Hiking in France - Day 4 (Cassis, Les Calanques)

July 19th, 2006

Read previous "Hiking in France" posts:
Hiking in France - Day 1 (Paris)
Hiking in France - Day 2 (Paris, Marseilles)
Hiking in France - Day 3 (Marseilles, Cassis, Calanques)

In our second day hiking the Calanques, we ranged further along the coast to fully explore Calanque d'En Vau, the steepest part of the trail. After ascending the plateau that faces the inlet, we descended on all fours to the ravine that connects d'En Vau's beach to the hilly inland country.

One thing I will say about most of the trails we encountered in southern France: the trail composition is virtually all stone. It was a rare day when we were able to rest our feet on packed dirt trails. Instead, we were constantly picking our way over paths laid with fist-sized rocks. Our day at d'En Vau was especially challenging as we had these rocky trails to navigate while climbing hand and foot down very steep inclines.

In our trip journal that night I wrote:

We had a good day hiking more of the Calanques. We walked past the area we hiked yesterday and went on to a really steep cirque where we dropped down to sea level, then gradually climbed up the other side. Then we descended back down (this was Calanque d’En Vau). We took a nap on the beach of that inlet, then made our way back up the “cliffs of insanity” and back to Cassis. All told I believe we spent about seven hours on the trail. We also went swimming in the frigid water at Port Pins.

This evening we picked up quiche, a sandwich “grille presse” and some juice and ate dinner at the petanque area on the port plaza. Petanque is a game played with metal balls—the object apparently is to get yours as close to a little red ball as you can.

There were a lot of people out hiking today and yesterday—nearly all of them French-speakers but we do occasionally hear German, Dutch or English on the trail. There are lots of older hikers walking in groups and many couples like us—even some with kids or small babies.

Kayla wrote:

James said seven hours but we really walked more—left camp at 10:30 a.m. and back here at 8:00 p.m. Last night we slept about ten hours and didn’t wake up until 8:30—nice! I’m surprisingly not exhausted and had a good hiking day despite being red-faced and wet with sweat!

James and I have been doing laundry every night together so it can dry overnight. That way we at least have clean sock liners and underwear every day. So far we’ve eaten a lot of baguette bread and sandwiches. Baguettes are about eighteen inches long and skinny—you see people carrying them around all the time holding them by a little paper.

We like the “hot-pressed” sandwiches which cost 3-4 euro with steak, onion, cheese, tomato or ham and cheese. We’ve also had some good pastries and croissants.

We shower in the evening. Here at Cassis they have nice hot showers but you have to push the button all the time for the water to continue. The toilets have no paper here at Camping les Cigales so I’m glad I brought my own. But they do have a little grocery store and a bar with a pool table close by our campsite. We’re too tired to be bothered too much by the noise.

So far there’s been no rain and we hope for clear skies again tomorrow. Although today was overcast so it wasn’t hot.