Detour #202: La Route du Road Tester, Route Napoleon, France
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It was once the chosen route of an emperor attempting to recapture his country, but now the route napoleon is a firm favourite with car testers.
Scroll through a few back issues of magazines like Evo, Car or Top Gear and you’ll soon come across a reference to the Route Napoleon. This 200-mile road from Grenoble to Golfe-Juan on the Côte d’Azur has long been the chosen spot for car reviews, new car launches and top secret testing.
It ticks every box that a motor writer could ever hope for, with the option to wax lyrical about the twists and turns of the road and the magnificent mountain scenery, even if the car they’re driving is rather less inspiring. Car makers also send their test pilots here as the rises and falls of the road, and its switchbacks and straights cram a huge variety of road conditions into a relatively short distance. So do look out for convoys of camouflaged cars. Take a snap or a video and you might even make a few quid selling it on.
In 1815 Napoleon began his march north towards Paris at the port of Golfe-Juan, adjacent to Antibes, but Detour suggests tackling the Route Napoleon in reverse. It was officially inaugurated in 1932 and, all along the way, you’ll find bronze Imperial Eagle statues watching over you from the roadside.
You’ll want to leave Grenoble as quickly as you can, as it’s not the most delightful of drives to escape the city and its industrial and commercial suburbs. Past Vizille on the N85 and the view becomes more enticing as you pass through forests and along the lakeside of Laffrey. It’s really only beyond La Mure that the road becomes challenging, chucking in a handful of hairpins as you climb as high as 1,200 metres negotiating the Col Bayard en-route to Gap in the Hautes-Alpes.
The road then straightens somewhat as you progress towards Sisteron, where you could take a Detour to the Col de Turini, famously a stage on both the Monte Carlo Rally and the Tour de France. At Dignes-les-Bains is where the excitement really begins as the road ascends and becomes progressively more tortuous. Heading in to Castellane you’ll find yourself engaged in a raucous sequence of steering, braking, accelerating and shifting gears through 180-degree corners. It’s so good you’ll probably be tempted to head back down and do it all over again.
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Onwards toward Grasse you’ll find the road is faster than ever, with open corners sweeping you down to the coast. Finally, you’ll get to the Mediterranean where Napoleon made landfall after his exile on the island of Elba. Together with 1,100 loyal soldiers he marched north, taking six days to reach Grenoble. If you put your foot down you could make the return trip in less than six hours.
ROADBOOK
CLASS:Road test route
NAME: route napoleon
ROUTE: grenoble to golfe-juan
COUNTRY: france
Distance: 202 Miles
High in the Pyrenees mountains, on the Col du Portillon, there’s a brief moment where your front wheels will be in Spain, while the rears remain in France.