Hiking the Cayolle Pass in the South of France

You may remember last week that I told you all about a quest we went on to find the source of the Var River.  The day after discovering the tiny puddle that the big river stems from, we decided to go for a glorious hike in an area that can only be reached in the summer: The Cayolle Pass.  In the winter the road is covered with deep snow, so unless you are very intrepid and own a snowmobile, or a husky pack, it’s impossible to get to.

As you can see below, the hike started at the already lofty altitude of 2,300 meters (7 500 feet).  The trail climbed up to the Pas du Lausson at 2600 meters (8 500 feet).  It was good that we had spent one night at the Relais de la Cayolle to acclimatize.  Of course, compared to Mt Everest, the Macchu Picchu trail, or even many hikes in the alps in Italy, it’s not that high, but if you are not used to the altitude, your heart will race and make you huff and puff very quickly when you start walking up the trail. Well, that’s the excuse you can make…..

Marmots, parking lots, and wondrous views

The views were already amazing shortly after leaving the parking lot.  In fact, a friend we used to hike with in California always said that the best views on the hikes we did were from the parking lot.  Often, he was right!  In this case, the higher we climbed, the better they got, which is just as well.  If you make a big effort for the same view that you can see from you car, it kind of takes the joy out of the whole experience.  There were marmots everywhere, waddling around and whistling to each other, which makes any hike worthwhile immediately, in my opinion.

How to feel very virtuous

We were hiking a loop trail, so headed up on the South side of the Tête de Crépine, which is the steep slope you can see in the photo above. Another thing I love about hiking, aside from the marmots, is being able to look behind you and see where you’ve been.  That tiny trail cutting across the slope is where we had walked.  There’s something immensely satisfying about knowing you’ve arrived where you are standing under your own power.

Once we got to the top, the view made it all worthwhile. We could see the valley the Var River starts its journey in, and where we had zigzagged up to reach the Cayolle Pass and mountains as far as you can see.

The view from the top

From the highest point of the hike, we were also able to gaze down at the stunning Allos Lake.  You may remember that we went hiking and marmot spotting there a couple of years ago, and came nose-to-nose with a city of marmots. The sign said that the lake was only an hour’s walk away, which made it very tempting, until we looked that how far down it was.  It may have only take an hour to skip down to it, but it probably would have taken at least 2 hours to toil our way back up to the pass again.  The amazing thing is that if you drive from the Cayolle Pass to the Valley of Allos, it takes you longer than it does to walk over the mountains from one to the other.

After admiring the view for a while (and catching our breath), we headed along the ridge and then down to the green jewel of a lake you see below called Lac du  Garet. A few brave hikers actually went swimming in the lake, but I’m a total chicken when it comes to cold water.  Dipping one finger in was enough to make me back up so fast that I nearly tripped over my own feet.

The scary part of hiking in the mountains

After our sandwiches, we continued along past the lake to a trail that made me want to screw my eyes shut and start quietly whimpering.  I suffer a little from fear of heights, and the trail cut across the side of the mountain on a scree-covered slope, where far, far below the Lac de la Petit Cayolle glittered malevolently in the sun. This is one part of hiking in the mountains that I’m not fond of.  When the rest of the family skipped and hopped along this bit of the path, I plodded along it like I was walking on the ledge of a skyscraper, imagining that at any minute I would slide down the steep slope to certain doom in the lake far below. OK, from the photo, it doesn’t look that steep, but I swear it was (at least in my head)! Obviously, I made it as I am typing this now with all my limbs intact.

The trail you see cutting down to the lake in the photo above heads towards the summit of the highest mountain in the area called Mt Pelat.  That one will be for another day as it’s a very long hike.  Instead, we turned right and headed down another part of the trail I didn’t like the beginning of much (see below) which headed down on the North side of the Tête de Crépine.

The horror of steep hairpins

I was quite pleased to get to the bottom of the hairpins, and hike out along the valley floor past a few more marmots scuttling around and this beautiful lake edged with cotton-ball flowers called Scheuchzer’s Cottongrass.  Just for the record, they really are as soft as they look.  Do you think I could walk by them without touching them?

