RtG The Daily Dispatch - Carrera Riviera - WEB - Flipbook - Page 19
4 to 15 June 2023
Day 9
Lyon to Courchevel (330.5km)
13 June 2023
We woke to rain this morning but the lavish InterContinental breakfast brightened things up. At 8am a
well fed Rally cast-off from the quayside car park and motored up the Rhône. First stop in the road book
was a Passage Control at the Notre-Dame des Dombes, a former Trappist monastery and resistance
stronghold during World War II subsequently awarded the Légion d’honneur for its troubles.
Photo: gerardbrown.co.uk
Simon and Jack Brien, 1952 Jaguar C-Type
Next was a Section from Bugey towards the Col de Ballon.
Run over a very wet and misty mountain road, visibility
at times was less than 20m so headlights were very much
the order of the day as the crews struggled to pick out
the twists and turns under sheer cliffs and low hanging
branches.
There was light at the end of the tunnel and, once we’d
passed through the last layer of cloud, we enjoyed a run
along the Rhône to a well provisioned Time Control in the
Auberge de la Paillère. There was time for a coffee and a
short stroll along the embankment before we left the Ain,
crossed the Rhône in Culoz and entered the Department
of Savoie. The next Section was up to the Col du Clergeon
which topped out at 979m and appropriately took us
immediately into the Haute Savoie. Some amazing alpine
meadows rolled past us which, as far as we could see,
would soon be delivering a bumper crop of hay.
Lunch, and the midday Time Control, were in the
magnificent Palace de Menthon on the eastern shore of Lac
d’ Annecy. On a good day there are views to the impressive
Semnoz Ridge and onwards to the Massif des Bauges. A
pleasant drive along the lakeshore to its southern tip
www.rallytheglobe.com