Sommet du mont Ventoux et chapelle Sainte-Croix

Bédoin

The "Giant of Provence" is a solitary mountain whose summit, a desert of white scree battered by the mistral, looks snow-covered all year round. In the 15th century, the bishop of Carpentras had a chapel built there dedicated to the Holy Cross, named after a relic it housed; in 1518 it was recognized as a pilgrimage site against the plague, then partly destroyed during the Wars of Religion, leaving only the apse standing, before being rebuilt in 1701; the small building seen today, which looks like a shepherd's shelter, was inaugurated on 1 July 1956. Ventoux owes its fame above all to a letter: on 26 April 1336, Petrarch climbed from Malaucène with his brother Gérard, passed an old shepherd who tried to talk him out of it, and opened, at the summit, his copy of Saint Augustine's Confessions, which reproached him for admiring mountains while forgetting himself; he came back down in silence. This account, often held to mark the birth of mountaineering and of the modern way of looking at landscape, may be partly literary invention. Local tradition long held the mountain to be dangerous and somewhat cursed: a sleeping giant named Gargan was said to lie there, witches' gatherings were said to meet there on full-moon nights, and a charcoal burner was said to have sold his soul to the devil there, supposedly explaining why the forest at the summit gave way to a desert of stone. The Provençal saying sums up the wary respect: "he is not mad who climbs the Ventoux, but he is mad who goes back." On 23 June, a great bonfire lit near the chapel used to give the signal for the Saint John's Eve fires of all the neighbouring valleys.

Provence 7 — chapelle Sainte-Croix du mont Ventoux ↗

Getting there : By the D974 road from Bédoin (south), Malaucène (northwest) or Sault (east); the summit road is closed by snow from roughly November to April. Large car park at the summit; the Sainte-Croix chapel is a few minutes' walk away, downhill on the south side, below the weather station. The summit is extremely windy and cold, even in summer: bring a windbreaker.

Opening times and access details are given as a guide only: check before you set out.

Ambient sound