This post is part of a linkup to a monthly event called #allAboutFrance run by Phoebe, who runs a lovely self-catering holiday rental on the Cote d’Azur.  You can read about other parts of France in the linkup by clicking here.

By Lisa Watson

Snow-shoeing, appendicitis, and roundabouts

So, decadently holidaying and snowshoeing wasn’t actually where I was last week.  This was a little jaunt I went on about a month ago at the same time I was watching other people ski while drinking a Bombardino or two. Last week I was actually in hospital with my eldest as he had appendicitis.  That’s much less fun than snow-shoeing or drinking hot alcoholic drinks.  As they say, ” Life is a series of swings and roundabouts”.  Actually, I never thought that saying made a lot of sense, as both swings and roundabouts are fun to go on, but one of them is supposed to be bad…….anyway, I digress.  This post IS actually about a hike I did in the snow from Jouvenceaux, a pretty little village a little lower down the mountain than Sauze d’Oulx in Susa Valley, Italy.

Sculptures in the forest

There is a wonderful trail that wanders along beside a burbling brook that gives you a good dose of nature and culture at the same time.  In 2007, they had a great idea of holding an art event in which the artists had to carve a sculpture out of a single log of wood.  Artists from all over the world rose to the challenge and those works of art can now be admired as you stroll along the path.  From experience, I can tell you it’s a great way to get young kids to walk without complaining.  When our boys were small, they loved discovering where each piece of art was “hiding”.  It’s a shame they’re too old to fall for tricks like that anymore. I especially love this trail in the Winter.  When I went for my hike, there was just me and my snowshoes for the whole time I was out there. Oh, and a fat red squirrel, but he doesn’t really count.

A small bit of New Zealand in Italy

The sculpture above is my favourite one on the trail.  The photo you can see below is a close-up of the cat and dog sitting on the chairs.  Why is this one my favourite?  Well, because it’s made by an artist from New Zealand, of course! The artist’s name is Donald Buglass.  He organizes a driftwood art festival on the West Coast of the South Island of New Zealand each year, in which he and other artists sculpt fabulous artworks out of driftwood found on the beach. I am lucky to be able to visit this piece of his called “Push Me Pull You” relatively regularly to admire it.

The best things about snow-shoeing

After an hour, the sculptures ran out and the truly untrod part of the trail began.  There were prints of hares, deer and foxes crisscrossing the snow where I was trudging, which showed that no people had been there for a while. I love it when  the crunch of the snow under my snowshoes and the birds singing are the only sounds I can hear around me. I also have a childish delight in making tracks in the snow where there are none, and then admiring them.  I did some walking sideways, and some backwards steps, just to confuse anyone who might come along.

The feeling of going where no-one has gone before

I finally came across a semi-abandoned village called Mallefossa Bassa.  Some adventurous soul had driven through the snow to get to the village.  From the tyre tracks it looked as though they drove right through it and left again straight away.  Maybe they were too scared to stop in case they got bogged down and had to wait until March for the snow to melt! Almost all the houses in the village are abandoned and falling apart, except for two that look recently renovated.

It must be a tranquil place to stay as there’s only one narrow dirt road snaking through the forest to get there. This place is so small (or so abandoned) that I discovered that it’s not even on Google maps! There are still some un-internetisized places in the world! I know “un-internetisized” is not actually a word, but I think it should be. Google maps suggested I should add this place to their map since it’s not there, but I like the fact that it’s not.  It’s nice to have some unexplored places that you can discover for yourself.

I decided to stop my snow-shoeing here and sit in the sun with my back to the warm stone of the church below to have my lunch and contemplate the mountains across the valley in front of me.  I imagine that back in the 1700’s, when this church was built, the inhabitants of this tiny village did exactly the same thing.

By Lisa Watson

In the Summer we do an annual pilgrimage to the Mercantour National Park which straddles the border between France and Italy.  If you click on these links and you can read about our adventure with army jeeps and cows that blocked bridges, and about the time we went to Allos Lake high in the mountains and met fat, fluffy marmots. This time, to get to the start of the hike, we drove to the very end of a crazily winding, narrow road that follows a river in the Vallon de Gordelasque. Before parking, I had already lost my breath from the sharp intake I made every time we met a car coming the other way. Luckily, there was a guardrail, so the chances of falling off the edge of the road were pretty slim. It took courage though to inch past the vehicles.  Pulling in the wing-mirrors was obligatory if you wanted to keep them. Once I had recovered enough from the adrenalin burst, we started the hike to a refuge perched on the side of a mountain that overlooks the Lac de la Fous called the Refuge De Nice.  The refuge is not actually in Nice, nor can you see the city of Nice from its terrace, so I’m not sure why it’s called that.

