Bike & Hotel
France • Luxembourg
Strasbourg - Luxembourg: Nature and Heritage
Self Guided • 7 nights
Moderate
From £1,060
Once the seat of its own dukes, Lorraine pairs Nancy's neoclassical Place Stanislas and Art Nouveau heritage with Metz's Gothic cathedral and a web of towpaths and greenways along the Moselle and Meurthe rivers. It's a region shaped as much by industry and conflict as by art, and all the more interesting for it.
Lorraine currently features as a stage on our Strasbourg to Luxembourg cycling holiday, linking Saverne to Nancy and Metz before the route continues north towards the Luxembourg border – a natural link between Alsace and the Grand Duchy.
Self Guided • 7 nights
Moderate
From £1,060
Lorraine's history runs deeper than its quiet countryside suggests. Nancy, once capital of an independent duchy, gave the world the Art Nouveau of the École de Nancy - Emile Gallé's glasswork among its landmarks - around the 18th-century grandeur of Place Stanislas. Metz, on the German border for much of its history, answers with a Gothic cathedral nicknamed the 'Lantern of God' for its vast stained-glass windows, including several by Marc Chagall.
Add a coal, iron and steel heritage that shaped the wider region, WWI battlefields still visible in the landscape, and flat, well-maintained cycle paths along the Moselle, and Lorraine makes a considered, unhurried alternative to its better-known Alsatian neighbour.
Lorraine has a temperate continental climate, with warm summers and cool winters, and forms part of the wider Grand Est region alongside Alsace and Champagne-Ardenne. The riding here follows river valleys and canal towpaths - the Moselle, the Meurthe and their connecting canals - so the terrain is gentle and largely flat. Spring and early autumn tend to offer the most settled weather for cycling.
“Nancy's Place Stanislas is named after Stanisław Leszczyński, the deposed King of Poland who spent his retirement as Duke of Lorraine and commissioned the square in the 1750s. Nearly three centuries on, it's a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the most photographed 18th-century squares in Europe.”
LukeCo-founderLa Voie Bleue, following the Moselle and Meurthe rivers between Nancy and Metz, is flat, well-surfaced and largely car-free – a good introduction to the region on two wheels.
Mostly gentle. The main cycling routes follow river valleys and canal towpaths, so the region suits a wide range of abilities rather than dedicated climbers.
Quiche Lorraine, obviously, plus mirabelle plums in late summer, Nancy's macarons and bergamotes, and the beers of the Brasseurs de Lorraine in Metz.
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