2017 – Page 2 – Ecotopia Biketour

Articles posted by 2017 (Page 2)

Recyclerie La Voulte

2017 September 14, 2017 September 14, 2017

From Saillans it was not far to La-Voulte-Sur-Rhône, where we went to visit the next project, actually kind of two projects. One was a farm collective where people grow vegetables and sell them to fund themselves and a place next to the river where people can live in vans and tents, and they invited us to stay there for some nights. The other one, run by the same people, is the Recyclerie, a huge warehouse in an industrial area of the city where the people are collecting all kinds of material, sort it, and try to redistribute it. They have…

Joining the AlterTour from Eurre to Saillans

2017 September 4, 2017 August 31, 2017

After Valence we had a short cycle to Eurre, where one of the most exciting part of the tour was awaiting us: We were planning to join AlterTour for three days, a Biketour similar to ours that happens every year since 2008 in France. It is the first time (at least in the last couple of years) that we meet another organised Biketour on the way, and we were very excited to find out what they are doing and how they are different from us. The first night we spent with them in l’Oasis de Serendip in Eurre, a collective…

Valence

2017 September 2, 2017 August 31, 2017

From Roybon we had some nice and fast 20 kilometers of pure downhill until we reached the valley of the Isère again, and followed the bikepath along it and then along the Rhône to Valence. In Valence we had originally not planned to sleep, but some people had gotten in contact with the Poissons Rouges social and art space some days before, and they offered us to camp in their garden for a night. Our main destination in Valence was to visit the Valence Atelier Libre, a self-organised workshop where they build wind turbines, organise workshops to learn how to…

ZAD de Roybon

2017 August 31, 2017 August 23, 2017

On Saturday and Sunday August 5/6, we arrived at the ZAD de Roybon. Some people had preferred to come here directly from Grenoble and not visit the bar collective, so the group split up and arrived on two different days. Roybon is on over 600 metres of altitude, so it was a tough day of cycling to get here. The ZAD is an occupation of a forest to prevent the construction of a huge holiday park called “Center Parc”. The plan is to cut big parts of the forest in order construct a huge dome with a water park at…

Switzerland part 2: Lausanne–Grenoble

2017 August 27, 2017 August 23, 2017

Saturday we passed a beautiful landscape with a scenic view of the Mont Blanc massiv to arrive around noon in Lausanne. The expensive city offered us nevertheless a bike kitchen that had invited us and we repaired our bikes inside and on the pavement. The mountain passages had taken its toll. Some of us went to the Musee de Art Brut and greatly enjoyed it. Others went swimming in Lac Leman and a small public bath. In the evening we were invited again by a local theater space in the rue d´ industrie 10. We ate together the excellent vegan…

Cycling in the Police State

2017 August 25, 2017 August 23, 2017

After the so-called “terrorist attack” in France in November 2015, the French government decided to enter a “state of emergency”, which basically gives the police the right to search your house, check your ID, search you, arrest you, and forbid you to leave your flat as they like. Before the COP21 climate summit in December 2015, this was used to raid the flats of many activists, arrest them or forbid them to leave their houses to prevent them from taking action, and to forbid any demonstrations to happen at all. The state of “emergency” has since been prolonged several times…

La Ferme du Joran (Orbe) and Lausanne

2017 August 23, 2017 August 23, 2017

On Thursday July 27, we arrived in Orbe, a small town about 30 km north of Lausanne in Switzerland. We were there to visit a new collective farm, which some of us got to know on the Reclaim the Fields meeting in Freiburg this spring. The farm is called La Ferme du Joran. The Joran is the name of a strong and unpredictable wind from the north-west that is very specific to this geographical location. Our sleeping place was on a field on top of a hill just outside of the town. We arrived quite late and got an introduction…

Switzerland part 1: Freiburg–Orbe

2017 August 16, 2017 August 16, 2017

Leaving Freiburg, we cycled switftly along the Rhine to Basel and crossed the border into Switzerland. It is the first time that the Biketour visits Switzerland, it hasn’t ever been there in 27 years. We expected beautiful landscapes and good roads, expensive shops but full dumpsters. The first two days in Switzerland were hard. We had to cross the Jura mountains and took mostly small roads which were very steep, but the landscapes and villages were beautiful. The first night we slept on a lawn just outside a small town, next to a garage for repairing cars and a small…