To get to the Refuge de Nice we had quite a hike on our hands.  It was worth the climb to see waterfalls tumbling down beside, and sometimes on, the trail as we clambered upwards. We kept hearing chirping marmots taunting us from high up the slopes.  How can something so large, furry and plump be so good at hiding? We did get to see chamois grazing all over the place: even some with kids in tow (not the human kind).  This blurry photo below shows some of them. Note to myself for the future: remember never to use the zoom function on your I-phone!

At the top of the first valley we passed through a gap in the mur des Italiens (Italian wall).  Nobody seems to be quite sure when it was built, or if it was really Italians who constructed it. Whoever made it were really desperate to defend themselves from marauding hoards as the wall is incredibly thick.  The energy it must have taken to lug all the stones there and build a wall would have left them with no power to fight anyone.

As we got above 2000 metres (6500 feet), the trees were replaced with a rocky rather barren landscape and even more chamois hanging out in the green patches around the valley. One hardy (or stupid?) chamois had decided that the dam wall you can see in the photo below would have some good grazing on it.  We saw it impossibly perched halfway up the side of the vertical concrete wall.  When it caught sight of us, it bounded (!!) across the wall and ran away.  That guy would give Spiderman a run for his money any day!

We finally rounded a corner into another valley and lo and behold, the Refuge de Nice stood in front of us at the far end of the lake! With legs shaking and stomachs growling, we inched our way around the lake to the refuge and settled down on the terrace to tuck into pasta and airy omelettes prepared in the restaurant there.  It never ceases to amaze me that at such out of the way places in Europe, you can walk into a building and get a cooked meal! They had hens pecking around the feet of the customers, so we could tell that the eggs were fresh, and they do helicopter deliveries at the start of each season to carry up all the food and drink (including wine and beer!). You can also stay up there, which I think must be a pretty amazing thing to do.  We’ll have to try that one another time.

We did one last push after lunch, dragging the kids behind us, to climb a little further to see Lake Niré.  It honestly wasn’t worth the pain of making the kids go up the last bit of trail to see it, but if you don’t have complaining children with you, it’s a nice point to arrive at.  After that it was 2 1/2 hours of downhill, and one marmot sighting!  Aha!!!!  I finally managed to see one!

For anyone who has ever watched the french movie Belle et Sebastian about a young boy becoming friends with a large dog during WWII, this is the valley for you to visit.  Not far from the car-park is a small house huddled against a large rock, which was used during the shooting of the film.  I must admit that I haven’t seen the movie yet as I heard that it has terribly sad bits in it.  I have also head that it’s excellent, so one day I’ll muster up the courage to watch it (yes, I know it’s a movie for kids…….).

By Lisa Watson

Hiking In The Drôme

As promised, here is Part III of the fabulous trip we took to The Drôme recently!  To catch up on the previous ravings about the area, you can  click on these links to read about the villages we visited and the wine festival we bumped into while we were there.  This time, it’s all about the wilds of the Drôme and the stunning geology that can be found nowhere else in Europe but there.  That makes it a region worth visiting, even if you don’t care about wine, castles and quaint villages.  Of course, while we were there, we took a hike, as that’s what we do, as you may remember from other posts I’ve written about getting lost in Allos valley and meeting cows and army jeeps in Mercantour  Park.

The Saoù forest is very special as it grows in an almost completely closed valley, which is surrounded by hills that slope gently upward on the inside of the valley, then drop away on the outside edge into white cliffs, as you can see in the photo below. The geological term for this kind of formation is called a syncline, where the land folds like a towel if you push it together from both ends at the same time.  Not only is it folded, but thanks to millions of years of erosion from glaciers, water flows and earthquakes, the cliffs emerged from the land, and formed a perched syncline.  So, now you know.

