Hiking in Réserve Domaniale du Mont Valier (Ariège/ French Pyrenees)

This summer, I visited southern France again. During my stay, I spent around a week in the French Pyrenees, mainly in the department called Ariège in Occitanie.

The first trip was a 3-day-3-night hike around Mont Valier. This was the first camp & hike trip since before the pandemic, which made it a little special. So I want to jot down some thoughts before I forget them, and also lots of pictures too.

Overview #

• Picking up supplies
• Routes
• The plan
• Day 0
• Day 1
• Day 2
• Day 3
• Thoughts

Picking up supplies #

With a friend of mine, we bought some food and other supplies from a nearby town called Saint-Girons. You can also get some topographic maps from a local tabac where they also sold some hiking guide books. I sometimes find books like these a lot more helpful than trying to find a route online. The information is more condensed and helps me avoid choice overload.

Routes #

Since I can’t embed iframes on this blog, a screenshot will have to do. You can find the full route on Komoot here. When I’m hiking, I usually download an offline map on maps.me along with a paper topo map. I would really love to visualize routes more nicely for blog posts though - are there any good free tools to quickly draw routes and download them as GPX/KML?

Some websites that I found useful (you’ll find more info if you search in French):

• [M](http://Mont-Valier par Ribérot et Muscadet) ont-Valier par Ribérot et Muscadet
• Pic des Trois Comtes (2689m) et Mont Valier (2838m) en boucle

The plan #

Our plan was to do a loop from La Maison du Valier - Etang de Milouga - Refuge Les Estagnous - through the two lakes Etang Rond & Etang Long - then walk along the crest towards Tuc de Barlonguere bordering Spain - descend along Ruisseau de Peyralade & Le Riberot. But what we ended up doing was taking a U-turn before we got on the crest towards Tuc de Barlonguere and coming back down Le Riberot (more on why later.)

Day 0 #

We parked our little van at the car park near La Maison du Valier, packed our bags and started hiking around 16:50 on a Wednesday evening, which is quite late. We still managed to walk just over 3 hours past Cabane du Taus towards Etang de Milouga (lake). I’m still surprised by how long the days are in European summer.

Just before Etang de Milouga, there is another hut where we were greeted by many horses with their bells jingling around their necks. I was getting a little anxious that it was getting dark, and we weren’t finding a good camping spot. We found a flattish place next to the hut (and the horses) and decided to set up our tent there. (We find out the next day that there are plenty of nice flatter places to camp just after the hut towards the lake though)

The horses were friendly, a little TOO friendly and I was a little afraid if I’d be able to sleep from the ringing bells, but we slept just fine. It’s been a while since I’ve been in the mountains and I noticed myself getting very nervous on just about anything.

Day 1 #

We woke up to a very sunny morning and continued our way towards the lake. There were a lot of people hiking (it is August after all) and I became very good at pronouncing Bonjour/Hola to say to passing hikers.

It was about an hour walk from the hut to the lake. It was a perfect place to wash off sweat, and other people seem to have had the same idea too. I didn’t have any swimwear on me and after seeing other strangers diving in water naked, I decided to not care and be happily naked as well. The water was COLD (it is at 2000 m above sea level) and it did take a bit of getting used to but once you’re under, it’s ok. Before the lake, there are plenty of nice flat places to camp with beautiful views.

Another 2h30 walk from the lake, we reached Refuge Les Estagnous. It was pretty crowded since it’s the peak season. They were all here to climb up to Mont Valier (another 2h hike up from the Refuge) but we decided to continue our way down to Etang Rond, a big round lake.

There are some nice camping spots just by Etang Rond but we decided to climb up another 1h to Etang Long. There is a beautiful waterfall that falls from Etang Long to Etang Rond and just by the waterfall, there are some great spots to spend the night.

We met a hiker who had apparently followed a footprint/scratch mark on tree with fresh blood possibly made by a bear who showed us some pictures. He told us that he took the photo that morning and followed the footprints in the hope of encountering a bear.

Sometimes ignorance is a bliss. This piece of information kept me up that night and I greatly regretted trying very hard to understand his French. Unlike him, I’m extremely scared of bears. I didn’t know that there are bears in the Pyrenees but now I know. There are apparently 64 brown bears in the Pyrenees and are “by nature discrete, especially with respect to humans. If it hears you or detects your odor, it will seek to avoid you. " - If I had known this, I wouldn’t have been so scared. I shouldn’t have worried so much but for some reason, maybe because I had forgotten how to be in the mountains and in nature in general, I was overthinking in irrational fear. But I should’ve done more research. What I should’ve been more careful of were guardian dogs who guard the sheep and maybe ticks (lyme disease?). Anyway, it’s always good to do research, when going to a region you’re not used to.

Day 2 #

I’m not good at carrying weight and I sometimes wonder why I even bother carry around camping equipment when there are other ways to enjoy the mountains. And possibly the one big reason is because I like waking up in the mountains (when it’s sunny). It’s the best feeling. The walk along Etang long was beautiful with lots of flowers, berries with the view of the turquoise water.

Our plan was to walk along the Tuc de Barlonguere but when we got to Cote de la Legne and Tuc dera Gireta, I got scared (AGAIN, sigh). I don’t know what’s got into me during this trip but I didn’t feel comfortable to hike along the crest especially because it was super windy. We were also super behind schedule and walking way too slowly.

We decided to turn around and head back towards Etang Long instead of powering through. I was disappointed but I also knew I shouldn’t push it. My knees and ankles weren’t feeling good either and felt physically quite broken.

We headed back to Etang Long because we really liked it there. We originally planned to stay on the east end of the lake but quickly realized that it was too windy. (Some people had built a wind barricade with rocks which suggested that the wind was going to be pretty bad) So we decided to head back to the same place as the night before.

Day 3 #

Next morning, we had a morning bath in Etang Rond and made our way down back to the car park. The weather wasn’t the best but I was apparently really dehydrated by this point and from the consistent exposure to the sun in the previous days, I got a migraine. Note to self: bring a hat and a pair of sun-glasses.

Thoughts #

It’s been such a long time since I had been outside for so long that I really seemed to have forgotten how to be outside at all. I struggled to sleep at night and I was scared - about everything. I was constantly assuming the worst and felt frustrated at myself from the severe decline in my physical ability to carry my weight. Lack of sleep also did strange things to my mood and made me a rather difficult person to be with. I felt awful for my hiking partner. But overall, the trip reminded me that I did like being outside as much as I did like staying inside. I may have been overly fearful but I was also alert - and felt more strongly to want to live and to live better. There’s something really real about feeling so small in the vastness of nature and that makes everything feel so trivial. It also made me want to write better, and to describe feelings and emotions as words better. (Which I’m obviously failing at the moment.)

I also have new goals. I’d love to try thru-hiking the Pyrenees one day.

The end.