Saint-Brieuc to Lorient on Voie 8 in Brittany

The Voie 8 Bretagne bike route goes from Saint-Brieuc on the northern coast of Brittany to Lorient on the Atlantic Coast. It is both practical and wonderful.

Distance: 200km
Difficulty: Moderate. As with any long-distance route, there is a little climbing, though it's a gentler route from Saint-Brieuc to Lorient than the other way round. Even so and with a few exceptions, the climbs are still (mostly) only between 25-50m.

At the time of writing (April 2024), Voie 8 was just known as plain old Voie 8. Local tourism authorities had yet to get around to giving it a fancy brand name like so many other regional routes, but it is none the worse for it.

This is a wonderful fully signposted cross-regional route that links the northern coast of France to the west coast, linking with several other major routes on the way.

On the northern coast, it meets La Velomaritime, the French section of the Euro Velo 4 Central European route as it snakes its way across northern France and into Belgium and the Netherlands.

At Voie 8 heads south-west, it crosses at Pontivy with La Velodyssee, the French section of the Euro Velo 1 Atlantic Coast route, which for this same section doubles as the Nantes-Brest Canal.

Type of bike paths: The majority of the route is on dedicated bike paths (some 136km), largely on canal towpaths and old railway lines that have been converted for cyclists and walkers. The remaining 64km is on shared local roads. Both the Rigole d’Hilvern Channel and the Blavet Canal feature on this route. The whole route is signposted with the no.8.

Getting there and away: There are train stations at both Lorient and at Saint-Brieuc, as well as at Pontivy and a few other towns along the route. See here for the regional train map.

Download the Voie 8 Saint-Brieuc to Lorient route as a GPX file.