Hidden France - In the footsteps of Robert Louis Stevenson
Hidden France, walking with a donkey in the Cévennes
In 1870, aged just 19, Scottish writer R.L. Stevenson set off with a donkey through the rural heartlands of south-central France, from the Upper Loire to the Cévennes. Man and beast covered 220 km, he to nurse a broken heart, she, the cantankerous Modestine, to carry the bags. Today, many follow in their footsteps, with or without donkey, browsing a copy of Stevenson’s ’Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes’ as they tackle the whole trail in 12 days or just a shorter section.
The main part of the trail crosses the Lozère, the least populated French county where they say you can see the Milky Way clearer than anywhere else. Here any village over 1000 people becomes a ‘town’, gathered around a ‘storm spire’ where bells would ring in bad weather to guide wanderers to safety. Many seem caught in a time warp, preserving their old wash-house, communal bread oven or wayside shrines. One of the prettiest is Cheylard l’Evêque with a chapel perched on a hillock and a cosy flower-draped inn, a lovely welcome for anyone after trampling through the dark forest of Mercoire.
For nature lovers, the Stevenson trail is a real haven, from meadows and forests, all waterfalls and babbling streams, to limestone plateaux, high pastures and moors strewn with heather and golden broom. Now and then, you come across a menhir or a dolmen, sometimes a Roman ruin, a medieval abbey or vestiges from the Maltese knights who had a seat in the area. Beyond Chasseradès and the elegant Mirandol viaduct spanning the valley, the path climbs up to Mont Lozère, reaching the highest point at 1699 metres, barren and wild, with tall granite stones marking the ancient route on the crest.
Up on this windswept heath, you catch your first glimpse of the Cévennes, the ‘blue hills’ which enraptured Stevenson, stretching south as far as you can see, towards the National Park where rare orchids and lilies mingle with carnivorous drosera. This is home to beavers, deer, myriad bats and birds, most spectacularly the birds of prey hovering in the thermals, in this rich UNESCO World Biosphere Reserve. On the southern slopes of Mont Lozère, crickets whir all around and the fragrance of lavender and thyme lingers in the air.
After the damp misty days on the early part of his trek, Stevenson had finally arrived in the South of France. Here a warm breeze rustles through the trees, hamlets nestle on the steep slopes and cows with tinkling bells graze in lush pastures among dramatic boulders. In this land of shale and chestnut, the mountain path heads down to Pont de Montvert, an idyllic village tucked in the cusp of the hills. The Huguenot upheavals are still remembered here but every trekker on the Stevenson trail heads straight for the Auberge des Cévennes on the banks of the river Tarn. Up on the wall hangs the portrait of Clarisse who waited at the young man’s table, the first pretty girl he had met since day one, ‘her grey eyes steeped in amorous languor.’ What happened then, no one knows for sure but as today’s ramblers continue to St Jean du Gard, there is talk of romance and a donkey patiently nibbling on marigolds.
By Solange Hando.
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