Wednesday 22nd June: Blue skies and warm, 16°C to 20°
Moulinet to Col de Turini: 13.8k walk: 8.50am to 2.50pm, 6hrs
That's the Col de Turini up there
Better make sure where we are
Hard Rock Cafe - sunlight affected
Views back to the coast
Knee deep in mountain flowers
Magnificent view snow capped Alps
Too good to miss another photo
Col de Turini at 1607m
Lunch under a pine tree at Col
View from L'Estive balcony
Early enough for a cold beer
View from L'Estive window
Line in sun with ALL our clothes
No WiFi, nothing to do but enjoy the view
Honey from Turini
Another magical day in the Mercantour National Park and the highlight of the day was climbing the 900 metres up to Col de Turini at 1607m with relative ease on a good grade in the cool of the pine forest.
Breakfast is in Jenny and Grahams room as they have the kitchenette, and 7.30am is teh agreed time. We enter just as Graham is getting out of bed naked and becoming decent. The fruit and yoghurt bought the previous night together with a microwaved cup of coffee is demolished, and after divvying up the food bag its time for a last minute pack, an goodbye and thank you to Simone, and we're out the door at 8.50am - our earliest ever this trip. We're anticipating a long hard day.
The walk begins at the back of the Villa de Beau Site, and Simone opens the back gate for us. It's cool and soon it's even cooler as we walk uphill through the pine forest. After an hour's climbing, with spectacular views back towards Sospel and the coast beyond, we're sweating but still cool and at 10.30am I find a spot for coffee with a bit of sun and shade. Ian's GPS tracker tells us we've come 3.5k and have climbed 600 metres to 1500m. With such a gradual grade, and walking in the cool of the forest, we're amazed we have made such good time, after yesterday on steep tracks in the sun.
Another hour and we reach the high point of 1740m with a meadow of mountain flowers. Then it's down through a forest track to the Col de Turini at 1607m. There's a cluster of 3 Hotels at the Col de Turini, famous for the Monte Carlo Rally, but nothing else. We've heard cars and bikes buzzing up and down the 37 zig zags on the main road, the D2566, rising from the valley. This road is deemed to be one of the most dangerous, but most spectacular roads in the world, hence the attraction of motor bikes and sports cars.
It's only 12.30pm, and we're well ahead of our planned schedule, so time for an early lunch under a shady pine tree around teh corner from the hotels. We've still another 2k to go and my IGN maps don't show a regular route between teh Col de Turini and Camp d'Argent where we're heading, but there's a new sign pointing to Camp d'Argent along a track just 10 metres to the west of the busy road. It's through the forest in the cool and at 2.50pm we arrive at Gite L'Estive at Camp d'Argent. Michele, our host whom I'd been corresponding with is having lunch on the timber balcony with magnificent views down the valley towards the Mediterranean. We don't need to go to our rooms just yet, we tell her, but a beer would be nice. So we to sit on the balcony and enjoy and icy cold beer, enjoying the view on this now warm sunny day.
It's almost 4pm when we are shown to our rooms. We're really pleasantly surprised. The rooms are quite basic, but large, with an ensuite and 3 beds, and the view out the window is amazing. And, there's a clothes line just outside the window. In no time we've showered, washed all our clothes, and have hung them on the line. We mightn't see another clothes line for quite a while.
There's no WiFi, so time for a rest with some trip blogging and photo sorting.
Magnificent haze over Mediterraneanl
Lasagne for dinner
Magnificent dusk