Responsible walking holidays in France


From the controversy over empty second homes, the conservationists’ battle to make Mont Blanc a more protected site, the overuse of pesticides in French agriculture and the sustaining of small artisanal food producers, there are many topics to discuss on your walks. Because, although stunning and special, responsible tourism in France is far from being a fait accompli.
Our France walking Holidays
Guided walking holidays in the French Alps
Catered Chalet Based Guided Walking in the Giffre Valley
French Riviera holiday, walking, culture & cooking option
Experience real French culture while relaxing mindfully...
Self guided walking holiday in France
Idyllic walking in France with great food, wine and ambience
French Alps self guided walking holiday
Catered Chalet Based Walking Holiday in the Giffre Valley
Mont Blanc holiday, Tour du Mont Blanc
The best of the Tour du Mont Blanc
Loire Valley walking holiday, France
An easy-paced, gentle walking holiday
Snowshoeing in the French Alps
Snowshoeing in the Alps with a high mountain guide
Mercantour family walking holiday, France
Family walking tour with a donkey in Southern French Alps
Mont Blanc climbing holiday
The exhilaration of summiting an alpine peak
Highlights of Provence walking holiday, France
A guided walking holiday through beautiful regions of France
Mont Blanc walking holiday
A stunning walk through the Alps around Mont Blanc
Mont Blanc ascent climbing holiday, France
Climb Western Europe's highest peak
Mont Blanc Circuit walking holiday
Probably the most dramatic walk in Europe
Mercantour Park self catering gite, France
Comfortable gite, Mercantour, France an hour north of Nice.
French Riviera holiday, food, walking & culture
Experience real French culture while relaxing mindfully...
Mont Blanc Circuit trek, with hotel accommodation
Classic Tour, using small inns and guesthouses
Family walking holidays with a donkey, France
Above the Rhône to discover the unspoilt traditional Ardèche
French Riviera walking holiday, France
Relaxed mountain and coastal daywalks
France gite accommodation, Mercantour, sleeps 5
Comfortable gite, Mercantour, France, an hour north of Nice.
French Alps guided walking holidays
Catered Chalet Based Hiking Holiday in the Giffre Valley
The Way of St James walking holiday in France
Discover the pilgrim trail of Compostela
Walking holiday in France
Traverse the vast limestone plateaux of the Causses
Ice climbing holiday in the French Alps
An unforgettable weekend ice climbing in the Alps
Alpine GR5 guided walking holiday in France
The mythical "Grande Traversée des Alpes"
France walking and gastronomy holiday
Mediaeval villages, chateaux, Dijon, brilliant food and wine
Loire Valley circular walking holiday, France
Meander along serene riverside tracks and sleepy villages
Walking holidays in the French Alps
Walking holiday taking in three contrasting alpine valleys!
Upper Provence walking holiday in France
A sunbathed adventure with great food and a rich heritage
Wildlife & environment
Mont Blanc – Where silence is golden
The Mont Blanc massif is one of the most popular regions for hiking holidays in France, and so it is hard to believe that it is not actually a highly protected landscape. It doesn’t have national park status, for example. In France, it was designated a ‘site classé’ in 1951, which prevents development, camping and supervises amenities, but it does not have a conservation strategy that is co-managed by the three countries, something that would exist with a higher form of protected landscape designation. What it does have, however, is a strong group of mountaineering, environmental and conservation experts from three countries, who came together in 1991 to form Espace Mont Blanc. Two of its priorities of late are to seek international protective status as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and to perfect a management plan for the massif which will be controlled by European judicial statute. Indeed the former won’t be achieved until the latter is put into practice.It is not just the slopes, forests and precious alpine tundra that needs protecting around Mont Blanc, it is also the air. And the ambience. Mountain Wilderness, a mountain conservation organisation created in Biella, Italy, in 1987, leads important campaigns to protect wild mountain places. They define these as “any untouched mountain environment where anyone who so wishes may come into direct contact with the wide-open spaces, experience solitude, silence, rhythms, natural dimensions, laws and dangers.”
A recent campaign is ‘Silence’, lobbying to stop the growing number of privately chartered tourists planes and helicopters which are currently destroying this rare natural gift of silence on Europe’s highest mountain. There is now rarely a moment of total silence, without hearing tourist propellers, echoes and engines overhead.
The conglomerate Espace Mont Blanc recently developed the first ever ‘Strategy for the Future’ management plan for this multinational mountain, including a campaign seeking to ensure that an air space without aviation is prioritised as the world looks forward to a cleaner future. To date, flights are not limited unlike, for example, the silent paragliders, and drones, which are not allowed over the Mont Blanc range in July and August. It is also thought that the increasing number of ‘flyovers’ is becoming a safety risk. In French national parks flights for leisure purposes are only allowed at a minimum of 1,000m above the ground, but there are no such restrictions over Mont Blanc, as it does not have protected status. Watch the video below which captures the heart of this campaign, as well as the hearts of the campaigners, which beat strongly to protect this unique mountain territory.
"Silence has become such a rare commodity, because wherever we live today there is always noise. And here we are in one of the few territories where there is no noise at all. Not one noise. It is so quiet you can even here the silence. I believe that such a rare and beautiful territory deserves a minimum of respect, and respecting Mont Blanc is respecting its silence."
