France Covid-19 situation & Ukraine: booking your bike tour with confidence.

Covid-19: As with many countries, the number of Omicron cases and hospitalisation rates, in France, is low. And life is back to normal now, with no health pass or masks required to enter a public building or transport, with the exception of « medical » buildings (hospital, doctors, pharmacies...).

International borders are opened to vaccinated visitors or people with a negative test. No reason for travelling or a sworn undertaking statement are required to enter to France. It is essential, however, to check the conditions with your own local national bodies regarding travel to and from France. Below we have listed links to several official Foreign national bodies regarding their own travel requirements to France.
USA: https://fr.usembassy.gov/covid-19-information/
Canada: https://travel.gc.ca/travelling/health-safety/travel-health-notices/221
UK: https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/france/entry-requirements
EU + Schengen area: https://reopen.europa.eu/en/

We understand though that even if you are fully vaccinated, some guests may still have some reluctance to organise overseas travel, for fear of the Covid situation deteriorating and due to the tragic situation in Ukraine. So, in order to give you peace of mind when booking your future tour with us, we have put in place our 3-point Covid/Ukraine Guarantee policy.

1. Full Credits – Should your local Gov’t not let you travel to France, or the French Gov’t not let you enter France (within 21 days of your tour start dates), then we will provide you with a Full Credit for any payments made.
   
   
2. Full Flexibility – Any credits made by us, will be on an open-ended basis, allowing you to use them for any future tour date of your choosing and convenience. There is no short “use by date”.
   
   
3. Full Transferability – If you want to pass your full credit onto a friend or family member, that would be fine, and there is no admin fee either.

We hope you find the above conditions reasonable; it must be said not many other tours are offering such good terms!

Our 2022 tours restarted in May, with great joy from our guests being able to cycle again in Provence and the Luberon! Please note though that with the back log of people wanting to travel, availabilities for 2023 are moving very fast…

Here’s a link to our 2023 tour dates https://www.provence-cycling-holidays.com/availabilities-2023.html.

Happy biking - Neil & Nat (Owners).

Our Covid-19 bike tour measures.

Vaccination requirements.

We are comfortable receiving our biker guests, as any international traveller entering France has to show evidence of their double vaccination.

Furthermore, and for your peace of mind (and ours), we’re happy to say that our entire family has been vaccinated, so again we’re covered, and ready for our tours.

Covid measures and our tours.

We are of course implementing all necessary Covid-19 measures to keep everybody as safe as possible. Something that is relatively easy given that we have lots of space at our properties and that we run relatively small group numbers, with no more than 8 guests at any one time at the B&B - and no more than 6 guests at the villa. These are not mass tours.

Measures at the B&B -

• Hydroalcoholic gels and tissues in each room and at strategic points around the property, along with enhanced end of stay cleaning.
• The shared bathroom for the rooms "Menerbes" and "Gordes" is sanitized on a daily basis, and has antibacterial spray and gel, and wipes always available.
• Additional daily cleaning measures at the property.

Measures at the Villa -

• Hydroalcoholic gels and tissues in each room and at strategic points around the properties, along with enhanced end of stay cleaning.
• All bike equipment sanitised at the beginning and end of your tour.

Also something to remember is that our guests spend the majority of their time out biking in their own small groups, made up of family and friends. The biking is also in a low density, rural setting, with the majority of the time being spent in open countryside and the small villages that we visit along the way. Areas, that to date, have been less impacted by Covid-19 than urban areas.

Our B&B based tours are on the edge of the small village of Coustellet, whereas our Villa based tours are in the small village of Taillades.

Another advantage that we have is that you can minimise risks by using the quieter, smaller, yet convenient transport hubs to get to our locations. Marignane/Marseille airport is a medium sized, relatively quiet airport (yet it has good links) and we have the Avignon high speed train station (TGV) - which are both just a 50 min car journey away.

If you have any questions regarding an existing booking or a future booking, please contact us.

Hope to see you soon for some great cycling in Provence – Neil & Nat Cowell - (Owners).