We are currently researching an expedition in Napoleon's footsteps from Paris to Moscow - below is a narrative of our proposed expedition - please contact us if you are interested!

By 1812 Napoleon had already conquered virtually the whole of continental Europe - from southern Italy to the Baltic, from Portugal to Poland. With a glittering 20 years of military triumphs behind him, Napoleon had enough gall to proclaim himself emperor of a kingdom that rivalled the size of the ancient Roman empire.

But Great Britain, France’s arch enemy, remained independent and defiant. At the Battle of Trafalgar  in 1805, Lord Nelson defeated the combined French and Spanish navies. Napoleon had hoped to undermine the economic superiority of Britain by banning trade with her and excluding the products of the 'nation of shopkeepers' from European markets.

However, When Russia refused to join a Europe-wide blockade of Great Britain, Napoleon made preparations to invade by assembling the largest army the world had ever seen. The Grande Armée, consisted of about 700,000 soldiers from almost every nation in Europe. Not only did the emperor Napoleon believe he could not lose but also that victory would be quick - Russia would be defeated in three weeks. Yet the Russian campaign – known to Russians as the Patriotic War of 1812 - was a catastrophe of epic proportions that sowed the seed for Napoleon’s downfall.

The Tour:
We start our adventure in the French capital where many monuments stand as Napoleon’s legacy, including his tomb at the national war monument of Les Invalides, the Napoleon Foundation and of course his Triumphal Arch on the Champs-Élysées.

 We will cycle east through the beautiful French countryside, exploring the gothic city of Reims in the Champagne region.  Napoleon’s favourite drink was Chambertin, a robust, red wine and still regarded as one of the best reds in Burgundy.   But he liked champagne enough to say: “In victory you deserve champagne, in defeat you need it”, so we will visit the expert champagne makers in Reims including Tattinger, Mumm, Piper-Heidsieck, Veuve Cliquot-Ponsardin and Ruinart.  

In 1812, Germany was part of the French empire.  We cycle on to the Bavarian town of Würzburg where we can tour the Würzburg Residence, a UNESCO recognized site and regarded as one of Germany’s most beautiful baroque structures.  Napoleon stayed here in its special Imperial Bedroom.  Next stop: Dresden, where Napoleon set up court in the Schloss - Dresden Castle - built in the 16th century by George the Bearded, Duke of Saxony.  The original palace was completely destroyed in 1945 during an allied bombing raid but was restored in 1989 and is now open as a museum.

The cycle continues on Napoleon's Trail through the Odenwald Forest (a UNESCO Geopark) and here we will enjoy a Saxon banquet in Dresden cooked by a local celebrity chef.

From Dresden to the Polish city of Poznań where Napoleon was considered such a liberating hero that the locals named a street after him and renamed the Jesuit College where he stayed Chateau de Poznań. The classic medieval town of Toruń, now a UNESCO World heritage site, is also en route. The building which Napoleon stayed in still stands in the market square as the local post office and here he visited the birthplace of Nicolaus Copernicus.

After crossing Poland’s lake district we will ride through Königsberg (Kaliningrad) Russia’s largest harbour on the Baltic Sea and end up in Kaunas, Lithuania. Here we will have the option for some last minute training at the Lithuanian Army Training Centre.  If the cycling so far hasn’t been enough preparation then this ex-Soviet military base will provide severe physical and mental tests before the assault on Moscow!

On 24th June 1812, the Grande Armée crossed the river Neman in a bid to conquer Russia.  Starting in the Lithuanian city of Kaunas we retrace Napoleon’s steps as he enters enemy territory. We cycle on to the city of Vilna. Against all expectations, the Russian army simply withdrew and so we too can follow Napoleon’s advance into the city of Vilna, like the Little Emperor, hopefully without opposition.

The Russians retreated adopting a scorched-earth policy and the faster they withdrew, the further Napoleon pursued them into Russia, looking to strike a killer blow. We will go east into central Europe’s last remaining dictatorship: Belarus and then enter Russia through the city of Vitebsk - visiting the Russian Governor's Palace where Napoleon celebrated his 43rd birthday - and Smolensk - which was completely burnt down by the invaders except for the Cathedral. We will have a guided tour by the Russian Orthodox priest here.  According to some historians, Napoleon liked it so much he warned his soldiers that if anyone was found looting its treasures he would personally kill them.

By this stage of Napoleon’s invasion it was the middle of July and it was the heat rather than the cold that was becoming a major obstacle.  One veteran described the hot conditions as, “worse than anything we'd known in Egypt”. Men died of heatstroke and dysentery at such a rate that the army had been reduced in size by a third when it reached Vitebsk. The remaining men were at the end of their endurance and they hadn’t even fought a single battle! Many of them had been on the march for three months, all the way from Paris with only two days’ rest. Others had endured a forced march for 32 hours covering a daunting 170km!

We will reach the site of the Battle of Borodino - where the French and Russian armies met in a major battle for the first time. It was one of the bloodiest single days of battle in the Napoleonic Wars. It has been calculated that nearly 2 men died per second. There were over 70,000 casualties by the day’s end. Although the Russians were defeated, Napoleon regarded Borodino as "the most terrible of all my battles." Every year a Russian re-enactment group recreates this historic clash of arms and this time you will be able to watch or even take part on the 200 year anniversary of the famous clash!

A week after Borodino, on the 14th of September 1812, Napoleon marched into Moscow. Out of the almost 700,000 men that had made up the Grand Armée, only 100,000 reached Moscow. What they found was a deserted city which the Russians had stripped of all supplies. To make matters worse, the next day Moscow went up in flames; perhaps burnt down by its Governor. Four-fifths of the city was destroyed.

Napoleon hung around for a month, waiting for the Tsar - who was in St Petersburg - to make peace, but the Tsar was in no mood for negotiation. “My campaign, led by General Winter, is just beginning”, he said. “There can be no peace with Napoleon.”

We will encounter a much different city which reportedly boasts more billionaires than any other in the world. Here our journey will end having ridden from West to East across Europe on the trail of one of history’s greatest disasters.