DAY 11: Tuesday June 12th - Seyne to Costeplane:
WALK: 26k, 8hrs: Rain, overcast then 1hr of sun: 5°C to 18°C (but mostly 10°C all day)
Accommodation: Chambre d’Hote Nature Sejours (Holidays in Nature)
Leaving the Hotel Les Chaumiettes
Tuesday is market day in Seyne
Trudging up the road - 8°C in rain
Boiling the billy, looking for sun
First glimpse of Lake Serre Poncon
A sea of wild flowers in the Alps
It snowed last night
On the old Roman Bridge 100m up
A few minor disasters today. Firstly, the tea for breakfast was luke warm and the bread was stale then this afternoon we ran out of gas for our Jet Boil.
We awoke to grey skies and rain at 6.30am after a long nights sleep. Downstairs to get a WiFi connection but the breakfast room door was locked, so we sat on the cold stairs in the dark to phone home. Breakfast at 8am was awful - luke warm tea, stale bread, rock hard toast and dry sweet buns from the freezer. Other than breakfast, the hotel was comfy and warm. I stick my head out onto the street - it's 5°C and drizzling rain. Back upstairs we rug up with flannelette shirt, scarf, beanie and waterproof pants and jacket on top.
We leave at 8.30am and across the road, is a Boulangerie - it would have taken the hotel chef 1 minute and 1 Euro to buy a fresh French stick. We’re still hungry, so we go in, our backpacks squeezing the 3 locals in the shop and buy bread and a big jam tart. Tuesday is market day in Seyne, with local cheeses and flowers galore. Buying some cheese we stand in the market square devouring our fresh bread with cheese - should have been our breakfast - bring on Trip Advisor!! We leave town a little later than hoped at 9am and get lost. We’re looking for a short cut and walk up a muddy path to the road.
There's no designated route today. It was always going to be a higgledy piggeldy mix of tracks and roads to get around the edge of Lake Serre Poncon. The GR6 is cross country to the south so we part company with this GR. The other main track, the Tour de Lake Serre Poncon, is meant for mountain bikes, with long distances between somewhere and nowhere. So we opt for a mixture of minor roads, tracks, and a bit on a few major roads. When we eventually got to the lake, and saw the steepness of the sides of the gorges, we could understand why there were very few tracks and only one main road into Lauzet Ubaye.
We follow a minor road to the ski station St Jean Montclar, and find a picnic table in the shade - it's still 10°C and we're looking for a sunny spot for coffee so we don’t stop. We made good progress considering our late start and its really pretty with fresh powder snow on the top of the Alps. We also get our first glimpse of Lake Perre Poncon, the largest manmade lake in France built in the 1960's.
We take a gravel road towards the village of St Vincent Les Forts, perched high on a cliff top above the lake then follow a track into the forests. Feeling deprived of a hot cup of tea this morning, we stop at a beautiful sunny picnic spot on a log in the middle of the woods. It's still cold. The fresh bread, sausage, tomato and cheese from the local markets is divine. We decide to take a secondary walking track (not a GR) down the mountainside to the main road at the bottom of the lake, rather than walk 12k on a major road around the gorge edge to the only bridge at Lauzet Ubaye. After 2hrs we hit the main road at the bottom and walk 2k on the narrow road shoulder to the deserted ski town town of Lauzet Ubaye.
Sitting in the village square midst the barricaded empty shops we boil our billy - or try to - NO GAS! A disaster - it wasn't supposed to run out now and should have lasted another 5 days. Maybe we were stopping for more cups of tea than we thought. It will be 2 days and a detour to Embrun to buy another gas bottle - but it's so worth it, so we'll make some amendments to the itinerary.
We leave the village square, cross the old Roman Bridge built high above the gorge and head up on a narrow road to a chamber d'hôte Nature Sejours (Holidays in Nature). We’re greeted by a dog and the owner and have a cherry beer with him. The place is unusual and engraved into the side of an arch is the date 1861, and we’re told it was originally for sheltering sheep in the winter. Dinner is at 8pm and is superb beginning with a home made aperitif from grapefruit. First course is salad and quiche tart, then salmon and mushroom rice, apple tart, all washed down with red wine and finished off with genepi. We do a little bit of washing and go to bed. It's really warm and cosy inside - 2 foot thick walls.