Big Ride: Alpe d'Huez - Climb and a half

No climb is as emblematic of the Tour de France as Alpe d'Huez. Ahead of its first appearance at the women's Tour, Cyclist takes a ride around it and up it. And then up it again

- Emily Chappell

I thought there was only one way off this mountain: via its famous 21 hairpins. But rather than turning left out of our hotel to descend past the ski lifts and building sites of Alpe d’Huez, we head upwards.

Within moments the road has narrowed to a single lane and all around us are green pastures, colourful Alpine flowers and distant mountaintops. We’re here to celebrate perhaps the most famous climb ever to feature in the Tour de France – Alpe d’Huez – but our first port of call is the Col de Sarenne, the Alpe’s lesser-known B-side.

The col itself, which we reach just 15 minutes later, is a broad green saddle a shade under 2,000m in height, overlooked by peaks that still bear traces of last winter’s snow. We have it to ourselves aside from an oblivious marmot and a few skylarks.

A tiny roadside hut is hung with hand-painted signs promising us cheese and cake, but seems uninhabited. Clément, my ride companion for the day, laughs kindly when I point out just how different this is from the bustling resort we’ve only just left.

This road has been here much longer than the main climb, but is less often used these days. During winter it’s covered in snow but it is a technical challenge in any conditions, especially today because no one has bothered to clear the drifts of gravel that collected on its hairpins during storms a week ago.

We descend mindfully southwards into the valley, and eventually Lac du Chambon comes into view, glittering in the morning sunshine.

We cross its hydroelectric dam and peer into the lake’s water, under the surface of which lie three villages and a lavender distillery that were submerged when the dam was built a century ago.