Pyrenees – Circuit des Ramparts in Angouleme – Loire Valley – 2006

As kindly written by Eric Hoile

I have long wanted to drive the Pyrenees in my Jaguar to experience the altitudes, hairpin bends & scenery, and when the Continental Car Tours brochure had this trip planned for Sept 2006, I just had to sign up.

The tour was directed by Ray Guiver, JEC Regional News Editor, who I had met previously as tour director for the excellent Norway trip earlier this year. That was fantastic for scenery let alone the pre-tour information and hands on support during the trip; so I was expecting high satisfaction for the Pyrenees tour. The tour also included the weekend historic car racing in Angouleme, mid west France, together with

historic car racing in Angouleme, mid west France, together with many opportunities to visit other tourist sights en-route through France. A total of 26 cars entered and included Jaguars, old & new, Triumphs, MG, 2 GT40’s, 2 BMW Z4’s and 8 very unique Ronarts.

The tour started with a P & O sea trip from Portsmouth to Bilbao; departing Sunday evening at 21.15 and arriving Bilbao 07.00 Tuesday morning. A pleasant short sea cruise with 2 overnights; the Monday cruise dragged a little but some on deck tuition in dolphin & whale spotting passed the time and eventually resulted in a view of a spouting Minke whale over a 10 minute period. Two excellent dinners on board and a few bottles of Red ensured good nights sleep until the “bing-bongs” at 05.45 Tuesday morning; Oh well!
The plan was for a fast drive along the Spanish AutoRoute A8 towards Donastia San Sebastian and Biarritz then turning right into the Pyrenees; luckily I spotted Ray Guiver’s car off the ferry and duly slipped

in behind him along with 5 or 6 other cars to exit Bilbao. Subsequently we all agreed that the route map out of Bilbao did leave a little to be desired; better next time!

Onwards to the original Basque village of Baigorry, renamed Saint Etienne-de-Baigorry by the French, originating around the 11th century and which for many years had a reddish burnt sienna coloured river running through it due to the high amount of iron ore in the region.  

At the top of the Col d’Ispeguy, around 670 metres, we stopped for lunch at a typical Spanish restaurant to consume a feast of cured meats, cheese, eggs, asparagus, bread and beer; our first of the day! Fantastic scenery and thanks to Jaguar V8 power AND power steering, the “arduous mountain passes” were scaled with ease, although I must admit a nervous eye on both oil and temperature gauges also kept me busy.

Through Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port; literally meaning “St John at the foot of the mountain pass”, which was a significant pilgrimage route as it was the last stop from Paris and Vezelay before the arduous mountain crossing into Spain; we criss-crossed the French-Spanish border through the Pyrenees reaching peaks of around 1800 metres until our first hotel at Oloron Saint-Marie. It had been a long day with 250+ miles of hard driving but rewarded by incredible scenery and the pleasure of driving the Jaguar in terrain it relished!

The second day was another wonderful driving day spent scaling many Col within the Parc National des Pyrenees; including Col du Somport at 1632m, Col de Pourtalet at 1749m and he Col d’Aubisquet at

 well over 1800m. The latter is famous as a regular part of the Tour de France cycle race and is considered an hors-catégorie climb; the road starts at 515m and rises to 1709m in around 17 kilometres, the average gradient being almost 7% and not a single point where it goes downhill! Our day finished at Luz-Saint-Sauveur after only 160 miles but more Col than we could count. Our final Col before departing north into France was Col de Tourmalet, a mountain pass in Central Pyrenees reaching 2114 mtrs (6935 ft); a mountain climb

regularly included in the Tour de France (TdeF) and the highest paved road in the French Pyrenees. Back in 1910 when this Col was first added to the TdeF, Octave Lapize reached the pass in great pain and pushing his bike past a group of officials yelled “Assassins!” he however gained spirit from this and took the stage and finally the overall title.  

A visit to Lourdes; including the Basilica of Immaculate Conception and the Grotto, confirmed rumours that it was like

Blackpool seafront and the local A&E unit combined; pity really as the buildings, statues and experience were incredible and appeared to be completely free entry. A visit to Lourdes; including the Basilica of Immaculate Conception and the Grotto, confirmed rumours that it was like Blackpool seafront and the local A&E unit combined; pity really as the buildings, statues and experience were incredible and appeared to be completely free entry.

