If you happened to read my previous post on Marseille then you already know that I wasn't all that thrilled by the big city. But there was a reason that we chose it as our main destination a few weeks back and that was because of its very close proximity to the Calanques.
On day two of our stay there we took a bus to the edge of town and embarked on a long journey through these natural wonders.
The Calanques National Park is a unique geological landscape of rough and jagged cliffs made from limestone rock deposits.
The Calanques themselves are these rocky coves usually with steep cliffs on the sides that are made from rivers digging through the landscape over time.
You could almost think of them as a water filled valley that is connected to the sea.
They are located along the coast of the Mediterranean between the cities of Marseille and Cassis.
There are about 26 Calanques in total but most of them are on the Marseille side of the park.
We did visit 3 Calanques from the Cassis side last year though and I did a post on it a while back. If you're interested in reading that, please see the link at the bottom of the page.
Both hikes are pretty awesome and each for different reasons in my opinion. On the one hand I thought the 3 Calanques that we saw in Cassis were a lot nicer, better identified and a lot easier to access.
But on the other hand I actually enjoyed the hiking more so on the Marseille side.
Overall you can't really go wrong with either hike though.
Each Calanque has a name but I don't recall the names of any of the ones that we saw from Marseille. There were a lot of them and they weren't as well identified as the ones in Cassis.
I call the one below the square one. We viewed it from quite high up but it looks like there are some homes or maybe a resort hotel with some shops and restaurants. I don't know exactly what the buildings are.
The national park is quite extensive, spanning 20km in length and 4km in width. The highest peak has an elevation of about 565 meters.
There are also several trails to follow within, all of varying lengths and durations.
You can really get lost in there for more than a few hours if you'd like.
I should note that the photos in this post are not in chronological order. I'm basically posting them to fit the context of whatever I happen to be writing about in the moment. I don't think it matters though really.
For our hike we took the bus to the starting point of the park, which is located in Mont Rose. Then we followed the red and white trail to the town of Les Goudes.
From there we took the path along the coast and through the woods all the way to Luminy where we caught a bus back into Marseille.
You could do this hike either way really and one nice thing was that the bus in Luminy was specifically dedicated to bringing people from Marseille to the Calanques and visa versa.
Another option is that you could take a transfer from Mont Rose to Les Goudes and start the hike there if you wanted to shorten a long hike by about an hour or so.
If you wanted a short hike you could start at Mont Rose and walk to Les Goudes then jump on the bus in Les Goudes and head back to Mont Rose. From there you would take a transfer back to Marseille. Basically, there are a lot of options.
In total we walked for roughly 17km and it took us about 6 hours in total so it was a pretty decent hike.
I would definitely recommend bringing lots of water if you go because there are very few places to buy any during the hike.
It wasn't super hot when we were there but by the end we had wished we brought more than only 2 litres.
As you can see in a lot of the photographs, I carried our dog in his backpack for most of the trip, probably at least 5 hours of the 6 hour hike.
It's only an extra 20lbs or so but after a while it really started to kill my neck and back.
But he really loves the views from back there so I just couldn't say no to him.
He likes to keep moving though and gets a bit anxious when you stop; Even if it is simply to take a rock out of your shoe.
"Let's move sherpa! Come on let's go."
My wife also carried a backpack with one of the water bottles, our jackets and a lunch that we packed.
No part of the hike was technical by any means but there were some areas along the way that were a little challenging to traverse.
There are some places where steps are cut into the stones but others where you have to use your hands to do is a bit of light climbing.
Most of the hike was along a standard path though.
There was some elevation gain but not a whole lot really. It ended up being a lot of up and then down and up and back down again. Some areas were quite steep and tiring but they really didn't last very long.
It wasn't like climbing a mountain or anything, though we did see some people doing that in the park.
Actually this is more like rock climbing I suppose.
Our trail lead us through one very small town after Les Goudes that I don't recall the name of. There wasn't much there though other than a few cottages and may one or two restaurants.
Above is a photo of the first Calanque that we saw. It was about an hour and a half into the hike and a ways after Les Goudes. I personally wouldn't consider it to be a Calanque because of the human intervention to it, but technically this is a Calanque. I prefer the more natural ones myself.
After the town and the first Calanque the trail is less through the woods and more along the coast of the Mediterranean.
Most of the coastal shots like the one above were taken around this time.
We saw this run down house near one of the Calanques.
My wife likes to take photos of me while I'm taking a photo of something else.
Looks like I was taking a picture of this tree here (above).
Here are a few of my wife getting herself situated. This happens a lot on our hikes.
I generally take such opportunities to take pictures of our surroundings.
Overall I would say that the Calanques are well worth a visit if you enjoy hiking and are thinking about traveling to this part of France. I would easily put this location on my top 5 best hikes in the country. The landscape is picturesque and the terrain is quite varied throughout (rocks, forests, coastline, cliffs, water...etc) so there is a lot of variation to see along the way. It's also relatively easy to access and there are many options for hikes that would suit anybodys preferences. It's just an all around great hiking spot to get lost in.