The Ardèche is a river that flows in the south of France, in the inland of the country. It is 125 kilometres long, from which especially the so called “Ardèche Gorge” (canyon), a 35 kilometresection of the river is known to be especially beautiful and famous for its great outdoor sports opportunity.
It is a paradise for nature sports lover who enjoy kayaking, climbing, mountain biking and many more. In summer thousands of people come to the Ardèche valley, if families, groups of young people or couples, the area is a great place for everybody. They come for camping, to enjoy the sports offer or take the famous kayak trip down the gorge.
At the Ardèche Gorge, the river is surrounded by huge walls of limestone cliffs that can reach at some points up to 300 metres of height. The canyon is incredibly impressive, not only when you a paddling through it in a kayak, but also if you see it from the top of the stone walls, to which you can get by car or hike. The high stone walls, the river curling its way through the valley and the beautiful green nature surrounding it, lead to the a very scenery view.
When I visited the valley, we had a nature guide accompanying us and explaining lots of interesting facts about the nature of this special place. Something very impressive was a special characteristic of the river of Ardèche: the level and the flow of the water can change exceptionally strong during the different seasons. While during summer and dry season the water flows with just about 12 cubic metres per second through the valley, in winter, from January to March, it reaches up to around 100 cubic metres per second. A true incredible amount of water was for example measured during various floods in the 19th century, where the water ran with unbelievable 7, 800 cubic metres per second through the riverbed.
There are plenty of outdoor activities and sports to do in the valley of the Ardèche River. There are for example great mountains and rocks for climbing in the area, as well as the cliff walls on the Ardèche itself, which are often used for roping and rock climbing. Also hiking tours or mountain bike rides are a great way to enjoy the stunning nature along the river. Very thrilling experiences are also the canyoning tours offered by many nature tourism providers. As the high cliff walls around the Ardèche hide many amazing caves, they also offer guided tours through the impressive “underground world” of the area.
The most popular activity although remains the descent of the Ardèche in the kayak. I have to say that this really is the most beautiful way to enjoy it! The start is most of the times in the town of Vallon Pont d’Arc, at the “entrance” of the Ardèche Gorge. From there you can choose how far you want to go. The whole descent is 32 km, but you can do just parts of it, choosing between half days (8 kilometres), full days (24 kilometres, or the whole if you are very sportive and ambitious) or two days (full 32 km descent) trips. If you are dividing the descent on two days there are ways to camp at a camping space at the half of the route, although you have to reserve the camping in advance, because the amount of people on the campsite is limited.
While kayaking down the Ardèche there is so much beautiful nature to discover. When we were there I was seriously thinking behind every corner: “wow this part is even more beautiful than everything before! ”, and it truly has some scenery views! When the sun in shining into the light and clear water, the sky reflecting on the surface and the impressive walls of stone are surrounding you, you might be so astonished you forget to paddle. A special highlight on the descent is definitely the famous Pont d’Arc. The natural bridgewas carved out with time by the water and is today a 54 metre high arch you pass under on your descent. A little secret spot is a whole inside the arch on about 5 metres of height from where you can jump into the deep water. You can reach it from the back, going through a little cave.
All of this nature sport and adventure at the Ardèche I was lucky to experience, was because we had a class called “Adventure Education”, with which we visited the area for a week (tough life of a sports student! ) and during which we got the chance to experience great outdoor sports in this beautiful surrounding. We spent one day climbing, on day doing a cave tour (which was extremely spectacular as we got the “hardcore-sport-students-tour” (as they called it), winding ourselves through narrow passages and roping down into deep gorges), then two days of kayaking the descent of the Ardèche, during which we slept one night on a camping sit and to finish one day of “Raid”, which is a French form of Adventure Racing, during which we did more kayaking, roping on the 40 metres high cliffs of the Ardèche and a mountain bike orientation race.
As you can assume it was an incredible time and even if it is more difficult for “normal tourists” to organise a program like ours, a visit at the Ardèche with either of those outdoor sports is a wonderful experience! To enjoy the French nature at its best you should maybe change your holiday destination for once from the beach-laying type of holiday to a real adventurous and sporty action vacation in the Valley of the beautiful Ardèche.
