Hiking and Scenic Walks
The most famous and beautiful hikes in the gorge include:
- Le sentier (pathway) de Martel
- Le sentier de l'Imbut
- Le sentier du Bastidon
- Le belvédère de Rancoumas par le pont de Tusset (the Rancoumas panoramic viewpoint near the Tusset Bridge)
The most famous of these, the Sentier Martel, was laid out in 1928 by the Touring Club de France, and given its present name in 1930 to honor the explorer Édouard-Alfred Martel (1859–1938). Martel had visited the Verdon in 1905 as an employee of the Southeast Electricity Company, carrying out precise geological surveys of the river. On 11 August, he and his team (explorer Armand Janet, schoolmaster Isidore Blanc, geographer Cuvelier, plaus Baptistin Flory, Fernand Honorat, Prosper Marcel, and Tessier Zurcher) began an expedition of the region by boat and foot (especially when one of the boats became unusable). They discovered a narrow corridor which Martel named "Styx." When they arrived at Imbut (meaning "narrow" or "funnel" in Provençal) Martel wished to abandon the expedition, but his comrades encouraged him to continue. They entered the canyon proper and discovered more passages and rock formations; their successful arrival at the Pas de Galetas marked the completion of the first expedition of the Verdon Canyon.
Other expeditions to the Verdon included Martel's team the following year; Robert de Joly who in 1928 was the first to completely cross the Verdon Gorge, passing over the Imbut; explorer and filmmaker Albert Mahuzier in 1938 and 1939; a group of Scouts in 1945 and the Canoe Club of France in 1946; and Roger Verdegen, who made several expeditions in a boat made from animal hides and natural rubber, and became an authority on the Verdon.
Read more about this topic: Verdon Gorge
Famous quotes containing the words hiking, scenic and/or walks:
“The westerner, normally, walks to get somewhere that he cannot get in an automobile or on horseback. Hiking for its own sake, for the sheer animal pleasure of good condition and brisk exercise, is not an easy thing for him to comprehend.”
—State of Utah, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“Hence from scenic bacchanal,
Preshrunk and droll prodigal!
Smallness that you had to spend,
Spent. Wench, whiskey and tail-end
Of your overseas disease
Rot and rout you by degrees.”
—Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)
“Dreaming of evening walks through learned cities,”
—W.H. (Wystan Hugh)