Support the invaluable work of Pro Mont Blanc, the umbrella organisation of various charities and conservationists working to protect Mont Blanc in France, Switzerland and Italy. French speakers might also like to seek out Pro Mont Blanc’s book, published in 2002, Le versant noir du Mont Blanc (The black hillside of Mont Blanc), which highlights many of its conservation issues. Follow their many projects and share on social media outlets. Hikers are often aware of the issues, but many skiers aren’t.
Hunting & hiking – never a happy marriage
If you have ever camped in France towards the end of August, you will know that dawn rude awakening well. Packs of barking dogs revving up for the annual hunting season, which usually continues until the end of September, but varies per region. So, if you see signage saying ‘chasseurs’, or chasse gardee’, wander right back to where you came from – this indicates a hunting area and these guys mean business. Indeed, 25 French hunters die each year after being shot by other hunters.A more controversial area with regards to hunting is regarding the rare wolf and bear populations. The French hunted wolves to extinction back in the 1930s, but in 1992 a sneaky alpha mating pair crossed the border from Italy and since then wolves have got their own back. Today there are a minimum of 300 individual wolves in around 25 packs spread throughout the French Alps, across the Rhone Valley into Massif Central and up the country’s eastern border, and under the Berne Convention and European Law, the wolf is a protected species and can no longer be hunted or poisoned.
Until now… due to a rise in wolf attacks on farm animals and much protest from farmers across France, the government has passed a ‘wolf plan’ under which 24 wolves can be legally ‘removed’ annually. The role that began as an official culling job for states marksmen however has now been extended to ‘wolf lieutenants’ too and today wolves can be shot in ordinary hunts, or in areas where they can be ‘seen to pose a problem’ – a subjective opinion and one that has conservation groups who view a return to wolf hunts as archaic and scandalous up in arms.
Don’t hunt, and definitely don’t tell a hunter if you see a brown bear. Apart from that, your best bet is to support any tourist initiatives that centre on either seeing wild animals in their natural environments, or keeping them happy there. Such as WWF, or locally Ferus, which strives to protect bear, wolf and lynx populations in France.
People & culture
The culture of mountain safety
Mountain safety is like a religion for people who live in and love the mountains. Especially on Mont Blanc which has seen tragedies and fatalities. Tourists can be guilty of turning a blind eye to the harsh realities of walking and climbing in the mountains, be it the Alps or the Pyrenees, because they are so accessible, by cable car or train, they are packed with pretty ski villages and state of the art mountain refuges, they somehow seems ‘safer’ or that a Panama hat and a bottle of red is all you need to enjoy the exquisite excursions. Talk to the experts, your hosts and guides – they will be switched on to the unpredictability of French mountain landscapes.If possible, always go trekking with an International Mountain Leader or IML. These are highly qualified people, who know exactly how and when to tackle different aspects of the mountains, depending on weather, the time of year, avalanche risks and so on. They are also fully trained in emergency procedures and will warn the walking group about dangers and how to prevent accidents. You might fall into the trap of thinking that you do not need a guide or leader in summer but this is not true. Conditions can still be extreme in summer, so don’t take any risks. Or, in early summer, the temperatures might soar early morning, causing ice melt and avalanche at higher levels. 80 percent of rescue operations are due to exhaustion, and are usually preventable with better preparation.
What you can do
Make sure you are fit and well prepared before your trip. Safe walking boots, the right amount of layers, waterproofs, water and an emergency kit are key. Ensure that you are walking with an internationally qualified mountain leader, particularly when hiking at higher levels. The UIMLA International Mountain Leader and the IFMGA Mountain Guide are the only internationally recognised qualifications in the mountains world-wide.
Second homes: The British invasion
France is still an enduringly popular destination for British people, in particular, seeking to buy property overseas. Something that is a persistent bone of contention in France. On the one hand, the invasion of holiday home seekers in France has been blamed for making some of its most quaint villages ‘seasonal’ and half-empty for much of the year, as well as forcing prices too high for the pockets of French locals. On the other, second-home owners have been lauded for contributing to activity in rural districts with lower populations where agriculture had been previously in decline, as well as preventing rural-urban migration among young French employed to work at rehabilitated B&Bs.Luckily, our walking holidays are run by travel companies that support locally owned accommodations, guides and restaurants. And also, they operate for many months of the year, and so you are supporting a whole other side of the economy than you would be staying in a second home rented out on an accommodation booking website and heading off on random hikes on your own.
Responsible tourism tips
“These days, wild flowers and insects such as bees, butterflies, damsel and dragon flies fare better on relatively steeply undulating countryside. A possible reason for this incidence is that steeply undulating countryside does not lend itself to the large-scales favoured by industrial agriculture. Since much industrial agriculture leans towards liberal use of herbicides, wild flower diversity is seen to suffer on plains favoured by industrial agriculture. Steeply undulating countryside can be found in the famous mountainous parts of France – the Alps, the Pyrenees and the Massive Central. Not so well-known is the bocage in the Pay de Gâtine in the region of Poitou-Charentes.”
“When air pollution hits certain levels, then the heavy good vehicles are stopped entering the Mont Blanc tunnel and driving speeds for all drivers are limited too. But in general, the pollution levels are far too high, and we encourage tourists to leave their cars behind.”
“If you are in national parks, respect the rules – you can bivvy out BUT fires are strictly forbidden.”