1. Stage 1: Ancelle - Col Bayard Oxygenation Centre - Le Noyer

9 points of interest

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  Panorama

  View over Gap

  To the south of Champsaur, the town of Gap is the administrative centre of Hautes-Alpes, with a little over 40,000 inhabitants. It stands at an altitude of 700 m on a major communications route between Provence and the Alps, and enjoys generous rates of sunshine with large natural areas in the vicinity. In 2013, L'Equipe newspaper voted the town of Gap as France's most sports-oriented town of over 20,000 inhabitants.

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  History

  Canal de Gap

  Work began on the canal in 1864 and was completed in 1880. The canal is 28 km long, and takes its water from the River Drac, upstream of Pont du Fossé, before channelling it into the Gap basin. In today's money, it cost some 2 billion euros to build! The man in charge of the project, Maurice Garnier, a local member of parliament and contractor, went bankrupt and died in poverty, but managed to improve the life of local farmers.

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  Archaeologie

  Archaeological site of Faudon

  A quick ride takes you past the Croix Saint-Philippe to the remains of the Gallo-Roman village of Faudon, meaning mountain of fayards or beech trees) Settled during the Bronze Age by the Tricorians with a population of up to 400, in the Middle Ages this village became a stronghold for the local nobles before being abandoned in the seventeenth century.

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  History

  Old Champsaur railway line

  1912 saw the start of the Champsaur rail works, an old project for a line between Grenoble and Gap which was intended to pass through Champsaur. In service from 1932 onwards, the Mure to Corps section was an undoubted success. From Corps to Gap, the earthworks and engineering works were almost totally complete. However, the onset of the War, a lack of resources and the development of cars all brought the project to an end in 1941. Today, numerous structures along the route bear witness to this past endeavour.

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  Fauna

  Mouflon

  If you make a detour to the Col de Gleize, you may well see some mouflons. An ancestor of the sheep with ammonite horns, it was introduced from 1949 into the Alps from herds in Corsica and central Europe, and seems well settled in the Chaudun area. Even though the European Union recommends strict protection of the mouflon, it is still hunted during the hunting season. Its populations are ill-adapted to extreme Alpine conditions and can fluctuate according to the winter weather.

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  Know-how

  ONF

  The work of the Office National des Forêts (National Forestry Office) is not limited to the forests. After buying a large amount of land following the rural exodus (public land), the state delegated to the Water and Forestry agency the difficult task of preserving the natural heritage of a large number of areas (restoration of land and building, maintenance of paths, etc.)

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  Flora

  Fir

  100 metres below the Cabane des Pierres stands the oldest and biggest fir tree in Champsaur. It is a European silver fir (Abies alba). The silver fir is often confused with the spruce (Picea abies). A tip to tell them apart: the spruce has cones that hang under the branch with needles all around the branch, while  the fir   has upright cones and rows of needles  that stand out through having two small white lines underneath them.

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  Fauna

  Roe deer

  Walnut forests are a favourable home for roe deer. They came from Italy, the Isère and Drôme regions, and were added to some forty animals that were released between 1969 and 1975 in the neighbouring forests of Durbon and Morgon. This timid animal can be recognised by its red-brown coat and white patch on its rear.

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  History

  Dominique Villars

  The botanist Dominique Villars was born in Noyer in 1745. From an early age he was interested in botany, and with his friend, Dominique Chaix, a priest and botanist from Roche des Arnauds, he discovered many new species. He wrote "L'histoire des plantes du Dauphiné" (History of Plants in the Dauphiné), bringing together 3,000 species. Shortly before his death in 1814, Napoleon Bonaparte appointed him botany professor at the Strasbourg Special Medical School.