There is one narrow road that leaves from the village of Saoù and follows the Vèbre River into the valley, and one nearly-mountain pass that hairpins its way out of the forest at the other end of the bowl. I saw photos taken from the air.  They’re really spectacular! Unfortunately, we didn’t have a way of flying above it so we had to content ourselves with walking along the top of it instead. The highest point of the walls that shelter the Saoù forest are three peaks called Les Trois Becs at La Chaudière. This is, of course, where we went since I have decided the rest of my family are half mountain-goat.  They’re always trying to head for the highest bit of ground they can find!

The valley shelters a whole heap of animals and plants that have been protected by its isolation from the rest of the surroundings. You can find everything in the Saoù Forest from squirrels and foxes on the valley floor to chamois and marmots in the higher reaches of the bowl. We did see a fox hunting on the side of the road one evening when we were going back to the gite after dinner. Sadly, we didn’t bump into anything else, except a very colourful snake when we were on the hike. I’m not sure who was more frightened.

After the actually-not-so-difficult hike, and the fabulous views from the top of the Saoù Forest, we went down into the valley itself to lie around in the grass and relax.  This time around, my eldest was tired enough not to moan about how bored he was.

By Lisa Watson

Hiking Up The Haut Montet

I’ve been looking at this huge ball perched on top of a mountain behind our village in France for years, and wondering about it. We affectionately started to call the mountain “Football Mountain”, which I think should be its official name instead of Le Haut Montet. Finally, one warm Fall day a few weeks ago, we decided that it was time to hike up there to finally see “the football” from up close. The giant ball on top of Le Haut Montet is actually a radar for checking out airplanes (just incase you were thinking it’s some kind of very obvious spying device).

The terrain is very rocky and bare, as you can see from the photos, so you have to be very careful that there’s no fog if you decide to go walking up there.  It’s really easy to get lost if you can’t see very far.  We even managed to do it with sun shining down on us.  On the way up the mountain it’s fine as you can see the ball at the summit, so you head towards it if you get off trail. On the way back, we were happily walking along, chatting to our friends who went with us, then suddenly realized that the trail had vanished.  The path is marked by piles of stones, which  are not that easy to see as they’re surrounded by other white stones that are naturally in piles.  Anyway, after some exciting cross-country roaming in the general direction of where we knew we had to go, and help from the eagle-eyes of the kids, we found the trail that led us down to the parking lot again.

The path up Le Haut Montet led us past two very cool ruins of shepherd’s dwellings that the kids had huge fun climbing on and exploring. Just for the record, one of the ruins is called Maubert and the other is called Mary.  I’m not sure if those are the names of the people who lived in them during the Summer months, or if people have just given them random names since then.

The view from the top of Le Haut Montet was amazing and we could even see Corsica, which lies about 200km off the coast!  Unfortunately, the rest of the sea was covered in a hazy mist, but the view was spectacular, none-the-less.  I was so happy to see the giant football from up close!  The great thing is that now, when I look from our house, I can think that I hiked up there!

The mountain you can see poking its bald head above the trees is called the Pic des Courmettes. You may remember reading about it after we hiked up there a few weeks ago.  If you missed that experience, here it is! Behind the Pic, in the hazy distance on the coast, is Nice.  If you strain your eyes and look EVEN further away, towards the mountains in the background, you are then looking at Italy.  See, it’s not that far!

It’s been so warm this Fall that there are very few signs of the seasons changing this year.  It was wonderful to come across this lone tree, trying to tell everyone that it actually is getting colder!

By Lisa Watson

If you are ever staying on the Cote d’Azur in the South of France and want to get away from the crowds and bling of the coast for a while, the Pic des Courmettes is the answer to your need for a little peace.  You can look down on the coast glittering in the sunshine while listening to the sound of the wind rustling through the grass, and smelling the scents from wild lavender and oregano as you brush by them. Even if you are not a hiker, you can take a stroll from the beautiful old buildings which now house a Centre for Environmental Education into the fields next door for a fabulous view over the whole coast.  The photo below is taken at the bottom of the Pic des Courmettes, and as you can see, the view towards Nice is spectacular on a clear day!