Friday we arrived in Angouleme, our venue for the weekend. The Circuit des Ramparts was first held at Angouleme in 1939 and the 2006 event marked the 28th edition of this historic race which runs throughout the walled ancient city. Much preparation is

undertaken by the city with Armco barriers to many buildings, grandstands, safety screens and the typical ensemble that only the French know how.    

Saturday was a day to unwind; visit Angouleme to review the race track layout, grandstand locations and review the cars in the pits.

Sunday was race day and we agreed on

taxies to the track as we were around 3 miles from the centre; we had also booked a splendid restaurant on recommendation, Chez Paul, for lunch which no doubt would include more than   a few bottles of wine. Races included classes for Vintage Sports-Cars; Bugatti Grand Prix and Type 13; Lagonda; Porsche; GTS/GTP; Formula 3 500cc and Classic Touring Cars.

The competitive spirit in the races was fantastic; despite parts of the track being “single lane” and barriers everywhere, the drivers pushed their cars to the limit; not forgetting that many were priceless and unique examples of cars of the early 1920’s. It was surprising that lap times varied only 5 seconds or so whether it was a Grand Prix Bugatti or a Porsche RS race.

The old cliché about “men were men…” in these cars clearly springs to mind.
As always time overtakes one and we had to leave Angouleme on Monday to journey north to Blois, our next stop. We decided to deviate from our planned route and head for the village of Oradour-sur-Glane; the village is also known as the Martyrs’ Village in memory of the atrocity that occurred here during WWII when the complete population of 642 was executed on Saturday June 10th 1944. General de Gaulle wanted to preserve the ruins of Oradour in order to bear witness to the consequences of war and it proved a stark

reminder as one walked through the derelict buildings made even more poignant by the silence of the visitors.Having deviated from our route book we then had to rely on our lead car navigation; however, at times this proved unfortunate! As a forfeit for this misdemeanour it was agreed that Geoff should pay for lunch, which needless to say included ice cream and cakes! Onward and upwards to Blois passing through beautiful Loire scenery en route; stopping again at

Ambois for more afternoon coffee and cakes; boy, was that an expensive navigation error!

Tuesday was spent visiting Le chateau de Chambord where we had an arranged photo shoot for the cars. The park surrounding Chambord is very large, at 5400 hectares and the drive from one of the six gateways we entered stretched for almost 2 miles before we reached the chateau itself; the size of the estate no doubt explained how our tour group

arrived at different locations around the park requiring Ray to make numerous phone calls to the chateau staff that finally resulted in a squad of Gendarmes being called and with much arm waving staff managed to arrange our car group “at a suitable distance from the chateau” before photographing.

Our final visit was to Chateau du Clos Luce in Ambois where Leonardo Da Vinci spent the last three years of his life, to May 1519,

painting and working on countless ideas that aroused his passion. The chateau holds many paintings, drawings and models of his inventions including a 4X4 Armoured tank, Helicopter and Parachute; all these depicting inventions long before they became reality.  

Throughout the tour although we had broken into small groups each day for ease of convoying, our evening meals were all spent together which proved an excellent way of enabling discussion with others on the days events, mishaps and traumas.

The Ronarts did suffer most failures, particularly the clutch system, and the GT40’s proved they were not built for rainy days; one resourceful driver resorting to “cling film” along all joints overnight as an effective water seal!

Our last night’s meal in Blois was accompanied by many amusing stories including unrepeatable jokes throughout the evening mainly from our Ronart colleagues; clearly their drivers relish the open air which no doubt appears to sharpen their wits!

The final day’s drive from Blois was to be 330 miles to Calais; setting off around 08.00 we made good time, even using D roads, enabling us to savour our last French meal in a splendid restaurant somewhere between Alençon and Rouen before the final dash along auto route A28/A16.

We missed our ferry by 15 minutes, but were quickly booked on the next one boarding 5 minutes from our arrival; good news.

Once aboard we settled down to coffee and biscuits in the lounge, stocking up on a few cases of “duty free” wine and sharing addresses and contact details for later.

Everyone had enjoyed the trip; some long days driving but extremely varied and fantastic scenery, through Spain, the Pyrenees, Dordogne, Loire etc; the challenge of the mountain hairpins; the atmosphere of Angouleme and not least the Spirit of Classic Car groups.

Très Bon!! 

Eric Hoile

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