Still playing catch-up here, so the events of this post took place about a week ago, on Thursday the ninth. I mean, the date's not importantly anything, it's just to give you a frame of reference as to just how behind I am. Anyway, onward!
When I was planning my European adventure, I read a lot of books. But perhaps no book was more central to the locale-choosing process than my copy of 501 Must-See Destinations. You have probably seen this book on the bargain table in the vestibule of Barnes and Noble. It is fantastic. It cost me all of five dollars, probably, and it has been invaluable not only in trip planning but in making me forlornly (wander)lust after other exotic locales.
At any rate, one of the Must-See Destinations featured in the book is Mercantour National Park in France. As soon as I started planning my trip, I knew I HAD to go there. That being decided, I spent most of my time using the book to borderline assault the rest of my family.
"IT'S JUST SO PRETTY!" I said, shoving the book in my mother's face as she tried to cook dinner.
"LOOK HOW PRETTY IT IS!" I commanded my father as he went upstairs to change after work.
"IS THAT NOT THE PRETTIEST THING YOU'VE EVER SEEN?!" I demanded of my sister as she tried to nap on the couch.
And now I've been and gone and I can say that, while the part of the park I saw looked nothing like the picture in my guidebook, it is definitely among the prettiest places I have ever visited.
The pretty scenery overload started with the train ride from Nice to Sospel, a small mountain town on the southern boundary of the park. The train on that particular route is called "Le Train des Merveilles" (the Train of Marvels) because it travels a really beautiful scenic route--so pretty that a train ride is a tourist activity in its own right. I got some pretty pictures but, like the photos from my last pretty train ride, I'm saving them for a later post.
I got off the train in Sospel and set about trying to find one of the GR trails that supposedly went straight through the middle of town. GR stands for "Grandes Randonnées," or "big hikes," and there are tons of them all over France. However, I was having some problems locating them in Sospel. I'd walked down the street out of town, hoping to run into something that looked hiking trail-like, but no such luck, so I'd turned around and wandered back into town. In a stroke of brilliance (read: an average level of logical problem- solving skill) I decided to go to the tourism office. It was, of course, closed for the public holiday, so I was on my own. Keep on wandering, sad hiker without a hiking trail! Keep wandering!
By a stroke of luck, I happened upon a wooden sign pointing me in the direction of GR 52. "GR 52 it is, then!" I said to myself, and started climbing up a giant hill past houses and walls and cars. As I got higher, the houses got farther apart and the road became less busy, and eventually it dead-ended into a dirt hiking trail.
By this point I was soaked through with sweat, not only because the hill was giant (GIANT, I TELL YOU!) but also because the weather, which was supposed to cap out at around 65-70 degrees, was clearly well into the mid-seventies or above already, and it was only mid-morning. I was cursing my jeans and sighing forlornly at the thought of my gym shorts just sitting in my bag back at the hostel.
Luckily, the path became more winding and therefore less steep and strenuous, so my lack of shorts quickly became less of a problem. The trail went through a wooded area for a little while and then began its winding ascent up Mount Agaisen. The path was out in the sunlight, bordered on either side by bushes or rocky bluffs. As I walked, the foliage ahead of me rustled as tiny lizards that had been sunning themselves on the path ran to hide. (There were a LOT of lizards, guys. If you don't like reptiles then I would suggest that you stay well away from Mercantour National Park.)
Every time the twisty path changed directions, a new "level" began, and at each new level I stopped to take about a gazillion redundant pictures of the view. I knew it was pretty much the same scene every time, but I couldn't help myself. It was so beautiful that I felt compelled to take as many pictures as possible, even though photos just don't do justice to the real thing. I really tried, though:
I reached the summit of the mountain in probably about two hours, and the view there was every bit as lovely--and perhaps even more impressive--than the scenery on the way up. I stopped to eat lunch and enjoy the sunshine and the sight of the mountains and valleys spread out all around me, but had to move on a bit quicker than I'd planned because the spot seemed to be frequented by giant buzzy insects. I don't mind bugs generally--in fact, I think they're pretty interesting to watch most of the time--but these things were giant, like they'd been bred in a mad scientist's lab or something. Plus they seemed to enjoy speeding past my head in group formations, like the insect equivalent of the Hell's Angels. I finished my sandwich and got moving.
I explored the mountain top for quite awhile and eventually came upon a view that can only be described as breathtaking. And I'm not exaggerating or being hyperbolic; I mean that I literally stopped breathing for a second. I was not aware that this was a legitimate reaction to something and not just a tired cliché, so I was pretty surprised by this turn of events. The picture might help explain it a bit, but it won't really convey the feeling of being high above everything else, having a view that stretches for miles, and seeing mountains and valleys spread out before you with very little evidence of humans. In some directions I could see distant towns and houses, but mostly the only human additions to the landscape were some power lines stretching from one mountain top to the next, and even THAT was impressive given the sheer distance from one tower to the next. It was a truly awe-inspiring experience.
After wandering to my heart's content, I realized that I was beginning to get a bit tired and that I still had at least a two-hour hike back into town. I made good time coming back down the mountain, even though I ended up on a self-inflicted detour with the steepest hills known to man--seriously, they were practically just vertical drops. But I made it back into town with a couple of hours to spare before the next train to Nice.
The story of how I killed that time is worthy of its own post (it's a pretty fantastic anecdote, if I do say so myself), so au revoir for now!
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