Brittany – the land of striped T shirts, galette pancakes and cider – also has an extensive network of cycleways, riverside tracks and lanes. So Brittany is well set up for circular bike trips, or as the starting point for longer pan-European rides. This one is an easy tour of about 350 km with a high proportion off-road riding.
The port of St Malo is right next to the old town so it’s easy to grab a coffee or baguette before starting your trip. Although there are cycle routes that you can join directly at St Malo, such as the Euro Velo 4, this trip starts from Dinard. It’s a short ferry ride across the estuary to Dinard with a frequent service operated by two companies. Details in the ‘Travel’ section below.
Once in Dinard there’s a short section through the town before you get to the start of the cycle way – see screenshot below
The French velo tourism website is great resource for planning any cycle trip to France. On this trip we followed Cycleway 3 to just beyond Ploermel, then took a section of the Euro Velo 1 to Redon and headed back along Cycleway 2 via Rennes to Dinard. For some reason Cycleways 2 and 3 are shown on maps and marked on the trails as ‘V2’ and ‘V3’ and occasionally as ‘V42’.
The velo tourism website also gives stage by stage route maps and GPX downloads for each section.
The route from Dinard is a rail trail cycleway to start which takes you well out the town and then a mixture of lanes and canal side tracks to Dinan, an attractive medieval town with both a waterfront on the River Rance and a fortified town on the hill.
From Dinan most of the roads taken are quiet D classified roads linking villages or small towns, including Trevron, Plouasne, St Meen, Mauron and Ploermel. Apart from occasional farm traffic it’s a quiet ride through farming country.
Most of the canal and riverside sections are well surfaced gravel tracks – better surfaced than many UK roads!
Post-Covid many smaller villages seem to have lost their shops and cafes . This self-service pizza machine was a welcome find in one of those villages and saved us from a hungry night!
The V3 cycleway joins the Euro Velo 1 just south of Ploermel at the Nantes-Brest Canal. It’s worth taking a diversion northwards (about 15 km) to the small medieval town of Josselin with its impressive chateau which dominates the town.
Josselin, not suprisingly, has a street market with plenty of food and drink stalls plus a range of other shops. The chateau is worth a visit for the views alone.
Brittany still has small municpal campsites like this one at St Lery near Mauron – charging 8 Euros for two people!
After riding along the EV1 /Nantes – Brest Canal through Malestroit, St Martin-sur-Ouest to Redon you pick up the V2/V42 cycleway which mainly follows the river La Vilaine to Rennes.
Rennes is a busy city but has a good network of cycle tracks which take you through the city. The Cycle.Travel app should take you on a fairly low traffic route to the campsite or other accommodation in Rennes.
From Rennes follow the V2 cycleway back to Dinan and then reverse the route back to Dinard. Dinard is a stylish resort with beaches and coastal scenery to match so it’s worth spending a bit of time there before catching the small passenger ferry back to St Malo.
Practicalities
Travel
From the UK the easiest way to St Malo is to take the Brittany Ferries ferry from Portsmouth to St Malo. Currently (Summer 2024) there’s an overnight ferry that arrives in St Malo at 8.00am and daytime or overnight ferries back to Portsmouth.
From St Malo to Dinard the ferry company Corsaire run a regular small passenger ferry that takes bikes to and from Dinard. There is also a smaller ferry that runs to Dinard but doesn’t have a website. Both take bikes but be sure they stop at the Cale de la Vallée jetty in Dinard which has step-free access. The ferries operate from a jetty close to the St Malo old town and the cross-Channel ferry port.
Routes/maps
The France Velotourism site provides full route descriptions for the cycle route mentioned in this blog Cycle route V3, Cycle route V2 There is also detailed information on this French section of Eurovelo 1 (also called La Velodyssee in France). The most useful maps are the French IGN 100,000 maps sheets 124 and 115. These are readily available fron UK map sellers – make sure you get the latest editions of the maps as they have cyclce routes marked.
The Cycle.Travel website and app are also useful for finding low traffic routes between places and also can show accommodation near the route.
Accommodation.
The French Velotourism website lists accommodation for the routes it covers, although it doesn’t seem to list all campsites. A Google search for campsites in the areas you’re going to ride is probably the easiest way to find sites as the number of sites and their opening times seems to change. Booking.com works well for hotels and other accommodation.