And, if you don’t even want to stroll, you can just get out of your car, walk ten paces, collapse gracefully on a picnic blanket under a majestic chestnut tree in front of the Centre, and sip from a flute of champagne that your butler has already poured for you. From this languishing pose, you still get a decent view over the startling blue Mediterranean Sea.  Ask the butler to hike up to the top of the Pic des Courmettes for you and take a few photos so that you can see the panorama better.

As our butler was on holiday the weekend we went, we had to walk all the way to the top of the Pic des Courmettes ourselves.  Disgraceful! It’s so hard to get decent service these days (hmmm…I think I’ve been  watching too much “Downton Abbey)! The hike winds its way from forest-lined fields at the bottom to the typical rocky terrain of Provence at the top. The ground is covered in small bushes of thyme, oregano and lavender.  The perfume wafting from the plants transports me directly into a Marcel Pagnol book  (if you haven’t read “Jean de Florette” or “Manon of the Springs” yet, go get a copy straight away!). If you’re lucky, or unlucky (depending on your love of dogs), you can meet a huge sheepdog or two guarding flocks of sheep in the fields near the parking lot.  There are lots of signs warning you to keep away from the dogs as they are VERY protective of their sheep.  So far, I’ve always taken heed of the warnings and not gone near them.  If anyone has found out that they are friendly, please let me know!

It takes about an hour and a half to hike up the trail to the top.  On a clear day, the view fans out to the horizon in every direction.  It can be possible to even see the island of Corsica.  It lies about 200 km off the coast of France, so theoretically, it’s not possible to see much of it, but under certain conditions, thanks to a physics concept called refraction, it seems to magically rise above the horizon in all its glory.  I’ve seen it just once like that.  It’s a little like catching sight of a bear in Yosemite Park.  It doesn’t happen often, but when it does, all the cynicism of being an adult drops away and you feel like a kid again.

From the summit of the Pic des Courmettes, you can turn your back on the coast and look toward the mountains and wild land that stretches out behind the Cote d’Azur for hundreds of kilometres.  The tiny villages dotted through the mountains on this side are few and far between. The area around the Pic des Courmettes has been inhabited for tens of thousands of years, by humans in the Neolithic period, to Romans, to modern day farmers, so you can find ruins of buildings such as the one below scattered over the mountain.

A little practical information: to get to the Pic des Courmettes, you need to drive (or if you’re crazy, cycle) to the parking lot at the Domaine des Courmettes  by taking a tiny winding road about half way between two villages called Pont du Loup and Tourettes sur Loup (the Loup is the name of the river that runs through this area).  You will wonder where the heck you’re going as it is very narrow and hairpins its way up the side of the mountain.  It’s not as long as it seems when you’re on it, and afterwards you’ll be glad you did it!

This is part of a monthly link up for Phoebe’s “All About France” group. Go check it out to find other bloggers who are writing about all aspects of living in France!

By Lisa Watson

Discovering the french alps with wine and without a bicycle

I’m actually working my way backward through our trip to the area of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence that we did a few weeks ago before the Summer holidays finished and things got crazy again.  If you click on the link above, you can see exactly where it is in France: it’s a mountainous area a little north of the famous Cote d’Azur, and a little East of the Italian border. You may have read my post last week on crossing the Col de la Bonette (no, not on a bicycle……I’m not quite that athletic. You can’t hold a glass of wine while riding a bike, after all…..priorities, priorities!).  That’s actually what we did last on the way home, but it was so stupendous, I had to tell you about it first. So, to rewind a little, BEFORE we crossed the mountain pass, we stayed for a few days in the beautiful Valley of Allos.  Allos is a paradise for skiers in the Winter, and a haven of marmots and peace in the Summer.

Dress for the occasion and don’t miss eating the tartiflette

We stayed in a very brown apartment that hasn’t changed since the Seventies, that made me feel as though I should have been wearing huge flares and and giant sunglasses just to walk across the threshold. Luckily, if you ignored the inner view, the outside view made it all worth it, as you can see in the photo above. We were set in the middle of bucolic fields, only two minutes walk from the charming village of Allos.  In the evening we were able to wander along the pedestrian street and eat tartiflette, a very hearty mountain dish that will be coming to you here next week (so stay tuned!).  Tartiflette is a mixture of potatoes, onions, bacon, covered in melted cheese: definitely not one for the diet-conscious, or for anyone who wants to walk in a straight, energetic line after eating dinner, but oh, it’s SO good to eat!

