So, not discouraged by my last but ultimately rather unfruitful attempt, I decided to go try the Vierge noire trail again, following the itinerary I scoped out last time.

I was more prepared this time. I left around 2pm, which was a little too late for a comfortable ride as it turned out it got quite hot and there was still a bit of ambient humidity from the morning rain. My tire had been repaired and the bike checked by the nice folks at Mountain Cycle in Voiron. I still need to buy a tool kit to take with me on the trail and a couple of spare tubes but, this time, I had plenty of water and food if needed. :)

The goal was to establish a baseline as I can envision this itinerary becoming a practice ground as it provides a good but not too long climb first and then a technical (though not terribly so) descent, for a total riding time around the hour mark.

As usual, here is the itinerary overview as recorded by PathTracker on my iPhone:

vierge-noire-baseline.png
La vierge noire – baseline (click to see the interactive version of the itinerary)

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