Sainte-Croix lies on a sunny shelf of the Vaud Jura, with the Chasseron ridge rising behind it and the Swiss plateau stretched out far below. The town is about four thousand people, but it punches above its weight in one very specific area: mechanical things that make music. For more than a century this was the capital of Swiss music boxes and automata, and the industry grew into a wider tradition of precision engineering. The Paillard company, makers of Bolex cameras and Hermes typewriters, was founded here, and the town's wealth shows in the solid old buildings along the main street.
Today the heritage is on show at the CIMA museum of mechanical art, where you can hear music boxes, singing birds and little automata perform. Even if you are a rider who does not usually visit museums, this is the right kind of rainy-day stop, because everything in it moves and sounds, and the staff will show you how it works.
The road up to Sainte-Croix is where the riding pleasure comes. From the Orbe side or from Yverdon, you climb through gorges and forest with a handful of firm corners, and the view back toward the plateau opens as you rise. The Col des Étroits, a few kilometres on toward France, offers a gentler route across the border to Les Fourgs. Up on top, the Chasseron has a mountain restaurant and one of the finest panoramas of the Alps in this part of Switzerland, though the road to the very top can be rough and seasonal, so do not assume you can ride all the way.
Sainte-Croix is large enough to have fuel, a couple of supermarkets and cafés, so you can sort practical matters without a detour to Orbe. The place has a quiet confidence, a sense of having made something clever and not minding that few people know it. In summer, the air is cool compared with the lake shore, and in winter, the sea of fog lies below the ridge while the town is bright and cold above it.
Aim for a clear morning after rain, when the Alps are sharp from the ridge, and give yourself time to ride slowly; the Jura rewards patience.