Why this ride
From Besançon it runs 103 km to Besançon; allow about 2 h 10 of riding. It goes by way of Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans, From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai and back through Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
La citadelle and From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 103 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 2 h 10
- Journey
- Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. La citadelle
Besancon sits in a tight loop of the Doubs river, almost an island, and above the loop a great rock rises more than a hundred metres. On top of it stands the Citadel, the fortress that the military engineer Vauban built for Louis XIV after the king captured the region from Spain in 1674. It is one of the twelve fortified sites that UNESCO listed together in 2008 as the Fortifications of Vauban, and it is a fine example of his work, with thick walls, bastions and long ramparts that follow the line of the rock.
Read the complete La citadelle write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
La citadelle is where the day begins. Next is Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans.
2. Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans
Claude-Nicolas Ledoux wanted to build an ideal city, and he started with a salt factory. The Saline Royale at Arc-et-Senans was built between 1775 and 1779 on the orders of Louis XV's administration, to boil brine into salt, and Ledoux designed it as a perfect half circle of buildings around the director's house, with the workers, the boiling halls and the management all arranged in a geometric order meant to express reason, hierarchy and efficiency. It never grew into the full circular city he imagined, but what was built is astonishing, and it was listed by UNESCO in 1982, later joined by the great saltworks at Salins-les-Bains.
Read the complete Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans comes up about 36 km into the recorded legs. Next is From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai.
3. From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai
Salins-les-Bains lies at the bottom of a deep, narrow valley in the Jura, squeezed between two forested ridges, each crowned by a fort, and its wealth for most of history came from beneath its streets. Deep underground, salty water flows through layers of rock salt, and for over a thousand years the people of Salins pumped it up and boiled it in great pans to make salt, a precious commodity before refrigeration, used to preserve food and taxed heavily by the crown. The Grande Saline, the great saltworks, is now a museum, and you can walk through its underground galleries, where a huge hydraulic wheel and pump from the nineteenth century still turn, lifting brine from the depths.
Read the complete From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 52 km into the recorded legs you reach From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai. Next is back through Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans.
4. back through Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans, late in the day. Next is La citadelle.
5. La citadelle
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete La citadelle write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Back at La citadelle. That is the ride.
Leg by leg
La citadelle to Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans
La citadelle → Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans to From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai
Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans → From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai is 16 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai to back through Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans
From the Great Saltworks of Salins-les-Bai → back through Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans is 16 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans to La citadelle
back through Saline Royale d'Arc-et-Senans → La citadelle is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.