Plateau de Beille - Les Cabannes

While on holiday in the area in June 2012 my wife and I decided to drive up to the Plateau de Beille in the car, just to see what a Tour de France HC climb was really like. About 95% of the way up we passed a guy in a bright red top, plugging away on a mountain bike, and thought "well done mate, nearly there". Two hairpins higher up we came face to face with an enormous bull, which was standing slap bang in the middle of the road, facing downhill. Even in the car it was a bit nervewracking squeezing past it, as it didn''t budge an inch. I can only guess what a knackered cyclist travelling at five miles an hour while clad in bright red must have felt - especially if he was going against the clock. Although I din''t witness the encounter between the two, I can report that the intrepid grimpeur made it to the summitonly a few minutes behind us, having also had to pick his way through a herd of protective horses with young foals. Chapeau! p.s Can only assume "HC" stands for horrendously cruel.

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Hello, i did my first climb up it yesterday. I am getting ready for the Mountagnole bike race and thought that it would be good to do the course before the race, the accent came afer 100km, it was very hard especilly the first 10 to 12 km, the last 4 get a little easier.

My personal climb rating:

This summer, I stayed on a camping in Oust nearby Saint Girons. At 7 oclock I started in Oust and fisrt climbed the Col dAgnes and Port de lers before climbing the plateau de Beille. It goes immediately very steep and above the average in the first part of the climb.With this mind you know then that the second part will be easier and it became very easy nearby the top. I was a little bit disappointed at the top because I saw no sign with the height. There is only one building and a lot of cows. The advantage: almost nobody goes to the top except bikers and walkers. I almost lost control during the descend because of small gaps in the road. I went back to Oust via the col de Port.

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I am a cancer patient who climbed to rode to the top of Plateau de Beille in 2006. I have multiple myeloma and was treated with high dose chemotherapy and a bone marrow transplant in 2004. In remission, having recovered about 80% of my strength levels, I wanted to see if I could do it. It was the second hardest thing Ive ever done next to the transplant - like nothing Ive seen anywhere else. But like every hill, if you keep plugging along - youll get there eventually - and youve the satisfaction of knowing that after youve done a hors categorie climb nothing else will intimidate you again. Best of all: theres a great restaurant at the summit, and you get to swoop down the mountain afterward.

My personal climb rating: