Escaping heat to Le Corbier II

We spent another weekend in Le Corbier — this stay was offered by our host because of the issues we had with his apartment the weekend before (see the previous post). This time we rented a Smart, and had a little difficulty to fit our luggage, including a cooler, in it. This photo is at the toll station near St. Jean-de-Maurienne.

Again we spent our days hiking in the nearby mountains and this time also forest. Saturday’s hike took us first to the top of Mont Corbier (2265m) in foggy but not too cold conditions. From there we descended a bit in chilly wind, until we started another climb to L’Ouillon (2431m). The original plan was to descend all the way down to Le Col de la Croix de Fer (2067m) but we skipped the touristy mountain pass, which we could see from the summit; tens of car rooftops were gleaming in the sun. Instead, we returned via Tête de Bellard (2225m) and le Marolay (2041m) and Col de Marolay to La Toussuire and then back to Le Corbier (1550m).

This was a magnificent hike with splendid scenery, but rather eventless. When descending from Mont Corbier we saw tens of piles of salt on the trail (we did not taste it, but thought that it must be salt), and just moments later a flock of sheep was descending behind us following the trail of salt piles. This hike was 18.2 kilometers with 1100 meters of ascent and descent. We made it in 6 hours and 24 minutes (excluding the lunch break).

On Sunday we had quite a different hike that was at much lower altitude and traveled mostly in the forest so there was not much scenery to enjoy, especially during the first half and the last couple of kilometers. This hike was 11.38 kilometers long with 780 meters of ascent and descent, and we made it in 4 hours and 25 minutes, again the lunch break excluded.

There was not much of a scenery during the first part of the hike which traveled in a humid forest.

There were a lot of marble kind of rocks along the trail.

A baroque style Chapelle St. Bernand de Menthon dating from 1658, completely renovated in 1801.

This creature enjoyed a break on my hiking pole.

In the last couple of kilometers we saw a lot colorful berries, which we did not dare to taste.

We took non-toll roads back to Grenoble. On our way we stopped at Les Marches in Savoie department to stretch our legs, and visited the old town dating from 1300’s.

Community bread baking oven founded by several families.

Prolog

Hiking in Les Sybelles area is great. The trails, many of which are dirt roads zig-zagging the slopes and thus quite steep — they are on the skiing slopes after all — or more gentle ones, undulating between the summits and passes, are not too technical, except one short section when going down from Tête de Bellard to Col de Marolay. It does not require any special equipment but is very steep and fragile, at parts the trail is completely eroded. Another plus side of Les Sybelles is that during the summer — and especially now when it’s the holiday season — it is not very crowded; hours passed and we did not see a single human, only sheep and predatory birds. Being the fourth largest ski area in France, I guess it is quite different during the winter season.

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