Cevennes Corniche (100 km)

Florac to Anduze · one way, about 100 km back to the start

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Why this ride

A one-way ride of 100 km, Florac to Anduze - roughly 1 h 21 in the saddle. It goes by way of Col des Faisses and Saint Jean du Gard. The highest point is about 1,050 m. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.

Roadbook

1. Florac start

   Florac sits where several small rivers and several landscapes meet, at the foot of the great limestone plateaus of the Causses and the schist ridges of the Cévennes. A small town of nearly two thousand people, it is the headquarters of the Cévennes National Park, which occupies the old château, and it has a cheerful, unfussy air, with plane trees along the main street and a spring that gushes out of the rock just above town. The Tarnon river runs through, and the Tarn, a little way north, starts its journey toward the famous gorges.

   This is Protestant country with a hard history. In the early eighteenth century, the Camisards, Calvinist peasants of the Cévennes, rose against the king's attempt to suppress their religion and fought a guerrilla war in these hills for years, and the memory of that resistance is part of local identity. The Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson walked through Florac in 1878 with a donkey called Modestine, and his account of the journey, Travels with a Donkey, made the area known to the English-speaking world. The hillsides are covered with sweet chestnut trees, once the staple food of the region, and the landscape is a quilt of terraces and old stone farms.

   For a rider, Florac is a very good place to start the Corniche des Cévennes, a high road that runs along a ridge for miles with views over a sea of wooded hills, and it is considered one of the finest drives in southern France. The road climbs from town in a series of tight bends, then follows the crest with gentler curves, though the surface can be patchy and the road is narrow, with steep drops on one side. Mist can fill the valleys in the morning, and the weather changes quickly. Florac has fuel, but supplies are limited, so it is wise to top up before leaving, and the larger town of Mende, about twenty-three kilometres away, is the next sure stop.

   The best months are May, June and September, when the days are warm and the roads quiet. Summer brings crowds to the Tarn gorges, but the ridge roads stay peaceful. Buy a chestnut cake or a jar of chestnut cream in town, and keep it for the evening.

2. Col des Faisses scenic · 1026 m

   The high Cévennes do not look like the south of France that most visitors imagine. This is a land of schist and granite ridges folded one behind the other, cloaked in chestnut woods and heather, with deep valleys where the villages cling to terraces held up by dry-stone walls. The Col des Faisses, at a little over a thousand metres, is a quiet saddle in this world, a place where the road tops a ridge and the forest opens to a view of blue hills fading into distance. It is far from any large town, and that is much of its charm.

   The Cévennes have a history of resistance. In the early eighteenth century, Protestant peasants known as Camisards rose against Louis XIV's persecution, and fought a guerrilla war in these hills from 1702 to 1710, hiding in caves and forest and ambushing royal troops. A hundred and sixty years later, in 1878, the Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson walked through the region with a donkey called Modestine and wrote Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes, which put the area on the map for English-speaking visitors. Parts of his route are now a long-distance trail, the GR70.

   The riding is slow, intimate and rewarding. The roads in this part of the Cévennes are narrow, with plenty of tight bends and blind corners, and the surface is often patchy, with loose gravel on the edges and the occasional rockfall. Traffic is light, especially outside July and August, and you can ride for an hour without seeing another vehicle. Weather can change quickly. Autumn storms, called épisodes cévenols, bring heavy rain, and in winter the high roads can ice over or close. Spring and early autumn are the best times, with the chestnut leaves turning gold in October.

   The sweet chestnut was once the staple food of the region, the bread tree of the poor, and the old terraces and drying sheds can still be seen. Nearby Mont Aigoual, at 1,567 metres, has a weather observatory that has been in operation since the late nineteenth century, and the whole region is protected as a national park and part of a UNESCO World Heritage cultural landscape, the Causses and Cévennes.

   Services are thin on the ground. Florac, about fourteen kilometres away, has fuel, cafés and shops, and Alès, a larger town, is about thirty kilometres further. Fill up before you head into the hills, carry water, and expect to take longer than the map suggests.

