Hiking in the Grand Luberon

This fall, my friend, Bettina, invited me to join a women's group called Les Amies d’Aix. This organization, made up of mostly French women, was formed about 10 or so years ago by a small group of women who enjoyed getting together and doing things. The membership is about 200 strong and there are a variety of groups to join-the most popular two are the Cultural and Randonnee(Hiking) groups. Bettina and I joined about 60 other women in the hiking group which was separated into two groups of about 30 each. Each month, we go on a day long hike to some interesting destination in the Provence region. A professional guide joins us each time to not only lead us, but to provide interesting facts about the area we are visiting.

On our first hike, we went to L’Ourillon on the south side of the Grand Luberon mountain range. Our starting point, the tiny town of Vaugines, was about a 30 minute drive north of Aix.

Here, at the parking/meeting spot, our guide, Stephane, gives us directions to Vaugines and some details about the day’s hike…

In Vaugines, preparing to go...




This lovely old church greeted us as we began our hike...



Meandering through the narrow streets of Vaugines...



This fountain looked like a mushroom...



As we neared the summit, the weather turned quickly from warm summer to windy winter....



We took shelter on the other side of the summit to rest and have lunch out of the wind. When we set off again, the skies had cleared and it was happily much warmer!



Here is a lovely view looking south. The mountain in the distance, the one that slopes off quickly on the right side, is Mt St Victoire....a much different view of her than you customarily see from Aix.



We arrived back, about 6 hours later, invigorated by our first and very enjoyable hike of the season. A la prochaine!