We started the Ecotopia Biketour 2025 in Pontareuse, Boudry (Switzerland), on this beautiful farm, “The farm of Pontareuse” by the collective of Hirondelles (meaning swallows, like the birds).
The farm is a squatted farm with a goal of providing a chance for communal farming and gardening for villagers, offering a place for people from the nearby asylum seekers centre to come and cook food (in their cozy outside kitchen), as well as offering a place to stay in emergency situations while also being a home and garden of the people from Hirondelles collective.
We were welcomed and hosted by super friendly and welcoming people of the collective and other people staying at the farm. We enjoyed lunches and dinners together, went swimming to refreshing cold water of the river (we had very warm weather!) and got useful tips for our tour!
We got a tip of a bike repair shop in Neuchâtel called Le Black Office, which is were I was lucky to find a bike for a good price!
Another tip we got was for a good wild camping and swimming spot on our way from Pontareuse to Orbe. (We had decided to take the short route untill Orbe instead of going around the lake).
After having our last meal together, swimming in the river one more time, and saying good byes, it was time to start cycling!
We started with quite some uphill and downhill roads, passed a magical bit of forest with a hidden castle, rode a bit on a bigger road and ended with small paths in the strip of nature along the edge of the lake. We had a swam in the lake (which looked like an ocean to me with its clear water and waves) and had dinner together on the beach.
For camping we decided on two different spots, and some of us had nightmares at night as wild camping is not really allowed in the country.
The next day we had more pleasant road and got to test a couple more tips we got from the people of Hirondelles. Firstly about a market square of Yverdon-Les-Bains where it’s easy to ask for recoup vegetables after farmers start to pack up (we got Cameroonian friend food and loads of vegetables – including from someone who coincidentally is involved in ferme du joran, our next stop!)
And secondly a tip about a festival of La Dérivée in Yverdon-Les-Bains on our way, which was an awesome place to spend the day in the shade, playing a traditional board game from West Africa, reading books, napping, playing some frisbee, eating, before a quick bakery dumpster visit (very successful) and then making the ride up to Orbe!
