Our time in the Loire valley was coming to an end and we thought we should head towards our vague destination of the Pyrenees, so south. This was going to take us through Auvergne and one of the highlights of the area is the Parc des Volcans an area of dormant volcanoes. The plan was to dust off the hiking shoes and first stop was probably the most famous, Puy de Dôme.
Even though we have been stuffing our faces with gorgeous food since our arrival we have actually been maintaining a fair level of fitness at the same time, well at least we think we have so when we were researching the options of hiking at Puy de Dôme we decided on attempting a track a little longer and involving climbing an additional volcano on the same trip.
Our drive out of the Loire and into the Auvergne was pretty spectacular. The sun was out and the colours of the passing countryside were fantastic. We managed to find ourselves a great spot to stop for lunch with superb views from atop a small hill…winning!
Finding campsites is always a little hit and miss and so far we have had mostly hits but our chosen base for our hike most certainly wasn’t. We spent the first bit of the afternoon trying to work out whether the place had been allowed to descend into a state of such disrepair or whether it had recently been bought and the owners were attempting to resurrect it to some previous glory. Either way it was definitely in a state of disrepair for our stay but was certainly popular with the flies!!
Needless to say we decided to only stay one night. That meant the next day we packed up the van and headed to the base of Puy de Dôme to start our hike. We had to get a bit of a wriggle on as there were afternoon thunderstorms forecast and didn’t fancy getting caught out in those.
The car parks were all quite full when we arrived and I have to say the standard of parking was atrocious and all the cars circling for parks could have easily fitted in with a bit more consideration. We spotted a van that was taking up two spaces and I politely asked the lady smoking next to it if she wouldn’t mind moving so we could also park. She told me she would be moving in ten minutes. Not quite sure what she was doing smoking outside a van at the bottom of a hiking route as she didn’t strike me as an outdoor enthusiast but to be fair she did realise the shortage of parking and number of people waiting for parks and did actually awake her husband from his nap to generously move forward a little so we could squeeze in behind.
So we set off on our 15.5km hike. The first stage of which was 500m elevation gain pretty much straight up the side of the volcano. It was tough going and when we got to the top we were afforded great views of the surrounding countryside as well as the crater which was all that was left of the peak after it had blown off in an eruption.
There was also a funicular which gave people access to the top so while we were walking around admiring the views there were others looking fresh as daisies having caught the train to the top!!
After getting our breath back we set off the backside of the mountain to explore further. While the Puy de Dôme was the tallest volcano in the area there were at least a dozen others we could see surrounding it and that’s were we went.
We weren’t alone though, this being the Bastille day long weekend there were lots of people enjoying the same experience yet due to the huge number of tracks everyone was heading randomly in different directions which was nice.
The views after we descended the volcano were still fantastic and we strolled through the wildflowers before climbing again to the top of a smaller volcano before descending once again to finish the hike walking through woods.
All in all it was a superb hike and we really had a wonderful time it’s always nice to hike in a loop so you always get different views and to enjoy different sceneries along the way was brilliant. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come in France!! T