Geological bassins, water-catchment areas, where erosion is studied and measured.
Refuge d'Art / Arts Refuge at Belon - by Andy Goldsworthy
The hamlet of Belon had 10 inhabitants in 1846 when Draix at its demographic peak had 150.
It was the Second World War that made it part of history. In January 1944, the organisation MUR (The United Movements of Resistance) set up their training school there, which was too threatened in the Asse valley.
At dawn on February 14th 1944, following a tip-off, German soldiers surrounded the camp and captured the Resistance fighters who had not seen the signals agreed with the villagers of Draix.
The thirteen members of the Resistance were taken away for deportation. A few were able to escape, the others never returned. The Germans set fire to the hamlet in retaliation.
The Belon Farm was restored in 2003 as part of Andy Goldsworthy's project to create an Art Refuge sanctuary. This project is run by the CAIRN Arts Centre with the support of the Municipality of Draix.
The Natural Terrasses on the Bléone River
The Bléone river, about 67km long, drains a catchment area of 905km² between its source under the Tête de l'Estrop mountain and its confluence with the Durance river.
The foothills valley of the Bléone river, dominated by the Liman Ridge to the west, spreads a wide bed of pebbles revealing its torrential flow, with a succession of natural terraces indicating the former levels of the river at the time of the great glaciations.
Between the river and the hamlet of Villard, three natural terraces are clearly visible, separated by pine woods. The upper natural terrace corresponds to the Mindel glaciation (50,000 years ago), the middle terrace to the Riss glaciation (35,000 years ago) and the lower terrace to the Würm glaciation (15,000 years ago).
The Bléone river is a braided river characterised by a very wide main river-bed where the flow is divided into various channels separated by areas of gravel that are mobile according to the intensity of the waterflow and floods. These areas of gravel, or braid bars, ensure the temporary storage of the sedimentary load. This type of river, which used to be very common, is now in decline as a result of the development of waterflow and watercourse regulations and techniques. Between La Javie and Marcoux, the Bléone river is almost completely undeveloped : wild and natural.
The Hamlet of La Rouine
This small Romanesque chapel has a single nave, a central aisle, and is crowned by a small, delicate bell tower.
It was built at the request of the parishioners of La Rouine in 1647 and is called The Visitation of Our Lady.
Restored in the second half of the 20th century by the inhabitants of the hamlet, it is decorated with contemporary stained glass windows by Albert Chabot de Marcoux. In 1976, he created the half rose over the entrance and the stained glass window of the main opening, combining bright colours and Christian symbolism.
The hamlet of La Rouine and its surrounding areas had up to 44 inhabitants in 1846.
In 1944, when the Resistance Base at the Laval Farm, near Lambruisse in the high valleys of l'Asse, was attacked by the Germans, who left only two survivors, it was here that one of them took refuge. The young Del Vicario, wounded, managed to reach the mountain pass Col de la Cine in the middle of the night and to reach La Rouine where he was treated and healed.
Saint-Michel's Panoramic Landscape
Below the village, at the foot of the slope, lies the agricultural area of Marcoux, extended to the north by that of Brusquet. This vast plain, made up of alluvial deposits from the Bléone river, is crossed by the Bouinenc mountain torrent. Despite numerous protective structures upstream, this mountain torrent remains a danger in periods of high flooding.
Until the Quaternary period, it flowed along the Mardaric before flowing into the Bléone river.
This agricultural land has probably been cultivated since ancient times and even before the Roman conquest.
In the vicinity of the Saint-Martin Estate, the discovery of numerous Gallo-Roman remains from the 3rd century suggests this.
In the 19th century, a large part of the land was given over to the cultivation of fruit trees: plum and quince trees in particular.
Today, even if the agricultural land is retreating to make way for construction development, lowland crops (corn, cereals, fodder, oilseeds) have continued to be developed alongside cattle breeding.
The Cathedral of Notre-Dame du Bourg
With its archaeological crypt, it tells the story of 1,500 years of the history of Digne and its surrounding areas.
