Trails – Page 7 – la croix de gattigues

July 19, 2017October 31, 2021

The upper Dourbie river

Hiking distance : 16.5 km ; Hiking time : 05:00

The Dourbie river starts on the Lingas, a mountain region just south of Mount Aigoual and flows generally east to join the Tarn in the town of Millau. Along the varied river course, the Dourbie flows through green mountain valleys and deep limestone canyons. This hike sticks to the mountain valley and starts in St-Jean-du-Bruel, runs up the right bank of the Dourbie, crossing near Tayrac and returning to St-Jean on the left bank. In the springtime, this is a very picturesque circuit in an even more picturesque region. This time we don’t visit the canyons which are further downstream. Continue reading “The upper Dourbie river”

May 8, 2017October 31, 2021

The tower of Brison

Hiking distance : 17.7 km ; Hiking time : 05:30

In september of 2016, our club hike took us to the upper Beaume river valley and the mountain village of Laboule. We stayed in the area 2 days to hike a couple circuits on the Tanargue. The Tanargue is both a peak and a ridge-line oriented roughly west to east in the southern Ardèche – about 2 hours from the croix-de-Gattigues. The average altitude of this ridge-line is around 1200 m, but one section, called the Cham de Cros reaches an altitude of around 1400 m. This “Cham” (cham is an old french word usually used to name a small plateau surrounded by deep ravines) is visible from a long way off. From a variety of lookouts near the croix-de-Gattigues the distinctive skyline of this plateau is easy to identify. When we reached the top of the Cham, we could see, to the south, a prominent but lower peak with a tower and a beacon. No one could identify the site that day. So we had to find out. Continue reading “The tower of Brison”

May 7, 2017October 31, 2021

Les Fumades

Hiking distance : 10.9 km ; Hiking time : 03:30

This hike loops around several hamlets in the municipality of Allègre-les-Fumades. Les Fumades was a popular spa in the 19th century, drawing visitors from as far away as the UK and Germany due to the reputation of it’s mineral waters. Wartime (especially the 1914-1918 world war) and economic changes have taken their toll and, although still a spa, the town is not as popular as it once was. Apart from the spa, the town retains several points of historical and photographical interest. Continue reading “Les Fumades”

May 2, 2017October 31, 2021

Rivermills on the Vidourle

Hiking distance : 12.3 km ; Hiking time : 04:00

In these parts, almost everyone has heard of the river Vidourle. It’s famous for flash floods and devastation. But the river is a lot more interesting than just the flood damage it causes. For starters, it rises in a steep valley on the south face of the Cévennes mountain range where it collects water from many streams and occasionally from violent thunderstorm downpours. Flowing out of the valley at St-Hippolyte-du-Fort, it enters a karstic plain and promptly disappears underground. There is an “above ground” river bed which runs the 10 odd km between St-Hippolyte and Sauve and is often dry. In the small town of Sauve a substantial stream emerges from the base of the Coutach hills – this is the so-called “fountain” of Sauve – and flows straight into the Vidourle riverbed. This fountain presumably restitutes the lost Vidourle waters, and a lot more, to the main above ground riverbed. Then the Vidourle meanders on to Quissac and Sommieres. Later on, closer to the sea, the river flows into the Camargue marshes and has many possible courses. But that’s another story. This hike concerns the Vidourle river from the Runel river-mill north of Salinelles to Sommières. We start in Sommières and visit a number of interesting spots. Continue reading “Rivermills on the Vidourle”

Hiking in south central France

This site is about walking, mostly in south central France, specifically the Cévennes “mountain” range, the Grands Causses area with it’s plateaus and canyons, the departments of Gard with the garrigue landscapes, the Vaucluse, the Herault, sometimes the Ardèche, the Avéyron and the Drôme. There are descriptions of interesting walks, but sometimes also the non-interesting ones. There are occasional articles about the hardware and software you might use while hiking and in particular handheld GPS devices and smartphones. There are also references to cartography both in the field and on the computer screen back home. The progress in the area of web mapping in the past several years, with the arrival of services like Google Maps, Nokia Here (now “Here we go”) and the OSM Open source map service, has been spectacular.

However, hiking in this region is more than just walking with eyes focused forward or concentration on the GPS screen. It’s also about observing and understanding the landscapes, villages, farms, ancient ruins and various geological curiosities. Often the subject of interest is not the “what”, but the “why”. Why did people settle here hundreds of years ago? Why did the ancient trade routes pass this spot?

In this region, traces of human activity are everywhere – in the still occupied villages and farms, but also in the undergrowth, on the riverbanks and and on the abandoned hillsides. This site aims to explore these subjects, traveling on foot, at about 3.5 km per hour.

This site is also for people who like maps. There are maps in nearly every article, often with interactive features. Try them out.

For every walk mentioned in an article, the site provides a downloadable gpx file suitable for use on a handheld gps device. The site provides additional access to a database of some 700 circuits also complete with downloadable gpx. It is worth noting however, that a gpx track is a perishable commodity. Over time waymakings change, land owners block walking routes, obstacles appear. For this reason, when available, dates of the most recent passage on the circuits are also provided. Use with care.

Everywhere you go on these hiking routes you are likely to see a field cross. They can be in iron, stone, or wood and can be simple or ornate. These field crosses are supposed to have protected travellers from bandits – as supposedly no bandit would dare attack near a symbol of the all powerful religion.

So the french word “croix” translates to cross and holds the connotation of the cross as a religious symbol. However, in the context of this site, cross means crossroad or intersection. “La Croix de Gattigues” refers to a crossroad in a hamlet in the Gard department at which, no surprise, there is also a fine an iron cross.