Cyclomundo: helping you ride L’Etape and La Marmotte

Estimated reading time: 3 minutes, 41 seconds

I’ve previously written about the ins and outs of planning a trip to do L’Etape du Tour, particularly touching upon the challenges with logistics; you can read more here and here.

I’ve also identified La Marmotte (be warned, the official site is absolutely woeful) as something totally worth doing in addition to L’Etape du Tour. It consists of an epic loop of Cols du Glandon, Telegraphe, Galibier and Lautaret, and the Alpe D’Huez. Fun! We’ve done some of these climbs, which you can watch video of, and read about here.

I’m all about competition and excellent customer service, so today we look at an alternative to Australia’s BikeStyle Tours, Cyclomundo. Obviously BikeStyle is beneficial to Aussies due to a (hopefully reasonable) stable entry price. But Cyclemundo offers a real alternative to all our global readers.

I’ve come across Cyclomundo before, but the guys at Cyclomundo recently purchased the VeloNomad Guide to Cycling through France (thanks guys), so I contacted them for a chat.

Basically, I wanted to know if they could book L’Etape du Tour trips for people outside of the EU (they can), and, given I was interested in La Marmotte, if they could help me out there (again, they can).

Given I’ve already booked and paid for my Etape entry for 2010, I’ll have to wait until Oct 2010 to test CycloMundo out (when I book for the 2011 Etape Du Tour and La Marmotte), but feel free to put your input in the comments below.

It looks like you can book the Marmotte for only 70 Euro, and a Marmotte package for 400-ish Euro.

An Etape du Tour entry-only will cost you 220EU, which at the time of writing is around 330 AUD – significantly cheaper than BikeStyle’s AUD$500 (or thereabouts) charge.

The guys at CycloMundo told me:

To give you an idea of what we’re all about, Cyclomundo is a close-knit one-of-a-kind bicycle touring company based out of Gaillard, France- only steps from Geneva, Switzerland and the Alps. With our close proximity to the best cycling destinations in the world, we’re live and breathe all kinds of cycling and are passionate about sharing our love and expertise of cycling with others.

We offer a diverse array of cycling vacations: guided and self-guided, pre-arranged or customized, leisurely or challenging… even some based around cyclosportive events like the Etape du Tour and the Alpes Open Tour. Our tours are perfect for independent riders, families, friends, and cycling groups of varying levels. You can choose elements “a la carte” for your trip, and have multiple options in all regions of France as well as some regions in Spain, Italy, and Switzerland.

The race that we’re specifically focused on right now is the L’Etape du Tour. Cyclomundo offers several options for this tour: you can choose from entry-only places for the tour at 220 euros, self-guided 3-night packages starting at 525 euros, 3-night guided packages starting at 835 euros and our 4-night all-inclusive package starting at 895 euros. These packages include race entry, accommodations (you can request no accommodations for a reduced price), dinners, airport transportation, luggage transfers to each hotel, secure bicycle storage, guide service (n/a on self-guided package), mechanic services and all tax and service charges. For more information about Cyclomundo’s tour packages, visit the website: http://cyclomundo.com/etape_du_tour.html.

What sets us apart from the rest is the fact that we’re a local company with cycling expertise and we have the means to customize every aspect of our tours. We are the ONLY French tour operators that are able to offer a thorough level of contact with our clients- from start to finish we’re accessible. Also, Cyclomundo’s regional contacts are all personally developed relationships that exceed the level of expertise we require and trust. Most other French bicycle touring operators are based overseas and don’t have the level of access to the cycling regions as we do, which is quite an important factor.

We’re passionate about what we do and our quest to increase our extensive list of quality regional trips. In our free time we hit the road and personally scout new route- only finalizing an official tour when we’re completely satisfied with the accommodations, sights and sounds along the way. For these reasons, we’re confident Cyclomundo clearly stands out of the crowd of cycling tour operators.

If anyone has used Cyclomundo, I’d love to hear from you.

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