Walking holidays on the Grande Traversée du Massif Central

Get advice

Estelle Torterotot

Travel expert in France and Switzerland

Write

Cassandre Dufour

Travel expert in France, Switzerland and Italy.

Write

From the Puy de Dôme to the Plomb du Cantal: a complete crossing of the Auvergne Volcanoes Regional Nature Park

The Chaîne des Puys, near Clermont-Ferrand, is the best-known part of this walking route across the Massif Central, with its roughly 80 “young” volcanoes lined up in a succession of cones, domes and maars, and beautiful crater lakes. Panoramic views await from the Puy de Dôme or the Puy de Pariou, while the shores of Lake Servières and Lake Guéry offer a wonderfully refreshing respite! On reaching the Sancy and Monts Dore mountains, the terrain becomes more rugged; climb the Puy de Sancy, the highest peak in the Massif Central (1885m), and stop at Lake Pavin, an almost perfectly circular crater lake. Next comes the vast Cézallier plateau, a “little Mongolia” sculpted into gentle curves by glaciers, with magnificent summer pastures. You then reach the Cantal mountains, a great volcano with pronounced relief, crossing along its ridge (Puy Mary, Puy Griou…), to finish at the Plomb du Cantal before heading down into the valley.

You will love the beautiful medieval villages built from lava stone (Orcival, Besse-en-Chandesse), and enjoy the cheeses: Saint-Nectaire, Cantal and other Fourme varieties…

The Chaîne des Puys–Limagne fault was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List as a natural site in 2018.

Aubrac, Grands Causses, Tarn Gorges and Cévennes: heading south!

We are now halfway along the route… The scenery gradually changes until you reach the Mediterranean scrubland known as garrigue. This section of the Grande Traversée du Massif Central walking route begins in Lozère, in Occitanie, in the Terre de Peyre area and the Truyère valley, before reaching Aubrac, a vast granite and volcanic plateau: an ocean of rock and greenery dotted with lakes and crossed by rivers. In spring, one of Europe’s richest collections of flora bursts into bloom here, providing abundant grazing for the Aubrac cattle that spend the summer on the plateau. Descend towards the Lot valley before reaching the Grands Causses… Granite gives way to limestone and schist, heralding a striking diversity of vegetation, as well as a landscape of plateaus and gorges. The Tarn and Vis gorges, the Causse de Sauveterre and the Causse Méjean offer a succession of wide-open spaces and steep, verdant slopes. Next come the vast forests of Mont Aigoual, then the Vis gorges, the Cirque de Navacelles, the Causse du Larzac and, finally, the Cirque de l’Infernet and Saint-Guilhem-le-Désert, amid the warm fragrance of rosemary!

The stone villages here are particularly beautiful: La Canourgue, Sainte-Enimie and Meyrueis, as are the traditional buron huts in the summer pastures…

The Causses and the Cévennes were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2011 as a “Mediterranean agro-pastoral cultural landscape”.

Thomas also shares his travel account of the Tarn and Jonte gorges to take you on a virtual journey through these beautiful Massif Central landscapes

See also our holidays on the Stevenson Trail.