As much as I love the landscape of the Massif Central, I think the Matheysine Plateau in the French Prealps in Southern Isère is one of the most scenic areas I’ve visited in France, with the silhouette of the magestic Grande Tête de l’Obiou as a backprop.
Soon after returning from our vacation in Finland we found out that the following weekend will be an extended holiday weekend with two extra days off, and started thinking where and how we should spend it. We had two conditions for the location: relatively short drive away and cooler than home. First place we thought was Gap in Hautes-Alpes, a town through which we have driven in several occasions but have never visited. However, searches on both Airbnb and booking.com returned no available accommodations. Next we thought about La Mure (even closer to home in Isère) and taking the touristic Le Petit Train ride. No available accommodations there either, but we found an apartment in Saint-Honoré 1500, an abandoned ski resort eight kilometers away, and booked it. We knew the area since we have been hiking there before. The apartment had a gorgeous view to the Matheysine Plateau and La Grande Tête de l’Obiou. Here are some views from our balcony; the foggy and cloudy ones were taken in early mornings, and the rest around sunset:
On our way to Saint-Honoré we made a detour via the Nordic skiing station of Les Signaraux and had a short hike in the Arboretum de Combe Noir, the project that was realized as a collaboration between school children and disabled children.
Next morning (Friday) we planned to go to the touristic train ride on Le Petit Train de La Mure but all three rides of the day were sold out. We bought tickets for the first ride on Saturday morning, which in hindsight worked better for us since the weather was nicer and the sky clearer. Then we just went to a not so scenic hike to the nearby village of Villard-Saint-Christophe. We really shouldn’t have chosen the route we did since the trail traveled in the forest and was almost overgrown with wet grass. We chose to return on the road. Since the clouds were hanging very low that day anyway, I doubt any other route would have been any more scenic.
Come Saturday, and we were ready for the little train adventure. We seldom go to touristy excursion like this, and I was not impressed. Most of the 50-minute trip to the terminus of Grand Balcon traveled in a dense forest or bushes, so the only view we got was branches brushing against the windows. There were a couple of openings from where we could see the old viaducts. But seriously, on needs to do a lot of vegetation pruning to make this truly a scenic ride. Fortunately the train wasn’t sold out or even near full, but there were a lot of small kids and dogs, so the noise was deafening.
A short summary of the history of this train: it started in 1888 as a steam operated service between Saint-Georges-de-Commiers and La Mure transporting anthracite (also known as black coal) from the mines. Since 1903 the locomotive has been operated by electricity, thus being the first railway in the world operated by high voltage direct current. The coal transport ended in 1988 and the following year the train started to serve exclusively tourists. In 2010 a landslide cut the railway in half and the tourist activity was halted. There was some discussion whether the railway should be renovated, and in 2017 the decision was made to repair it. In 2021, after ten-year hiatus the tourist transport resumed with a lot shorter route to the Grand Balcon above Lac de Monteynard.
To finish our Matheysine vacation we visited the traditional harvest festival in Pierre Châtel. We were getting hungry but didn’t feel like eating sausages, so we didn’t stay long. Besides, it was getting hot! All in all this was a nice short getaway on the Matheysine Plateau and very welcome respite from the heat in our valley.
