A Walk in la Garrigue

The city of Aix-en-Provence is in the department of Les Bouches-du-Rhône, and offers a wealth of beautiful walks outside the town.  The area is very dry with chalky soil, giving rise to a typical vegetation of pine trees, twisty, wind-blown olives and spikey undergrowth. This kind of heath, known as la garrigue, will be familiar to those of you who have seen the famous movies by Marcel Pagnol, La Gloire de Mon Père (My Father’s Glory) and Le Château de Ma Mère (My Mother’s Castle). There are tiny, prickly oaks (which Pagnol calls Chêne kermès, but which are perhaps better known as holly oaks), wild juniper (le genévrier), rosemary (le romarin) and thyme (le thym).

Setting off in la garrigue

Our Anglo-American group organizes guided family rambles once per month, and the June walk was a particularly rich experience.  It was a busy Sunday, with Father’s Day as well as the second round of legislative elections. But a small group of members met in the village of Cornillon-Confoux, whose name means “crossroads.” It is an ancient settlement site boasting many beautiful stone-built houses and a château , with lovely views of Les Arpilles mountain range to the north and l’Etang de Berre, a huge lake to the south-west.

The châteaufort itself was probably built in the XVIIth century, with a Roman style chapel thought to date from the XIIIth. It is not open to the public, having been restored and remodeled as private homes. We enjoyed the views from the road as we ambled by, and were startled to happen upon a huge classical-style bronze sculpture on a grassy knoll. It is the work of Igor Mitorag (or Mitoraj), an internationally renowned sculptor of Polish origin who now lives in the area.

Borie

Leaving the village by an easy, level path we soon came upon several bories. These are round shelters of dry-stone construction, traditionally used by shepherds, and as many as fifty can be seen in this area, including one covering a well. From the bories we headed off into the garrigue, at this time of year peppered with glorious displays of scarlet poppies, yellow broom and pinky-mauve cistus. Our French friend Annie gave us an impromptu French vocabulary lesson as we came upon a growth of bulrushes, explaining the difference between jonc (bulrush) and ajonc (gorse) as well as the Provençal word bancao for a low, dry-stone wall. In addition to the scent of rosemary in the warm air was the pungent aniseed smell of wild fennel growing along the roadside.

mur à abeilles

Lunch was a welcome break in the shade as temperatures soared to 32C. It was so tempting to laze away the whole afternoon listening to the cicadas, and it took a little cajoling from our guide Gilbert to get us back on track. Our route back took us on a section of the ancient Roman road la Voie Aurélienne. We made a five-minute detour to visit the mur à abeilles, a 60m long stone wall with alcoves for bee hives, probably hosting up to 200 swarms in its heyday. The area at one time had a thriving honey and wax industry. Another happy discovery, a nèflier tree, apparently in English a medlar. The yellow fruits (les nèfles) are small and fleshy, rather like a small apricot, and once peeled, offer a succulent, tangy fruit.

OK, so at 32C it was a bit hot for walking, but what a great day we had. Group leaders Annie and Gilbert very kindly invited us afterwards for cold drinks in their garden to cool off. Take the basic ingredients of beautiful countryside, add a good helping of conversation, a healthy dose of fresh air and exercise, a soupçon of vocabulary, a slice of local history, and the result is a recipe for a delicious day out.

© 2012 Text and Images Valerie and Trevor White