We are so lucky we live in this department. Even if we are still (until the coming Tuesday) restricted within 100 kilometers from our home, there is a lot to see and do in Isère, so we don’t really need to go any further — actually Lyon, even if in another department, is within 100 kilometers from us!

Ever since we drove through Crémieu in Northern Isère last Summer when returning from The Caves of La Balme (Les Grottes de La Balme), and saw the magnificent bike paths around the town, we have wanted to return there for a short get-away. When the 8-week lockdown ended on May 11, we finally had the opportunity, and booked an extended holiday weekend at an Airbnb apartment (BTW, one of the nicest and cleanest in France so far). For such a short stay, we did not bother to take our bikes with us as originally intended, but planned some hikes around the town. Crémieu is such a small town that it is fully covered in one day.

Since we couldn’t check in at the apartment before 3pm., we made a detour via Saint Laurent du Pont on Chartreuse for a short hike to Belvédère de None (1198m), starting from the monastery of Currière. It was actually quite a boring hike, traversing a forest that was not particularly scenic, but the view from belvédère to Saint Laurent du Pont was nice.

The second day took us to the archaeological site of Larina, situated on a plateau over the Rhône Valley. The site “contains the listed remains of a vast rural estate dating back to late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages.” The remains consist of a chapel, houses, sheds and outbuildings, and a burial site (cemetery). We walked all the way to the plateau from Crémieu, and then back, but before starting we did a short tour in the town. Below are the photos of Halle de Crémieu and a small chapel next to Château delphinal, as well as the entrance to the craft brewery Les Ursulines.

It was a long walk to and from Larina (28.66km, D+/D- 658m) — it followed a short section on a highway, but mostly paved and unpaved country roads and mountain trails. The whole trip, including the visit to the archaeological site, took us seven and a half hours. It was a beautiful and hot day, and we ran out of water before reaching Larina. Before starting back, we visited the village of Hières-sur-Amby, where we had been on our ViaRhôna tour the previous Summer, in hope of finding drinkable water; we remembered that there was a fountain, but it was closed now (damned coronavirus!). Luckily there was a public toilet, not the neatest one, but we could fill our bottles from the tap — the water tasted fine and we are still alive!

Early next morning we climbed  to Les Remparts de Crémieu on the hill of Saint-Hippolyte. This fortification dates back to the early 14th century.We wanted to avoid both the crowds and the thunderstorm that was forecast later that day. The dark clouds started to gather during our walk, but we were hit by the rain and storm only a bit later when we were at the supermarket. BTW, the whole facade of the building in the picture at bottom right is painted. You can walk pretty close to it and still get the feeling that the stairs and balconies are 3D.

On our way home we stopped at Saint-Chef, a town built around a monastery that was founded in 6th century.  As an anecdote, like many other small towns in this department, Saint-Chef’s population declined from its early days in the 18th century until after WWII, but then started climbing again, reaching the original numbers in the early 2010’s. I am sure there are towns where the opposite has happened, but there is a lot of new development going on in villages around Grenoble, especially on Vercors, which is strange given how bad the winters recently have been.

We did a 3.5-hour hike (13.4km, D+/D- 305m) amongst the rolling fields south of Saint-Chef. We saw a lot of blue sky, but the clouds covering the Sun, combined with the wind, did make us feel a bit cold even if it was about 18 degrees Celsius.  The destination of the hike was Lac Clair, pictured in the last photo at bottom right. At bottom left is pictured a common building material in this area; the same material was used both for farm houses and outbuildings. We have not seen anything  like that anywhere else.

It was really nice to get out of the home for a couple of days! But what we are looking forward to is a longer bicycle tour.