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1st June 2016 Hiking - Walking: St. Dalmas le Selvage Wind Direction: Wind Stength: Surf / Sea State: Air Temperature: Sea Temperature: Weather: cloudy with showers Max Speed: Distance Covered: Wednesday 1st June – Hike ***** St. Dalmas le Selvage – cloudy with showers The usual mountain morning – is it raining or are we in a low level cloud??? It cleared out by the time we were ready to start our walk from the little village we are staying in – St Dalmas le Selvage along the Piste de Gialorgues towards the refuge. There was no indication on the signs near the van as to how far away the refuge was but it looked a lovely walk so we thought we would just go and see how far we got. It was a good track up past waterfalls and a couple of small houses which looked very quaint and alpine from a distance but were actually like Steptoe’s yard when you got closer! The whole route was lined with the most beautiful wild flowers – cowslips, orchids, forget me nots, tiny daffodils, alpine strawberries, gentians and many many more – too many to list!! The Larch trees were lovely too, the needles are just forming and are the brightest green and soft to the touch. We were looking for animals the whole way up, thinking we would find more marmottes but although we heard them we couldn’t see any and think they were probably very high up above us. The first find were a couple of Roe Deer on the opposite slope, across the fast running river which we followed all the way up. They soon disappeared and although we watched for ages we couldn’t see them again. Carried on up and up for about 3 ½ miles finally spotting a small hut across the meadow and at the end of the track – it turned out to be just a shepherds hut and the only sign we saw said the refuge was an hour and a half away!! We decided to let that go and sit on the door step of the hut and have our snack. We looked through the binoculars for a long time and were rewarded with more leaping Roe Deer, Chamois and a small group of what we think were female Ibex and one male on his own. After a long rest we crossed the boggy water meadow admiring yet more flowers including several different orchids. Some kind of sluice had been built up there but we didn’t really know the purpose. Crossed the small river/waterfall and came down a really lovely narrow path through the trees following the water all the way to the bridge. Then the long walk down. It started to really rain and we had to dig the cagoules out of the rucksack. The village, way down the valley, looked as if it might even be in sunshine! This mountain weather is whacky! As we walked along the track with a craggy clump of rock rising to the right we said wouldn’t it be good if there was some kind of animal up there so you didn’t have to search so hard with the binoculars when we looked up and saw what we think were 4 female Ibex watching us!! They were silhouetted against the sky and looked very curious about us, not at all nervous. We watched them for ages before moving on and then nearer the scruffy house saw 4 male Ibex with huge horns. Then even nearer the village another 4!!! Then a pair of massive eagles were soaring overhead with peregrine falcons attacking them! So we had been really rewarded by wildlife on our walk. We were out over 5 hours and had walked about 7 miles, half of which was a tough uphill hike but coming back was a lot easier! Had a cuppa and cake then packed up and thinking we were probably being a bit daft as it was approaching 5 o clock, left our spot and travelled down to the next town of St. Etienne de Tinee where we picked up some maps from the tourist information. On to Auron which is a ski resort with a bubble cable car and a few chair lifts. There was an enormous amount of parking but they didn’t want camper vans (or any habitable vehicle!!) and there wasn’t a good view anyway so we left there and took the first right hand turn once we were back on the main road and found ourselves on one of our usual tiny narrow roads with a sheer drop off on the leftt hand side which wound its way up to a tiny village called Roya. Luckily we didn’t meet anything coming the other way!! There is a church, a few houses and an Auberge! There are a few walking signs so we thought we would park in their car park and if anybody questioned us we could say we were walking in the morning but nobody even gave us a second look. We haven’t got a view down the valley but can see mountains all around:) Posh tea of fried potatoes and fried salmon :) Photo Gallery Here |
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