section came where cars had somewhat compacted the gravel. Still not rideable - at least in our judgement. But we watched as at the other end a pair of rare cyclists tried riding. The first went down hard and took a while to get up.

The pair were Dutch and told us that a nice stretch by a river was coming. They didn't mention that the road there, while sort of paved, was too rough to easily ride.

These problems were fairly minor, and par for the course in a day's cycling. Things only really went south at the town of Torchamp. Our map book mentioned food and lodging there - lies, but the real problem came when a Francette sign pointed us left and the GPS and map book said right. We went right. The GPS and route map then called for a left turn coming soon. We saw no signs, but cruised by a construction crew who were tearing up a street on the left. Waitaminute, that's our turn!

We went back and around the crew, but I paused to try reaming out a worker. "Do you know that this is part of the Velo Francette?" "What?" "Have you seen any signs that you may have thrown away?" "What?"

So we carried on down the path, until we crossed a bridge and wound up on loose gravel. It was sort of rideable, assuming your fillings were glued in well. We half rode and half walked. Along the way were some red plastic fencing mesh bits, that people had cast aside, and there were some sections of chain link fence, that people had gone around.

Eventually the gravel relented, and we came to the largely unmarked intersection of two of the major veloroutes of France - the Francette and the Veloscenie. Just beyond we met two more Dutch cyclists. They asked us if this was the way to La Rochelle, pointing in exactly the wrong way. We put them straight and carried on. Soon the path dumped out onto a busy, no shoulder road. We knew we needed the Tourist Information in Domfront, so we headed that way. We had already seen the spire of the Domfront church, so we had a good fix on where the town was,

The road was totally infested with heavy trucks, predictable since it was a 900 level D road. Then it headed steeply uphill. We changed sides of the road a few times, looking for any shoulder or vestigial sidewalk. Traffic was fast and unforgiving. So much for "Welcome Cyclists"!

We saw one sign (only) for tourist information, pointing uphill. Domfront styles itself a medieval town, and sure enough the medieval bit is at the top of a hill. A road worker confirmed it - tourist information was in the least accessible cyclist place, at the very top. So up we pushed.

Several kms of barely cyclable loose gravel

The unmarked, unheralded intersection of Francette and Veloscenie

It looks like Domfront has been captured by a giant Dalek.

Domfront does have a small but intriguing old section

The "Dalek" church has a unique design. It is actually called the St Julien church and is neo-Byzantine. It is a 20th century production! The site had not enough room to support a traditional latin cross, so they went with squared Byzantine style frame. They also made it from concrete and finished with mosaic tile. In this distant photo you can not see, but the main graphic has lots of saints that are from this region. For example there is St Louis, the King who who was born in Domfront.

Many walls are mosaic, this is a close look at a basic wall.

This old renault was parked in the square, maybe to add atmoshere

The Saint Julien chapel (dalek church) on the main square

Descending from the hill we hit this roadblock. I made the workers prepare a way through for us (fed up with this nonsense).

The lower, somewat newer part of Domfront

Domfront is a major bike route crossroads. Unfortunately it is also a major truck route crossroads and big D roads cut through it this waay and that.

Today's ride: 57 km (35 miles)
Total: 3,769 km (2,341 miles)

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