Velteper

I have earlier been asking some "first time in tour de france"-questions in this forum, but it I still have some more:

How do the Frence police handel all the traffic? When do they close the roads? When should we go to the point we ar going to stay?

Keith99

Road closures will depend on the road.

However for mountian passes they close the road more than 24 hours in advance.

I would be shocked if the road closures were not in the local papers. Life still goes on in France during the Tour and people still need to get from here to there.

Velteper

Okey, but the problem is that I do not speak french... Well well, it can be a funny experience since we are going to the Alps...

dagna

You've got time...start learning a little French now. Hello, goodbye, please, thank you, and how do I get to [name of place] would be a good beginning. People seem to react much better if *you* show you're making an effort. At the very least, always say hello and goodbye when you enter/leave a shop or other place of business, or ask someone directions. You'll get much better service and much better directions that way .

Or, wing it and hope for the best...it's all good.

Bonne chance!

Keith99

Yes, it makes a huge difference if you at least try. There are tons of stories about someone seeing a Frenchman who is accosted by an ugly American who expect the natives to speak English insisting he speaks no English, only to be approached later by another American who tries for a couple of minutes to get by on limited French. At that point the Frenchman changes into barely accented English (and likely with better grammer than the American).

One thing I would add is that I have played Rugby for decades and a couple of teammates played in France. The one that comes to mind played first division Rugby. He had no problems at all. He claimed all he had to do was say parley vous Rugby? and all was fine. What I think he ment was that as soon as it was established he was a Rugby player, and thus by definition not a typical American tourist he was seen in a much better light. You might be able to accomplish the same with cycling. But just cycling alone will not do the job. If you come off as a 99er, someone who only knows about the American riders, then you are still in the tourist class. If you know who the favorites are for the KOM and Points or better yet are a fan of any non-American rider it may help. Of course being a fan of some French rider would be best, but don't try to fake it.

I saw Elvis

Road closures depend on road location, how close the road is to a finish etc. In the mountains it can be 24h before the race is due, in practice you can get a car up a mountain early in the morning, late previous night (but don't rely on it). I've taken a coach up Alpe d'huez the night before a stage finish (but I had fake TdF logos on the front to confuse the police ).
Also you can cycle up a mountain a couple of hours before the race is due and even closer if the police can't be bothered to stop you. There will come a point when the police / other fans will physically pull you over if the race is too close - so don't be that stupid.
Best bet is park the car in a town / village and ride out to the mountains, sit on the road side for a couple of hours in the sun enjoying the sights and sounds of Le Tour.
In stage finish towns hotel rooms will now be getting scarce, so if you haven't booked think about camping as an option, as a last resort you can sleep in the car (many do).
You've got a few months, so try to pick up a little french, please, thanks etc do go a long way.

GGDub

I was going to mention the same thing. It reallly depends on the road. I remember in 2001 on Alpe d'Huez that cars were still coming up the mountain the morning of the stage (they definetly were not official vehicles). I wouldn't recommend waiting that long though if you're driving up to the top, it was slow and painfull for those in cars.

In 2005, we hit Pla d'Adet and were easily able to drive the base of the final climb on the morning of the stage. By the time we were riding up (9:30) however, the road was completely closed to motor traffic. Driving back to our hotel (40 km away) took 5 hours, worst traffic jam ever.

I saw Elvis

Good point, about getting back down. It may be easy to drive up a mountain, but remember you're coming down at the same time as 250,000 others. It's easier on a bike, sometimes they hold the cars , vans back to allow the cyclists to get clear.

POTFH

We camped the night before on Alpe d Huez last year. Drove to the top and camped up there with thousands. On Galibier the next day, we drove up and through the pass at around 7:30 or 8 am and the road was open. We parked on the mountain and watched the descent. Very cool. The riders came through at around 1pm. There were a couple of restaurants near the top. Riding would have been nice but we didn't have bikes. This year we will. We spoke no French other than hello, bye, thanks, please, etc. I did try because I enjoy it. Let me know if you have questions.