The Route des Grandes Alpes, from Thonon to Menton

A week from pass to pass

The route crosses seventeen passes over about 700 kilometres, with some 16,000 metres of climbing. It is not one road but a chain of local roads. The itinerary goes from one mountain region to the next: the Chablais, the Aravis, the Beaufortain, the Tarentaise, the Maurienne, the Briançonnais, the Queyras, the Ubaye and the hills behind Nice.

Each pass changes the scenery. Below the Cormet de Roselend, Lac de Roselend is a good place to break up the day. From the Col du Lautaret, at the foot of the Galibier, you can see La Meije and its glaciers. On the south side of the Izoard, the Casse Déserte is nothing but scree and chimneys of ochre rock.

The classic mistake is wanting to chain the passes together. Three passes in a day is five hours behind the wheel and not one walk. It is better to fit in two short stages, a hundred kilometres or so each, after the highest days. That is where the lakes, the alpine pastures and the villages you actually stop in belong.

Further south, many people prefer the Bonette to the official route over the Col de la Cayolle. Above the Col de la Bonette, a loop around the summit climbs to 2,802 metres. It is the highest tarmac road in France, but it is no longer a pass.

All around the Bonette spreads the Mercantour National Park, where the wolf came back from Italy in the early 1990s. Then come the Col de Turini, made famous by the Monte Carlo Rally, and the descent to Menton. You leave the larches in the morning for the lemon trees by evening.

Briançon and Vauban’s strongholds

The road runs close to Italy, and for a long time these mountains served as a line of defence. In 1692, the Duke of Savoy invaded the Dauphiné. Louis XIV then sent Vauban. The engineer fortified Briançon, the highest town in France, at 1,326 metres. He also built Mont-Dauphin from scratch, a stronghold on a plateau where the Guil meets the Durance. Both have been Unesco World Heritage Sites since 2008, along with Vauban’s other major works.

Briançon also owes its reputation to sunshine and dry air. In the early 20th century it was a town of sanatoriums. People still come for the same reasons, but now by bike or on foot.

What not to miss

1. 1The Col de l’IseranThe highest pass on the route, between the Tarentaise and the Maurienne, open in summer only.
2. 2The Casse DéserteOn the south side of the Izoard, a mineral landscape of rock chimneys and ochre scree.
3. 3Vauban’s strongholdsBriançon and Mont-Dauphin, both Unesco World Heritage Sites.
4. 4The Mexican villas of BarcelonnetteBuilt between 1870 and 1930 by people from the valley who had left to make their fortune in Mexico, then came home.
5. 5Lac de RoselendA turquoise reservoir below the Cormet, ideal for breaking up the day.
6. 6The Cime de la BonetteThe highest tarmac road in France, topping out at 2,802 metres as it circles the summit.

The Route des Grandes Alpes in pictures

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Bonneval-sur-Arc, at the foot of the Iseran.

From cheese to lemons

The route crosses three cheese countries before it reaches the sea: reblochon in the Aravis, beaufort in the valley that gave it its name, then the tommes of the Maurienne pastures. The cooperatives sell direct, often with a tour of the cellars.

Beyond the Ubaye, the cooking changes sides. In the hills behind Nice it is ravioli and pissaladière; in Menton, the lemon, which has its own festival every winter.