The Le Bourg district has been occupied since the 1st century AD. The cathedral took over from several earlier sanctuaries dating back to the 5th century; it was built between the 12th and 14th centuries. During the Wars of Religion, the building was plundered and the Episcopal Seat was moved to Le Rochas, à Saint-Jérôme.
The remains discovered during excavations in the 1980s are on display in the archaeological crypt beneath the cathedral.
The nave with its single nave and flat chevet is one of the finest examples of Romanesque art in Haute-Provence; its walls still bear some frescoes from the Middle Ages. The liturgical furnishings and stained glass windows were created at the end of the 20th century by the Canadian artist David Rabinowitch.
The cathedral has been classified as a historical monument since 1840.
Demontzey Park
For centuries, the Southern Alps has been a victim to erosion due to the almost total distruction and disappearance of forested areas as a result of human actions: in August 1698, the Mardaric and the Eaux Chaudes mountain rivers overflowed and caused great damage in Digne.
In the second half of the 19th century, the State decided to take measures to fight against such erosion by introducing the laws of 1860 and 1864, then subsequently in 1882 and finally the laws of 1913 and 1922 to safegaurd the protection of forests.
The Department of Water & Forests was responsible for implementing these laws. Today, the biological-engineering elements (plantations) is carried out by the ONF (Office National des Forêts) and the civil-engineering elements (the required maintenance works of the mountain-rivers, often completed with stones and wood) by the RTM (Service de Restauration des Terrains en Montagnes).
Prosper Demontzey was born in 1831 in Saint-Dié (in Vosges). He entered the Nancy Forestry School in 1850. After a period in Algeria, he was appointed to Nice in 1863 and then to Digne in 1868. He was the great architect of the reforestation of the Southern Alps who understood the importance of reparing and maintaining the mountain-torrents before reforestation. He also promoted planting instead of sowing.
A consulting member of the Academy of Sciences, he retired to Aix en Provence where he died in 1898.
The Orchards of La Javie
Fertile agricultural land stretches around the confluence of the Bléone and Arigeol rivers. Long threatened by torrential floods, the area adapted by introducing irrigation techniques thanks to a system of canals, thus the land was dedicated to the cultivation of fruit trees from the 18th century onwards. In the following century, plum trees were foremost. The Perdigon variety of plumtree was used, it produces the so-called "pistoles" plum, which owe their name to their circular, golden appearance, reminiscent of the old coin of the same name.
A wide variety of apples and pears helped to spread out and prolong the harvest season. In the last century, apples almost completely replaced plums. In 1933, there were more than 5,000 fruit trees in La Javie, mostly winter pears which were sold after being dried.
Today, the interest of these fruits is rediscovered through the Foire de la Sarteau (The Sarteau-Pear Festival) on the first weekend in November.
The Beaujeu Geological-Fold
The Beaujeu geological-fold accentuates the terrain belonging to Digne's geological-nappe (geological thrust-sheet).
The oldest geological-layers concerned, which appear on the other side of the Arigéol mountain-river, belong to the Lower Jurassic period (Lias Group) and were deposited about 185 million years ago.
This geological-fold is a westward-facing anticline (an upward convex fold) with an N-NW - S-SE axis, which places it in a family of geographical-deformations that may have occurred around 34 million years ago.
From here, the view is along the axis of the geological-fold.
At the time of the formation of this geological-fold, the terrain involved was located a few kilometres further north. It was only much later, around 10 million years ago, that Digne 's geological-nappe (geological thrust-sheet) moved to its present location.
Other similar geological-folds of the same period, and just as spectacular, can be seen in the neighbouring Bléone valley, towards Blégiers where they are superimposed on older geological-deformations.
Adresse
UNESCO Géoparc de Haute-Provence
Musée Promenade
Parc Saint-Benoît BP 30 156
04990 DIGNE-LES-BAINS
France
Téléphone
L’UNESCO Géoparc de Haute-Provence est un service de Provence Alpes Agglomération,
administré au travers d’une Entente Intercommunale avec la Communauté de Communes du Sisteronais-Buëch
et financé par la région Provence Alpes Côte d’Azur et le Conseil Départemental de Haute-Provence.
