Mount St-Victoire

A long walk to the Montagne Sainte-Victoire that looms east of Aix and (especially) in a large photo on the wall of my apartment just above the TV. (Haven't seen the mountain from the city—there is no free horizon in the inner city.)

The 8:15 minibus to Vauvenargues had just three passengers, all going for a walk. After the other two left, the driver asked me how far I was going, and then explained me kindly about the two different routes that the returning bus took.

The chateau of Vauvenargues (closed to public) is the last resting place of Picasso, and in the silence of Saturday morning I can easily imagine Picasso (and his dachshund) strolling in the village.

Vauvenargues is a couple of kilometres east of the old mule track that takes straight to the Croix de Provence summit, so I had to walk a little in the morning sun at the southern side of a low foothill.

At around 10 a.m. the morning mist was dissipating, but I still got a few photos with the staggered outlines of the mountains and hills:

(A technical note: these are taken from the JPEG image and slightly tweaked (blacks, clarity and vibrance boosted a little, and cropped), but once an update will be published for my photo managing software that makes it recognise my compact's RAW encoding, I am sure I can get better results.)

The mule track started at 370 m and was steep. In places so steep that I had to zigzag from its side to side for easier walking (it was relatively straight and mostly covered with concrete). I decided to make a drinking pause every 100 metres, and repeatedly set the altimeter alarm to mark another 50 metres climbed. Fighting against gravity is hard.

There was a resting place at 722 m (where the forest ended) where I indeed rested a little and drank (didn't make much pauses earlier). The path continued as a narrow winding path amidst the shrubs. Surprisingly, that part of the ascent was easier than the mule track, as it was not that steep any more.

Another pleasant surprise was that after 722 m there was only a little over 200 m more to climb. My earlier experience with mountain walks (in the Pre-Alps) had been that after the forest ends, there are some 500 metres of bare mountain before the summit. Here there was much less, and the general size of the chapel gave a good indication that it indeed was rather close.

Now the path was covered with limestone that was attached to the ground and possibly rather sharp. Luckily it had been dry for several days and it was not slippery.

The chapel offered views like that:

Prieuré

And there was also a view to the southern side. The Mediterranean Sea could not be seen because of haze.

There was a sign at the chapel that the last leg of the path from the chapel (888 m) to the Croix de Provence summit (946 m) took 10 minutes. Rather much for a mere 58-metre climb (the horizontal distance is less than 150 m). Well... it was true. The last part was one of the worst parts of all the day's walk.

Now I had my earlier experience of mountain walks in Switzerland where falling from a walking path in mountains would have taken some effort. Here it was otherwise: no safety rails, no holding cables, no cut steps. So the ascent to the cross was slow and made me think what the descent would be. But as the cross was just behind the chapel, I climbed to it.

Croix de Provence

It was windy and cold up there, and much of the view was obscured by the haze. I rested for a quarter of an hour (watching a what seemed to be a swift harassing a raven; earlier when I was at the chapel, I saw a large bird of prey, but the camera could not focus on it). Then I started my climb back down to the chapel.

Knowing that the worst part of the day was over, I decided to decide only at the corner of my ascent path whether I continue back down on the trail I ascended, or westwards along the ridge towards the Bimont barrage and possibly on foot to Aix. I had earlier dismissed that option as the guide book classified them to be too demanding (as for shoes). Well, my descent was agility over boots, and as the limestone was dry, my outdoor shoes held nicely. During the descent I met maybe a hundred persons coming up eastwards and only maybe five going down westwards. It definitely would have been more easy to ascend that part of the trail, but descent was manageable as well.


Some more nice views:

As walking the 2½ kilometres seemed to last for ages (1 hour 20 minutes) and as it basically involved looking carefully where to step (as not to catch the foot between some projecting stones), I was sure that I will see these stones in front of my eyes at night before falling asleep.

There were more ravens at the ridge (the western part of the mountain that continues at around 600 m for 1½ km). Highly intelligent as they are, they must have noticed that people leave something to eat.

Pity that I am not a geologist, for it would have been interesting to know more about the varying stones. Here is some lichen:

But then the path descended through a soon to be colourful forest to the Bimont barrage:

Barrage du Bimont

Lac du Bimont

Checking the bus schedule, I was unfortunately just between two buses, with over 1½ hours to wait for the next one. At that moment I was not yet sure whether to walk straight to Aix (the X10 showed the distance as nearly 7 km in straight line that would have taken maybe two hours) or at some point to navigate to the road for the bus. I decided to walk at first and leave the bus option open.

At the parking lot of the reservoir dam I saw a group of military recruits being commanded about by a sergeant, such as noticing a deep puddle and ordering them to run through it. Two or three youngsters had obviously just made pressups in another puddle.

There were many people along the forest paths west of Bimont, many on mountain bikes, some even with prams. Often jogging, sometimes with dogs. Many interesting types of forests.

Bibemus

At the former Bibemus quarry (closed on Saturdays) the path returned to a road and took through the sparsely populated suburb (with large and well-hidden plots) to Aix. It was interesting to note when people coming my way stopped saying hello or replying to my hello.

What to do with garbage

Eventually, I reached the city, found myself just on the street leading to the school, and walked straight to the hotel, quite tired after the 24 km walk with 807 m total ascent and 1058 m total descent (according to Google Earth).

The walk (yellow line)