Holiday in France 16 - Saint- Véran
After Alan's ride we continued south thinking about where we could stay the night. Looking at the map we saw a tiny village, called Saint-Véran lying at the end of a blind valley. This seemed to satisfy a need for isolation so we left the Routes des Grandes Alpes and turned even more off the beaten track.
Saint-Véran lies in the Queyras National Park, a remote region bordering Italy. It took a little while to get there and I began to worry that there would be nowhere suitable to stay. But as luck would have it we found an area of carpark outside the village (cars weren't allowed in) devoted to camper vans, where you could fill up with water and dump the necessary. The carpark was elevated with a tremendous view across the mountains. As no one came to collect any money and there seemed no way of paying it was perfect. So we stayed 2 nights, the only time on the holiday.
The village, according to their website is the highest in Europe (2,042m) but there do seem to be other contenders to this title. It possessed one drag lift for skiing by the car park but if the weather was bad I cannot see that many people would make it through for winter sports. But it does house an international observatory, showing how little light pollution this area gets.
The first day we walked through the village which was very picturesque with old houses, barns and a museum. When we came to the end of the road we went down a footpath following a stony stream and through the pine forest. It was a nice walk and reasonably flat for Hettie but not tremendously interesting photographically apart from some marmots who entertained us for a while.
You can see from the first pictures the sensational view we had from our 'bedroom'.
Saint-Véran lies in the Queyras National Park, a remote region bordering Italy. It took a little while to get there and I began to worry that there would be nowhere suitable to stay. But as luck would have it we found an area of carpark outside the village (cars weren't allowed in) devoted to camper vans, where you could fill up with water and dump the necessary. The carpark was elevated with a tremendous view across the mountains. As no one came to collect any money and there seemed no way of paying it was perfect. So we stayed 2 nights, the only time on the holiday.
The village, according to their website is the highest in Europe (2,042m) but there do seem to be other contenders to this title. It possessed one drag lift for skiing by the car park but if the weather was bad I cannot see that many people would make it through for winter sports. But it does house an international observatory, showing how little light pollution this area gets.
The first day we walked through the village which was very picturesque with old houses, barns and a museum. When we came to the end of the road we went down a footpath following a stony stream and through the pine forest. It was a nice walk and reasonably flat for Hettie but not tremendously interesting photographically apart from some marmots who entertained us for a while.
You can see from the first pictures the sensational view we had from our 'bedroom'.
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