3. Saint Jean du Gard scenic

   On a day in early October 1878, Robert Louis Stevenson ended his walk through the Cévennes at Saint-Jean-du-Gard, and sold his donkey. The Scottish writer, then twenty-seven, had spent twelve days crossing the mountains with a stubborn grey animal called Modestine, and he recorded the adventure in Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes, one of the first books about hiking for pleasure. The route he followed is now a long-distance path, the GR70, the Chemin de Stevenson, and walkers with sticks and rucksacks are a common sight in the town.

   Saint-Jean-du-Gard sits at the foot of the Cévennes, where the Gardon river runs out of the mountains in a deep, green valley. It is a town of about three thousand, with a fine seventeenth-century humpback bridge, the Pont Vieux, narrow streets and a long tradition of silk, which was once the main industry. The mulberry trees that fed the silkworms still grow in the hills, and a museum of the Cévennes valleys recounts the story. A little steam train runs from Anduze, a tourist line along the river, which is a pleasure to watch go by.

   The town is also the start of the Corniche des Cévennes, the road that climbs along the ridge toward Florac. The road was built after the Camisard revolt, a Protestant uprising in the early eighteenth century, when the authorities wanted to move troops through the mountains quickly, and it clings to the side of the hills with a series of bends and views over deep valleys. The surface is good, the bends are rhythmic and the traffic is light, and the ridge, covered in chestnut and pine, gives a sense of space.

   The chestnut was the staple of the mountain villages, its flour used for bread and porridge, and a good deal of the landscape is shaped by the terraces built to grow it. In autumn, the woods are filled with collectors, and a plate of roast chestnuts or a chestnut cake is a taste of the region. The weather can change fast, and storms in the Cévennes are dramatic, with sudden floods in the rivers.

   Saint-Jean-du-Gard has fuel, and a number of cafes and restaurants, and is the natural place to stop before the climb. Anduze and Alès are the bigger towns for any further supplies.

4. Anduze finish

   Anduze is the gate of the Cévennes, a town on the Gardon river where the flat vineyards of Languedoc end and the schist mountains begin. The main entry is under the Tour de l'Horloge, a clock tower of the fourteenth century that stands at the edge of the old town, and the streets inside are narrow, shaded and full of small shops. The town is also known for the Anduze vase, a large, glazed, urn-shaped pot that became fashionable in the seventeenth century and decorated the gardens of Versailles. Potters still make them in workshops around the town, and you can visit and watch them being thrown.

   The history of the area is intertwined with Protestantism. The Cévennes were a stronghold of the Huguenots, and when the French crown tried to suppress them after 1685, the mountain people rose in the Camisard revolt in the early eighteenth century, fighting a guerrilla war in the forests and hills. The memory of the struggle is still strong, and a museum in the town tells the story. Just outside Anduze, the Bambouseraie, a garden planted in the nineteenth century with giant bamboo and other exotic trees, is a strange and lovely sight in the middle of France, and a steam train runs through the valley to Saint-Jean-du-Gard.

   The riding in the Cévennes is a pleasure, with the Corniche des Cévennes, the D9, running along a ridge between Saint-Jean-du-Gard and Florac with views over a sea of ridges and valleys. The road is narrow and winding, cut into the hillside, with bends and drops. The surface is mostly good, but gravel and fallen branches can appear after storms. In summer it is hot, with the sun beating on the road, while in spring and autumn the colour of the chestnut woods is a delight. The sweet onion of the Cévennes and the chestnut, in every form, are the local foods.

   Anduze has about thirty-three hundred people, with fuel, bakeries and cafés, though the larger stations are at Saint-Christol-lès-Alès, about eight kilometres away. The Gardon is a pleasant place for a swim in summer, and its clear pools lie below the old stone bridge, though it can rise suddenly in storms, with flash floods in autumn. Be careful in the rainy season, because the cévenol storms can be violent. Order a plate of charcuterie and a glass of local wine at a café in the square, and watch the village go about its day.

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