The Rampen family contains three children of a mid-teen persuasion these days. During the spring the difficult question arose: How to share a successful summer holiday together? Beaches and sun tanning were out -vetoed by dad, hill running equally sent packing by the remainder, so what might we do that contained some aspect of outdoor adventure?

The answer came surprisingly simply on the internet when I discovered a husband and wife organisation called Breton Bikes This family, Kate and Geoff Husbands and their three children, have lived in Brittany for the past 15 years and have turned their hobby of cycle camping into a livelihood. They do four simple things very well to assist a family like ours make a successful bid at cycle touring.

First: they provide each person with a lightweight hybrid bike that has been purpose designed for cycle touring (by them).

Second: they provide the balance of equipment that you need to camp successfully: tents, lightweight sleeping bags, camping mats, stoves, panniers, handle-bar bags, cutlery, plastic dishes and a map. You need only bring clothes and toiletries (and buy food along the route).

Third: they produce a detailed route description for a circuit that is tailored to your capabilities and needs.

Four: they are at the end of the phone and will pick you up in the event of an accident or arrive, within an hour or two, to effect a repair on a malfunctioning bike.

Arguably the first two items might be transported from home, though with five bikes this becomes a logistics nightmare. It is really the latter two aspects that make the Husbands so indispensable. The key was their detailed route knowledge, taking us on canal tow paths, abandoned railways and very minor traffic-free roads. Particularly lovely was the Nantes-Brest canal which figured rather heavily in our route, not only beautiful, it was shady and offered the option of riding two up without fear of being mowed down by cars. The canal extends diagonally across Brittany and would form a good basis for an A to B route on its own.

They provided us with a few different route choices on arrival, with most averaging about 50 km/day. This distance seemed about right with our teenagers over the terrain. Typically we were in the saddle about 3 to 4 hours a day, which left a lot of time to investigate the very lovely little towns that we camped in or beside. They would have been equally happy to arrange shorter or longer days for us if we’d asked. The instructions also contained directions to nice camping sites -typically costing £6 - £14 a night for all of us - which left lots of money to go to the very nice restaurants that were also, helpfully, recommended in the route plan.

The insurance policy of being retrieved following a mishap is also very valuable when travelling as a family. During our week one of the other family’s kids fell off and broke a wrist. They were collected , and the wrist put in a cast at the local hospital, so that the family was able to spend the balance of their week doing slightly less adventurous excursions from the base camp.

Which brings me to one of the best bits. Quite sensibly the operation runs out of a camping ground in a little town called Gouarec in central Brittany (about 1 ½ hours south west of St. Malo). This means that you can turn up on the Saturday, set up camp, collect your bikes and equipment, test it out so that you are really happy with it - and I do strongly recommend that you don’t set off until you are sure that everything is working and is as comfortable as it can be - and then choose your route before setting off on the Sunday morning after a information exchange at breakfast.

Incidentally, the campground is run by a completely bilingual Englishman, David Baxter, and his equally friendly wife Marion. He is a unique character with a strong intellect and firm opinion on almost everything. He was incredibly helpful to us and very welcoming. One of our most entertaining evenings was spent sitting next to their caravan sharing a drink and some conversation.

A total success, which is far more than we dared hope at the outset.

Cheers,

Win Rampen