Untouched nature in the French Riviera coast is rare, but it exists. As Exhibit One, we present today’s post.
Untouched nature – where it exists – is also, as a rule, well hidden. To find the lush green valley that provides the scenery for this week’s hike, you must go to the back of the first elevation of rocks that you can see from the coast.
Take bus line no. 10 from Menton to Saint Agnes …
… and have a look around town before you go any further, to visit the self-declared “highest coastal village in Europe”.
If you have been there before, however, you can also leave the bus at the Chapel Saint Sebastien just before you reach Saint Agnes …
… to take the path down in the direction of Monti (the northward continuation of the GR51).
That’s another, perhaps not altogether unwelcome feature of today’s hike: St Agnes (remember: the continent’s highest coastal village), is, at an altitude of almost 800 metres, certainly the rooftop of the French Riviera.
From here, the only way is down.
Just a few hundred metres away from the main road, you will be stepping into a new world: one of butterflies, colourful flowers and peaceful tranquillity.
The entire valley is protected, a rare thing in France, and it is not permitted to erect any structure as far as the eye can see. This will allow you to sample a part of the coastal landscape that you may not have seen before.
We have lived in the area for nearly five years, and it was completely new to us, at least in this form. We had been to St Agnes only once before, on a hike from Gorbio, and remembered the heights around the village as rather alpine in character.
It is true, however, that it is only the southern, sea-facing side of the hills which is quite rocky, turning quickly desolate and barren once you have climbed to an altitude of more than 500 metres.
The northern side of these first inland elevations is different in character, which has probably something to do with rainfall patterns. (Remind me to ask a meteorologist about this.)
The trail generally slopes gently down, but not always. Following the descent to a bridge across a rivulet, …
… the trail soon goes up again on the other side, while two ravines in the last stage of the hike (called Merthea and Cabrolles) require steeper descents and subsequent climbs.
But even those are not at all demanding and provide welcome changes of scenery.
Once you have left St Agnes behind – the trail leads away from it in a semi-circle, so this takes some time – you get fairly clear views of the more distant semi-alpine peaks.
Although you are, in fact, by now approaching the outer suburbs of coastal Menton, you may be beginning to feel properly “alpine” for the first time during the hike.
You are also getting some nice views of Castellar in the distance. (We have visited Castellar in the past, so you can believe me: it looks best from afar.)
We are now only a short distance away from Monti. Somehow, we managed to lose our way down the final stretch, so we cannot tell you what the Full Monti looks like.
But once you can see the warehouses and supermarkets of the Carei valley stretching out underneath you, you can free-style your way down the hill on the winding asphalt road.
The Carei valley is served by two local buses, nos. 1 and 15, both of which go to Menton town centre. Neither line provides a highly frequent service (count about one bus per hour), but you will still save time if you wait for the next bus instead of walking to Menton.
One more advice: at about the half-way mark of the trail, you will find the ruins of an abandoned complex of farm buildings, so large that you might almost call it a hamlet. According to the map, at any rate, this place was big enough once to have been given a name of its own: La Virette.
The remains of La Virette make the perfect place for a picnic: calm, shaded, and romantically abandoned in a painterly way.
A TIP: bring anything you want to eat along the way from Menton or the place where you are based. Do not rely on buying anything in St Agnes.
All we found open there was a mini-market that (cheekily) sold items from the Lidl discount supermarket at double the original retail price. You have been warned.
