La Loire à Vélo: stages, distances and logistics end to end

644 km, 783 m of climbing: what are we talking about?

A figure first: 783 m of total ascent over 644 km (400 miles) of route. That is barely more than 1 m of climbing per kilometre, and the highest point does not reach 185 m [1]. Nobody complains about the hills on La Loire à Vélo. The difficulties lie elsewhere: in the number of days, in the bed to book each night, and in the train that takes you back to the car.

The official site presents the route as running from Saint-Brevin-les-Pins, on the Atlantic, to Cuffy, near Nevers, in the Cher département [2]. Cuffy is kilometre zero: La Loire à Vélo starts there, at the Bec d’Allier, where the Allier meets the Loire [3]. The France Vélo Tourisme planner splits the route into 36 stages numbered up to 37, and adds up to 644 km from Nevers, which is 13 km (8 miles) before Cuffy [1]. Adding the stages one by one from Cuffy to Saint-Brevin, I get 631 km (392 miles), and that is the figure I use from here on.

La Loire à Vélo is also a stretch of EuroVelo 6, the cycle route of more than 4,400 km (2,730 miles) from the Atlantic to the Black Sea, whose section from Nantes to Nevers follows the same river [4]. That is why the waymarking is continuous and why maps in several languages exist.

The figure that changes how you organise a day is the second one: 62% of the route is on shared roads. There, you ride on the carriageway with the cars, with nothing but a sign to mark the route. It is not dangerous in itself, but it is not a greenway (a car-free path), and with children or a loaded bike you notice the difference after a few kilometres.

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Which section should you choose for three or four days?

Nobody has to start from Cuffy. The planner gives each stage one of two levels, ‘I begin’ or ‘I cycle often’. Counting them shows that the effort is not spread at random: of the seven stages from Pouilly-sur-Loire to Jargeau, six are graded ‘I cycle often’, against none between Orléans and Saumur [1]. The stages from Gien to Sully-sur-Loire, for example, have ‘several stretches of the route along roads, with some significant slopes’ [1].

The official Loire à Vélo site itself suggests a four-day split from Orléans to Tours: the first three days are 29 km (18 miles) to Beaugency, 44 km (27 miles) to Blois via Chambord, then 44 km to Amboise [5]. Those are comfortable days at about 15 km/h (9 mph), the pace implied by the times displayed (22 km, or 14 miles, in 1 hour 27 minutes between Tours and Villandry, for example) [1].

For three or four days without effort, I would pick one of two: Orléans to Tours, 134 km (83 miles) of châteaux, or Saumur to Nantes, 165 km (103 miles) in three stages of 50 to 60 km (31 to 37 miles), with only one stage graded ‘I cycle often’. Either way, stations are frequent, which matters for the return.

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How many days, and how many kilometres a day?

The sum is simple: 631 km divided by your kilometres per day, rounded up to the next whole day. The planner’s times assume an average of about 15 km/h (9 mph): a 30 km (19 mile) stage (Saumur to Saint-Rémy-la-Varenne) takes 1 hour 59 minutes [1]. Add the stops, the visits and the wind yourself.

One useful rule for the season: the Train Loire à Vélo runs from 1 May to 30 August with at least 50 bike spaces on board [6], and the Saint-Nazaire shuttle runs only from 4 July to 30 August in 2026 [7]. Seasonal services therefore cluster between May and September: outside those months, plan a different way back.

How do you get back to your starting point?

A one-way route always raises the same question: where is the car? On La Loire à Vélo the answer is the train, and the booking rules change with the time of year. The Train Loire à Vélo, a train fitted out for bikes, links Orléans, Blois, Amboise, Tours, Saumur, Angers, Ancenis and Nantes, and at weekends Saint-Nazaire, La Baule, Pornichet and Le Croisic [6]. It runs 3 return trips a day from Monday to Friday between Orléans and Nantes, and 2 at weekends as far as Le Croisic [6].

Booking costs €1 on top of the ticket (every price here is in euros, because you pay it in France), and it is compulsory for everyone from 1 May 2026 to 27 September 2026, on veloabord.fr, the national booking site of the regional TER trains (TER is short for Transport Express Régional) [6] [8]. The practical rules are blunt: take the panniers off, no cargo bikes, and folded trailers and tandems go in the dedicated room [6].

Luggage, accommodation and bike services

Travelling light takes planning: the official site lists companies that move luggage, bikes and people along the route [10]. Rêve de Vélo covers the whole stretch from Nevers to Saint-Brevin; Les Vélos Verts, Orléans to Nantes; Loire Vélo Nature, Blois to Angers; Vélo Val de Loire, Nevers to Orléans; and Arnotours, around Tours, Amboise and Montlouis-sur-Loire [10]. The site gives no prices and tells you to ask for a quote, so I will not invent any.

For a bed, the national ‘Accueil Vélo’ label (literally ‘cyclist welcome’) covers more than 800 professionals along the route. Each promises to stand within 5 km (3 miles) of the route and to offer a secure bike store and a repair kit [11]. For the lock you carry, here is how to read lock ratings. A dozen or so places also offer tent-bivouacs on stilts, which save you carrying camping kit [11]. That figure comes from the French page: the English page still says ‘more than 600’.

A few practical services: the Loire à Vélo passport costs €9.95 from one of the 38 tourist offices and can be stamped in 43 places, and trailers are allowed despite chicanes (staggered barriers) on some stretches [12]. Electric bikes can be recharged at charging points or with Accueil Vélo businesses [13].

Saint-Brevin and Saint-Nazaire: what about the bridge?

The route ends at Saint-Brevin-les-Pins, on the south bank of the estuary, while the railway station is at Saint-Nazaire, on the other side. The official site strongly recommends not crossing the bridge by bike [7]. There are three alternatives.

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What La Loire à Vélo costs: the figures you can source

I will not give an overall budget: no official source publishes prices for nights and meals, and they change with the season. The fixed logistics costs, on the other hand, are known, and they are small.

Worth watching

Two cycle tourers walk through the Loire à Vélo: a well-signed mix of quiet roads and cycle paths, very little climbing, and the châteaux and wine country along the way.

The video is hosted by YouTube (Google): nothing loads until you play it, and Google may then set cookies.

Julien de Jurquet

Campervans, motorhomes, cycling and calculators

Julien de Jurquet writes for Outfarer about campervans, motorhomes, cycling and calculators. He reads instruction manuals to the very end and never lets a figure through without its unit, so that your choices rest on sums rather than promises.

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