A flamboyance of flamingos was feeding on plankton in a reed-lined marsh. The water mirrored their lithe our bodies beneath clouds the colour of their plumage, blushed by the setting solar. Immediately, my information informed me to seize my binoculars: Black silhouettes of cows waded via the marsh like hippos within the Serengeti. I had by no means seen cattle so swish within the water. This aquatic ballet completely summed up the Camargue.
Set within the largest delta in Western Europe, the Camargue, a country area of France the place the Rhone River meets the Mediterranean Sea, has extra water than land and extra bulls than folks. Hundreds of birds migrate to its nutrient-dense terrain. It’s a colourful mosaic: verdant farmland, blue lagoons, sandy seashores and white salt mounds sprouting from marshes tinged pink by microscopic shrimp. “The panorama adjustments on daily basis,” stated my information, Jean-Yves Boulithe, 56. But the Camarguais tradition, of fishermen and mustachioed cowboys referred to as gardians, provides the sensation that point stopped on the flip of the Twentieth century — as do the restricted Wi-Fi and cell service.
The Camargue is finest skilled within the gradual lane, which I saved in thoughts as I rented a automotive in Marseille final April for a grand tour of the area, which hugs the coast about midway between Marseille and Montpellier, south of the vacationer hub of Arles. I had been warned concerning the whipping mistral wind and mosquitoes that preserve much less rugged vacationers away. I had remembered to pack footwear that would get muddy, since many areas are accessible solely on foot, in a saddle or on a motorcycle.
A land of salt and mosquitoes
Close to Arles, the Rhone splits into two branches, the Petit and Grand, and on this wishbone sits the roughly 300-square-mile Île de Camargue. The Rhone’s yearly floods have menaced the island ever since Phocaean merchants and farmers arrived there from Marseille in 600 B.C. In 1869, Napoleon III accomplished a system of sea dikes and river canals that managed the floods however reworked the panorama.
Then within the Twentieth century, a unique kind of transformation occurred: Made well-known in movies, the Camargue turned generally known as the unbridled Far South, roamed by the gardians of French westerns.
The area’s wild terrain could seem untamed, however human intervention has formed it. Or as a everlasting exhibit on the Musée de la Camargue, east of the village of Albaron (admission 7 euros, or $7.65), put it, at present’s Camargue is the results of generations of an “incessant combat towards floods and salty soil.” If not, the land would have drowned or dried right into a salt desert.
Every component of the Camargue’s ecosystem is linked: Tiny, purple wedge clams, or tellines, thrive in simply the correct mix of saltwater and freshwater. The pans the place seawater turns into the area’s prized salt rely on the arid local weather for evaporation. The horses and bulls act as four-legged garden mowers. Even the mosquitoes are vital, as a meals supply for birds. The bugs swarm in the summertime, and vacationers — 75 p.c of them French — do too. Spring and fall are the most effective time to go to.
Ferry experience to a different world
The Bac de Barcarin, a tiny automotive ferry on the jap fringe of the area, takes three minutes to cross the Rhone, however with departures each half-hour, it could be quicker to swim. The ferry (€6) lands in Salin-de-Giraud, a city perched on the fringe of one of many salt pans that bookend the Camargue. I climbed to the statement level for a chook’s-eye view of them: Snow-white mounds rose from swimming pools coloured 50 shades of pink.
My food-obsessed buddies had raved about La Chassagnette (€143, set menu for lunch or dinner, plus wine), a 20-minute drive north on the Route de la Mer. This Michelin-starred restaurant places seasonal greens middle stage: tempura fava bean leaves, charred mini-leeks beneath flame-roasted pigeon and smoky peas that tasted of a summer season barbecue. “Within the Camargue, the combo of natural world create a world the place every part is linked,” stated the chef, Armand Arnal, “which creates one thing magical.”
The place chook lovers are born
Greater than 400 chook species flock to the Camargue, which is alongside the biggest migratory hall between Europe and Africa. Keen to identify some within the wild, I had booked an evening at Mas de l’Ange du Vaccarès, whose web site marketed a sundown bird-watching tour with Mr. Boulithe, the guesthouse’s proprietor, as my information.
His encyclopedic data transformed me right into a chook lover. Every species has its personal character, he stated. The spoonbill makes use of its eponymous beak to scoop up tiny fish, and the chirp of the black-winged stilt matches its cute strut. As an alternative of a room within the stylish Seventeenth-century farmhouse, I selected a lagoon-side cabin (beginning at €200 an evening, together with breakfast) with a large window for bird-watching in mattress. It was laborious to sleep in with the squawking refrain and Technicolor dawn.
After a copious breakfast, I drove southwest to proceed indulging my newfound avian obsession at Parc Ornithologique du Pont de Gau (about €9, together with binoculars). The 150-acre park invitations birders to wander wood footpaths and reed-lined marshes, maybe recognizing a shiny ibis exhibiting off its iridescent feathers, or herons, that are an indication of a wholesome atmosphere, as one of many park’s informational panels defined.
I marveled at seeing such a big flock of the Camargue’s emblematic pink flamingos collectively within the wild — the way in which they balanced their football-shaped our bodies on twig-like legs within the water, then unfolded into elegant gliders in flight. My go to coincided with their mating dance, when males sing and unfold their wings large to seduce potential companions.