How to visit Allos Lake: the largest mountain lake in Europe

To work off the tartiflette, we decided to hike up to Allos Lake the next day.  That’s the lake you can see at the top of the page. It’s the highest natural mountain lake in Europe and is in the Mercantour National Park.  You may remember that I visited the South side of the Park a few months ago.  Well, this is one of the most Northern parts (The Mercantour is enormous!).  Just a hint if you ever decide to go.  Get up EARLY!  The lake is a 45 minute hike from the highest (kind of small) parking lot.  If you get there before 8:30 in the morning, it’s free and there are probably still spaces.  If you get there later, and have to park in the next parking lot down, the hike becomes a 2 -3 hour hike one way. Oh, and another great reason for getting up early is that the wildlife are still out and about.  You may also remember my fruitless searching for marmots in the Southern part of the Mercantour Park.  Well, here, around Allos Lake, they were EVERYWHERE!

How to get to the “Valley of the Marmots”

We got to the lake early (yes, we got a parking place in the highest car-park!), so decided to hike up some absurdly steep mountain just behind the lake to get a view  from higher up.  When we panting-ly arrived at the valley about that I have christened “The Valley of the Marmots”, my eldest son and I threw in the towel and let my younger son and husband who were still oozing energy, climb even further up some crumbly scree slope while we relaxed and did some marmot watching. They were squeaking and rushing around all over the rocks; shooting in and out of holes like Whack-a-Moles.

Where to relax after a day of hiking

After the hike, we returned to the village of Allos and relaxed at the Plan d’Eau in Allos.  Quite a few of the mountain villages around this area seem to have these parks.  You pay an entry fee to get in, and then have free access to the lake, waterslide, and all sorts of activities like mini-golf, tennis, volleyball, pedal-cars, kayaking etc. The kids braved the slide and the very cold water while we wiser adults lounged on the grass with a cocktail in hand.

Next day we climbed (in the car this time) over the Col de Allos down to the pretty town of Barcelonette nestled in the Ubaye Valley which leads to the Col de la Bonette. The road over the Allos pass was actually much scarier than the one over the Bonette pass, as on the Ubaye Valley side it’s about one and a half cars wide.  If you meet a car, generally someone has to back up somewhere, and if you meet a camper-van……good luck!  I honestly don’t believe people actually drive over that road in camper-vans!  We met one that was luckily in a part of the road that was wide enough to squeeze past; though when I looked out my passenger window, I couldn’t see anything but air below us.  If you’re the cycling kind of person, you may be interested to know that the pass is closed to car traffic on Friday mornings so that the cyclists can go without fear of being knocked into the valley below.

A summit with a view

Just to reassure you, the photo above is NOT of the road that cars take to go over the Col d’Allos.  It’s a hiking trail at the top of the pass. It’s worth parking at the top and walking a little way up this track to get a fabulous view.  We got a wonderful view of a guy trying to get his dog to come back (you can see them in the middle of the photo below).  He unthinkingly let his dog off the leash and it immediately thundered off down the mountain to chase marmots.  It was very entertaining to watch the man chasing his dog all over the side of the mountain (probably not so entertaining for him).

Next week, you can find out how to make tartiflette, that wonderful, addictivly good mountain dish I mentioned earlier.  Until then, try to have a relaxing week and start planning your next holiday!

By Lisa Watson

Here’s something a little different for this week.  I would like to write about a stunning National Park in France, near where we live called the Mercantour. The park straddles the range of mountains that divide France and Italy down near the coast.  We decided that we needed some fresh air (the heat on the coast has been pretty dire these last weeks) and also a little (make that LOT) of exercise, so we dragged the kids out of their pyjamas and threw them in the car for a day in the mountains.

