Summer Holidays: Les Gorges du Verdon

The Gorges of Verdon are often referred to as "The Grand Canyon of France". Well, we can attest that they are nowhere the size of the Grand Canyon, but impressive in their own right.

Thursday morning we headed earlier than usual after a lovely breakfast of warm croissants and vanilla yogurt in the garden. We arrived at Lake Saint Croix just as the boat rental guys showed up, and promptly signed ourselves up for a two-person kayak. We clumsily boarded the molded plastic boat, sealed our lunch into a waterproof drum, aimed ourselves toward the mouth of the gorge.

Of course, as the gorge spills into the lake, we were paddling upstream. The current wasn't too strong in the beginning, though, and we moved fairly easily into the depths of the canyon. The sides of the mountains towered over either side of us, and the water was the kind of blue we thought only existed at miniature golf courses. "It's just not possible" David muttered. "How can it be so blue?"

As we continued upstream, the current got progressively stronger. We passed a few small waterfalls, and scores of paddle boaters. We hit areas of shallow water and had to get out and drag the boat for lengths at a time. Unlike the mild water of the lake the river was freezing cold, and the bed was lined with stones, forcing us to wear our sandals as we tugged the boat along.

After a few hours the crowd thinned out, the paddle boaters turned back, and it was just us and a handful of other determined canoers and kayakers pressing on upstream. Finally we took a break and ate our lunch on the bank of the river, watching other boaters struggle against the current. Then we packed up the kayak again and started heading back.

Well, you'd think that going downstream would be a breeze, but in fact, we literally hadn't taken into account the breeze. The wind was blowing upstream in the gorge, and we found ourselves paddling hard to get back out of the canyon. So hard that at some points, we were paddling furiously and not even moving.

Finally, with an exhausting effort, we manage to expel ourselves back into the lake. We parked the boat at the rental shore and flopped on a rocky beach to bemoan our sore shoulders. We spent the rest of the afternoon there, reading and swimming, before returning to town for dinner at a little pizza place at the foot of the mountain in Moustiers Sainte Marie.