Good for consuming, ‘dangerous for kissing’
Throughout the southern fringe of the Île de Camargue, the Digue de la Mer, a 43-mile-long dike, helps defend the area from the ocean. A flat, typically bumpy, experience on an electrical bike (about €30 for a half day) from Stes.-Maries-de-la-Mer, the Camargue’s greatest city, alongside the dike to Gacholle Lighthouse took two hours and quarter-hour round-trip. On the slim, sandy path, I felt like Moses parting the salty sea and brackish lagoons.
On the Petit Rhone, a cruise on the 126-seat boat Le Camargue (€16) provided glimpses of black Camargue bulls consuming on the waterside whereas white egrets dived for fish. The skipper identified Za la Cabane du Pêcheur, a neighborhood hang-out well-known for its contemporary fish and eccentric proprietor, Daniel Zarate, 66, generally known as Za. By no means one to say no to a neighborhood’s suggestion, I returned later to lunch on charcoal-grilled sea bream, purple tellines the scale of press-on nails and octopus bathed in a garlicky rouille that Mr. Zarate warned was “dangerous for kissing.”
The boat departed from Stes.-Maries-de-la-Mer, which swells with vacationers in the summertime excessive season and for non secular pilgrimages in late Could. St. Sara, a.ok.a. the Black Madonna, is worshiped by the Camargue’s Roma folks, who traveled in cozy caravans referred to as roulottes. It felt as if I used to be bunking in a wood boat once I stayed in a roulotte on the close by Mas de la Fouque (€260 to €380 per evening, together with breakfast), a four-star resort that pairs gastronomic fare with reside music on Saturday nights.
Simply down the highway, the brand-new, fairy-tale-esque cottages at Les Bains Gardians (beginning at €300 an evening) remodel conventional cowboy dwellings into stylish retreats with thatched roofs.
A rosé revived
Grapevines blanketed the Camargue earlier than World Conflict II, when rising salinity started to decrease the area’s wine high quality. New winemakers are utilizing improved methods to reverse that unfavorable fame. Desirous to style the wine firsthand, the following morning I continued my journey west towards Aigues-Mortes, the charming, medieval-walled capital of the Sable de Camargue appellation. At Terres de Sable, I sampled a vibrant, saline gris-de-gris rosé that made the many of the sandy terroir.
The splashy and touristy salt marsh Salins d’Aigues-Mortes, on the western fringe of the Camargue, is the biggest within the Mediterranean — virtually the scale of Paris. You’ll be able to tour the marsh, whose valuable fleur de sel is harvested by hand, both solo or with a information — by foot or bike, and even on somewhat practice (€9 to €34). My information, Naomie Aurel, 25, defined that the marsh hits peak pink from June to September, a hue brought on by tiny shrimp that devour beta-carotene-rich algae. When flamingos eat these shrimp, Ms. Aurel defined, it “paints their plumes like make-up.”
Intrepid vacationers can bunk on the new Nuits Salines, fashionable cabins in a distant part of the marsh that’s closed to different guests (beginning at €130). The hidden perk: Bookings give friends after-hours entry to the sprawling property, together with its secluded seashores.
Driving a unicorn-white steed
Made well-known within the 1953 traditional movie “White Mane” — the French equal of “The Black Stallion” — the hardy, ivory Camarguais breed withstands the new, windy local weather. The unicorn-white horses are important for exploring the area’s wide-open areas that aren’t accessible by automotive.
I signed up for an intimate experience at Mas Saint Germain. “We would like you to get to know your horse,” stated Laure Vadon, 52, a part of the fifth era of a horse-breeding household. That meant fetching my horse within the subject, brushing it earlier than mounting the saddle and feeding it oats as a reward for our experience (about €45 for 2 hours). The welcome wind saved the mosquitoes away as we rode to the Étang de Vaccarès, a 25-square-mile lagoon that was so huge, I mistook it for the ocean.
Ms. Vadon additionally raises Camarguais cattle, their ebony coats a photogenic distinction to the horses. Some bulls are bred for equine traditions just like the programs camarguaises, a sort of nonfatal bullfight. Others are destined for the desk as flame-grilled steaks at locations just like the lunch-only Chez Bob (set menu, about €60).
Retro stylish and a museum of rice
Rice changed many grapevines within the Camargue as salinity rose within the mid-Twentieth century, and the area now produces many of the rice grown in France, together with the pink and black varieties prized by cooks. The rice fields assist desalinate the delta by way of a fancy collection of Rhone-fed canals that flood the fields with freshwater. “We have to preserve a detailed watch on the water, so the rice doesn’t dry out,” defined Marine Rozière, a fourth-generation rice grower whose household additionally runs the small Maison du Riz museum (€5 admission).
Not removed from the rice fields, the curved stone partitions of Les Cabanettes, the place I spent my final evening within the Camargue, didn’t resemble anything within the area. A Modernist Sixties resort (rooms beginning at €135 an evening, breakfast included), it had hardly something in widespread with cowboys, bulls, flamingos or salt pans.
But this eccentricity solely appeared to make it a fair higher match for such an inconceivable land.
“Coming to the Camargue, I had no thought such a spot existed in France,” stated Aaron Redlin, the American co-owner of the resort. I couldn’t agree extra.
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