Le Brassus is at the quiet top end of the Vallée de Joux, a long glacial trough in the Vaud Jura that holds the Lac de Joux and a handful of villages strung together along its length. It is a hard place to farm, cold and high, and over the centuries the people here turned to winter work indoors. That is how the valley became the home of Swiss watchmaking at its most complicated. Audemars Piguet, founded here in 1875, still has its roots in Le Brassus, and other prestigious names have workshops nearby. The houses look like ordinary farmhouses, but behind some of the windows people are assembling movements with hundreds of parts.
The riding is a pleasure of its own sort. The roads through the valley follow the lake and the long meadows, with forest climbing both sides, and the surface is usually good. From Le Brassus you can climb gently towards the Col du Marchairuz, which links over to the Lake Geneva side and takes you through beech and spruce woods and open pasture, or head toward the French border near Bois-d'Amont. The bends are open and rhythmic, ideal for a steady pace, and the traffic is light outside holiday weekends.
Winter is serious here. The valley is one of the coldest places in Switzerland, and the lake freezes thickly enough in cold spells for skating, ice sailing and even ice fishing. Even in spring and autumn, mornings can be sharp. The cold air also explains the dairy tradition: Vacherin Mont-d'Or, the soft cheese that is baked in its own wooden box, comes from this stretch of the Jura and is a seasonal treat in autumn and winter.
Le Brassus itself has a small centre with a couple of shops and cafés, which is enough for a coffee and a pastry. Le Chenit, the surrounding municipality, has just over four thousand people, and for fuel you will find pumps along the main valley road. If you need something larger, Morez across the border or Nyon on the lake are the bigger options. The valley also holds the Risoux forest, a big stretch of spruce that supplies the wood for violins and other instruments, a quiet claim to fame that suits the place.
Visit in early summer when the meadows are full of wildflowers, or in autumn for sharp light and the first smoke from chimneys.