Saturday 25th June: Blue skies and cool to hot, 16°C to 32°
Hotel Capelet to St Martin Vesubie: 22k walk: 8.20am to 4.50pm, 8hrs 30 mins
Leaving Hotel du Grand Capelet
A most spectacular day - stunning scenery across to the snow capped Mercantour Alps from the top of the Cime de la Vallette de Prals. Not our intended walk, but after last night's chat to our host Gabriel we changed our minds. He suggested going up and over the high ridge to La Madone de Fenestre in the next valley, rather than walking around the forested side, so we made a collective decision to do the 1000m climb up and 1500m down to St Martin Vesubie. And we were so glad we did even though it was a 22k day. Spectacular is not the right word.
Our morning started at 6am, showering and packing, then an early breakfast at 7.15am which was wonderful - yoghurt, muesli, muffins, tarts, bread, butter and jam - with hot tea or coffee. We're away at 8.20am and need to walk back up the road for 1k to the sign posted path to Cime de la Vallette de Prals.
Stony path up steep mountain
Looking back to Gordalesque Valley
Coffee with a view
Magnificent panorama from top
Now that's a back drop of Alps
Turn off to Lacs de Prals - Hmm
Stunning views on steep track into Valley La Madone de Fenestra
Madone de Fenestra Refuge
Lunch near the D94
10k to go down the road
Finally at St Martin Vesubie
Dinner in our studio (Hmm refuge)
The uphill climb up the valley road adds another 1k and 100 metres of ascent to our day. The path up to the Cime is crowded with Saturday walkers - it's Saturday - the day the French go hiking. And there's many ladies older than me!! The first section is a up a steep stony path then through a pine forest and after 2 hrs of slog we're above the tree line - about 2000 metres - and winding our way up through a grassy meadow. Time for a coffee before the last hour of climb. We try to hide from a cool breeze behind a small rock. But it's a long day ahead so we only stop for 15 minutes instead of our usual morning tea time of 30 minutes.
The next hour is a little easier - still steeply up, but along a well graded track. There's hikers going up, going down, running up the grassy slope instead of the track, young kids, old ladies and dads with kids strapped in backpacks with sun covers travelling like the Emperor Hun. It's a stunningly beautiful day, with blue skies and a slight summer haze. By 11.20am, we're at the top of the pass at 2378m and the views across to the snow capped Mercantour Alps are picture post card stuff. We stop and admire the view for 15 minutes before starting our long descent to the Valley of La Madone de Fenestre.
It's steep and shaley, and there's hordes of hikers coming up - Queen Street in the Alps, you might say. Down through the slippery shale, then a stony track beside a running creek - but we've seen goats and cows upstream, so not a good place to fill up the water bottles. We're aiming for the road in the valley below, the D94, which we need to walk on down the valley to St Martin Vesubie. We can see down through the pine trees into the steep narrow gorge that extends from St Martin up to the refuge La Madone de Fenestre at the head of the dead end valley. It's a long, long 1500m of descent - and the first section down to the road is only the start of the down - about a 700 metres descent, with another 850 metres of descent down the road.
At 1.30pm, we reach the valley road, the D94, and it's time for lunch. We bought a picnic lunch for 9 euro each from the Grand Capulet Hotel, and it's beautiful - a chopped salad of tomatoes, mung beans, chick peas, corn, peas, zuchini mixed with tuna - just the best lunch - together with some cheese, bread, a chocolate and apple. There's still 10k to go down this valley road, and although it's a bituminised road, it's still steep - dropping to 960m at St Martin Vesubie - 850 metres over 10k. It starts out easy, but the temperature is rising. We've left the cool pine forests, and it's now 31°C hiking down the road. Graham and Jenny decide to hitch hike, as suggested by both the guide Sondrine yesterday and Gabriel today, but there's no takers.
On and on down the hot road. There's markers indicating the kilometres to St Martin, and the first one we see says 6k to St Martin, but the next D94 indicator says 7.5k to the start of this road. This means it's 6k to the start of the village, but 7.5k to the point where the D94 joins the main Vesubie Road in the centre of town. At 3.30pm, it's time for a cup of tea at the side of the road. We've already emailed our St Martin AirBnB this morning to say we'll be late and probably will arrive between 5 and 6pm, so there's no real rush.
It gets hotter as we descend towards St Martin - 32°C - and finally we arrive in the village centre at 4pm. It's buzzing with hikers and tourists dressed like hikers. Sondrine told us there were two great boulangeries in St Martin and to buy a bread called a "Couple" - two round halves baked together, but don't buy a baguette! We see the Boulangeries, and a Casino - a small grocery store where we buy 4 beers for a pre dinner drink, but Ian's GPS has died, and my 1:100,000 map is very vague, so we go into the tourist office to find the locaction of our Air BnB, a studio at 1 Raoul Audibert. They don't know and they don't have a map of the village! They're only interested in booking tourists into accommodation. But they do have a free WiFi Hot spot which allows me to get onto google maps.
The studio is 600 metres up the road, a large building with about 30 apartments and we're not sure how to get in. Someone tries to help, but after finding our studio locked we're not sure what to do next, until I re-read the Air BnB instructions and see a phone number. Luckily Jenny has a phone with international roaming, and a quick phone call to our host Marie, and she organises her husband to come and let us in. It's quaint - a pseudonym for small - with a drop down double bed, pull out sofa bed, table, chairs, kitchenette and bathroom in about 25sq metres - our own private refuge - all in together, but at least there's a hot shower.
After guzzling 4 cold beers bought from the Casino, Graham, Ian and I go back to the Casino to shop for dinner tonight, brekkie in the morning and lunch tomorrow, while Jenny organises the studio, has a shower and does some washing. Ian and I return with the shopping - Graham MUST stay near the free WiFi to get the latest news etc as the studio doesn't have WiFi. Dinner is superb - smoked salmon with lettuce, tomatoes and cheese, washed down with two bottles of cold rose.
It's Jenny and Graham's turn on the pull out sofa bed, we take the drop down bed. Graham heads off back to the village for another WiFi session - addicted??