We didn’t get to the Mercantour quite as early as we hoped to thanks to getting caught in the middle of a very long and very slow procession of American World War Two era jeeps, trucks and tanks that was wending its way from one tiny village to another to have a parade through each place.  It was the 14th of July, which is a public holiday to commemorate the French Revolution hundreds of years ago. I’m very doubtful that American tanks actually showed up during the storming of the Bastille, so I’m not sure why they were parading on that day in particular.  Anyhow, they were all dressed to theme and seemed to be having a great time driving like snails.

After driving along the side of a gorge where the road is carved into the cliff, we finally arrived at Le Boréon, a tiny village that hosts a wolf park.  Here, they breed wolves and release them into the mountains to try to repopulate the area with its native species.  You can visit the park and, if you’re lucky and get there at feeding time, you can actually see the wolves. There’s a excellent detective story about wolves, which is set in the Mercantour area. It’s by a French author called Fred Vargas. If you’d like to read the book, it’s called Seeking Whom He May Devour.  She has a whole series of them that follow a detective called Adamsberg who fights bizarre crimes.  It’s good to read them in sequence (even though I didn’t), so you can get a sense of the stories of the recurring characters in the books.

Sorry….I went off on a tangent there….so, we parked and then set off on our hike to Lake Trecolpas, a lake nestled in a bowl surrounded by mountain peaks at the top of a long uphill trail. When we got back to the car in the evening, my husband pointed out an impossibly high pass, far, far away, and told us that that was where we’d been that day.   I was glad that he didn’t show us where we were hiking to when we started, otherwise the kids and I wouldn’t have even got out of the car.

The trail meandered its way uphill through the forest and over flowery meadows, following the course of a river.  We had to stop for a while to let some cows and calves cross a footbridge.  They seemed to enjoy the view from the bridge (or suddenly were scared of heights) as they stayed there for a long time.  This wasn’t so bad for me as I was glowing like a tomato and dripping with sweat already. I lay under a pine tree for a while wishing I’d done a little more cardio exercise recently, while the cows mooed at each other (I’m guessing the were talking about the intricacies of bridge versus river crossings).

As we climbed higher, we started to hear the whistles and trills of marmots.  This slowed my hiking pace considerably as I kept stopping to look for these invisible animals.  I’m becoming convinced that the Mercantour park rangers just put speakers in the rocks that emit whistles every now and then to make people think that there are little furry animals living there.  I heard them everywhere during the hike, but didn’t manage to catch a glimpse of even one.

The trail got steeper, but the top was getting tantalizingly close.  In the photo below, you can see the last part of the path as it crosses over the pass that leads to the lake.

When we got to the top, I collapsed thankfully on the grass. After gasping like a beached whale for a while, I finally came to my senses and was able to enjoy the astounding view.  The lake was filled with tiny fish.  I really would love to know how they got there in the first place. Did they drop out of the sky?!  The lake is made from snow-melt, so it’s not like they could’ve swum from anywhere else. While we were picnicking, we saw a white, very hairy chamois grazing nonchalantly nearby.  It didn’t get quite close enough for me to take a photo, but I was amazed how close it did get to the people wandering around the lake.

The clouds started to roll in, so it was time to saddle up and get hiking again. We took a detour on the way back down to check out a refuge.  These places are scattered all through the mountains in Europe.  They have restaurants and sleeping quarters, and can often be almost luxurious (at least compared to mountain hostels in New Zealand).

This refuge is about an hour’s hike up the mountain from the nearest village.  They told us that every day, one of the Summer workers at the refuge hikes down with about 25 kg of trash, and then hikes back up with food and drinks to sell at the restaurant.  If you’re ever looking for a job that will make you incredibly fit, this is it!

After a well deserved Panaché (beer and sprite mix), we gathered our cans together and took them with us to lower the next trash removal by a few grams.  Every bit helps, right?

The pesky marmots continued to whistle invisibly, while we hiked through scree slopes and jumped across streams. We met another chamois, who seemed a little confused about what its species looks like as it was mingling with the cows when we got back down to the herd.

Even in the Summer, when the Cote d’Azur is dense with people and traffic, the Mercantour, which is only an hour or so away, is a calm, cooler place to be. So, if you’re down this way, go take a hike, or at least a stroll, through some of the most beautiful wilderness in the area.  And, if you’re very lucky, you may spot one of those elusive marmots!

By Lisa Watson