Holiday in France 5 - Routes des Grandes Alpes - Tignes
Leaving Derek's house in the morning we drove through Bourg-Saint-Maurice and up into the Iseran Valley towards the Col de l'Iseran. We unwittingly followed the Route des Grandes Alpes for nearly the whole time we were down in the mountains. This was a series of roads created by the French Touring Club and finished in 1937, starting in Geneva and ending in Menton on the Mediterranean coast. It opened the area up to tourism and allowed the local population to reach the outside world more easily. With the coming of the autoroutes these rather narrow and precipitous roads are fairly free of traffic.
Alan wanted to cycle up to the Col de l'Iseran (2770m) so he left me and Hettie in upper Tignes, which was deserted apart from a few workmen who were engaged on the lifts and residences in village. There is something very depressing about a ski town in summer. The high rise accommodation is usually never that well designed and the mountainside looks a mess where the runs have been created. In winter they would be covered by a merciful layer of snow. Looking at the bottom pictures of the village, you can see that there has been an effort to fit the buildings into the line of the land. The mountain at the back of the resort is La Grande Motte and skiing starts on the glacier there on October 4th.
There was an old stone barn opposite the accommodation buildings which had a midden next to it so was obviously still in use. Hettie obligingly walked through it and had to go into a stream to wash her paws. There was also a trail of cowpats through the village showing who the more common inhabitants were in the summer.
I have included a couple of shots from the journey up to Tignes and then some of the area and the buildings. As you can see there was a really good, moody sky while I was there
Alan wanted to cycle up to the Col de l'Iseran (2770m) so he left me and Hettie in upper Tignes, which was deserted apart from a few workmen who were engaged on the lifts and residences in village. There is something very depressing about a ski town in summer. The high rise accommodation is usually never that well designed and the mountainside looks a mess where the runs have been created. In winter they would be covered by a merciful layer of snow. Looking at the bottom pictures of the village, you can see that there has been an effort to fit the buildings into the line of the land. The mountain at the back of the resort is La Grande Motte and skiing starts on the glacier there on October 4th.
There was an old stone barn opposite the accommodation buildings which had a midden next to it so was obviously still in use. Hettie obligingly walked through it and had to go into a stream to wash her paws. There was also a trail of cowpats through the village showing who the more common inhabitants were in the summer.
I have included a couple of shots from the journey up to Tignes and then some of the area and the buildings. As you can see there was a really good, moody sky while I was there
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