As the weather forecast looked very promising for the last weekend of October — with lots of sun and the daytime temperatures in upper teens or lower twenties — we decided to take Monday off and head for a short bike tour on this All Saints’ holiday. We had just […]
Thanks to the recent gas crises — due to the strikes at oil refineries 30-40% of the gas stations have shortage of at least one type of gasoline — Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes announced last week that all regional trains and buses were free this past weekend. We though about taking our bikes […]
This was the third time Martin Fourcade Nordic Festival was organized in Annecy, and the third time we attended. This year’s lineups for both biathlon and cross-country sprint races were quite impressive. There was supposed to be two Finnish biathlets, but on the race day we heard that one of […]
Yesterday we returned to the same rough area where we hiked three weeks ago. This time we started from a different place, at parking of La Doua. To reach the parking we drove several kilometers on a very rocky unpaved road, constantly fearing of getting a flat. The first part […]
The original plan was a bit more challenging hike (9K with D+/D- ~700m): a loop from Val Pelouse (1689m) to Refuge de la Perrière (1853m) , Col de la Perrière (1984m) and Source du Gargoton (1634m), and back to Val Pelouse. Because of the road closure some five kilometers before […]
This was again one of those hikes that go up, up, up and then down, down, down, and one can’t take the eyes off of the trail — otherwise one risks tripping or twisting an ankle. Supposedly easy (according to several sources) this hike was nice but somewhat tedious (11.6K […]
Another easy hike (11.6K in 3h 50mins, D+/D- 720m) deep in the Chartreuse range. The first half was quite boring, since we mostly walked in the forest and did not have many views to the surrounding mountains. The second part was much more interesting. It also traveled in the forest, […]
Recently our local newspaper advertised their magazines on hiking and biking trails in our department and the neighboring ones. I bought two issues that cover Isère, Drôme, Ardeche, Vaucluse, Savoie, Haute-Savoie, Hautes-Alpes, and Alpes-de-Haute-Provence (not so neighboring one, though). The information covered about the trails includes a short description of […]
We briefly visited the French capital this past weekend to leave our passport applications at the consulate. The Paris consulate is the only place to for the Finnish expats to apply for a passport in France, and it’s been made extremely expensive compared to applying for the passport in Finland; […]