Les Dentelles de Montmirail

View of the Dentelles from the northern side

In the north of Aubignan the mountain range of Dentelles de Montmirail is located. Dentelles means translated " bobbin lace". They are our first hiking destination. We drive to the small wine town Gigondas. And now, let's go!
Our hiking guide proposes a round trip of  14 km (9 miles) and  about 6 hours. The trail goes slowly uphill. We are at the north side of the famous rocks. Right and left well cultivated vineyards where good red and rosé wines flourish (resp. the grapes of course) . Wines from Gigondas are premium wines!

In a height of about 350 meters we reach a nice lookout, the Pas de l'Aigle (eagle pass).

Pas de l'Aigle

Here, we can see over a deeply carved valley the highest mount of the range, the Crête de Saint-Amand with 734 meters.

From now on the trail leads downhill. Below we see a small winery surrounded of the hills of the Dentelles. Small but nice - as we can read later - the Cassan wines are famous and they are always very early sold out and are distributed only in limited amounts. However we don't know this when we go through this domaine.

Aloft with a look at north. Afield the Alps

Soon we reach the hiking parking lot of Col du Cayron. Many hikers and climbers have parked their cars here, where the exhausting climb to the Dentelles begins. For us too. A steep, stony and narrow trail heads to the north flank of the Dentelles. It's a hard and sweaty way! Anyhow, we have to surmount 300 meters height difference. But now, we are at the top. Not at the top of the Rocky needles, of course. This is the job of the free-climbers, which like it to visit this region.


A small path goes directly beneath the rock needles opening some nice outlooks in the northern landscape. We can make out even the Alpes afield.

Me and the rocks

We wonder about one: the hiking guide say we are at the south side of the Dentelles. But we are definitely on the north side! Somewhere, perhaps in Cassan, we have take the wrong way. That doesn't matter. We enjoy hiking also in north!

By and by our round trail is closed. We have a nice view of Gigondas with its small stone houses, churches and surmounted by a ruin of an old castle.

The famous wine town Gigondas