Cevennes National Park

Created in 1970, the Cevennes park is unusual because its core zone is inhabited and farmed; it protects a working landscape rather than a wilderness. Schist valleys are terraced for chestnut, which fed the population for centuries and gave the tree the name of bread tree, and mulberries were grown for silkworms until the trade collapsed. Transhumance, moving sheep to high summer pasture along old drove roads, still happens and is UNESCO listed with the landscape. Robert Louis Stevenson crossed here in 1878 with a donkey named Modestine, and the GR70 follows his route. The park also has some of the darkest skies in France.

History

The Cévennes were the heart of the Camisard revolt, which followed the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, when Protestants were actively persecuted, and many towns and villages of the park keep traces of that war, remembered in a permanent exhibition at the old temple of Le Rouve. The national park was created in 1970, with its seat at Florac Castle, and stretches across more departments than any other French national park; in 2011 it became part of the Causses and the Cévennes Mediterranean agro-pastoral cultural landscape World Heritage Site (Wikipedia, Cévennes National Park).

Highlights

• The chestnut terraces - schist valleys walled and planted with the bread tree.
• The drove roads - transhumance routes still used for summer grazing.
• The Stevenson trail - the GR70 following his 1878 crossing.
• The dark skies - among the least light-polluted areas in France.

When to go

May to June and September to October; summer is hot in the valleys and the high causses are exposed. Autumn brings the chestnut harvest. Transhumance moves in late spring and returns in autumn.

Things to know

Roads are narrow, winding and slow, so distances take longer than expected. Villages are small with limited services. This is farmed country, not wilderness, and stock and fences are everywhere.

Nearby

The Gorges du Tarn lie west; Mont Aigoual is in the park.

Key facts