Trail Book ➤ An MTB scouting journey through the Occitan Alps to the French border.
Setting off on a scouting trip does not simply mean travelling towards something you have imagined or drawn on a map. It means finding out whether that journey truly exists. The adrenaline that comes with that moment is always the same. You think you must be used to it by now, yet every departure still feels exciting.
When the Map Meets the Mountain
You load the van, wondering whether you have remembered everything. Probably not. Inner tubes, chain lube and a blanket in case it gets cold are wedged somewhere between the coffee and the biscuits. You imagine that everything will go smoothly, but you already know that something unexpected will happen and make you look once again at the map you have studied for months.
This time, the unexpected is a wildfire.
We are in Valle Stura and, as soon as we arrive from Liguria, the contrast with our home terrain is immediate. We are tired and the temperatures are high, but we still want to test the first trail. The mountain rescue team, however, tells us that we cannot pass.
And so we slow down. Perhaps that is what this journey is really about.
The valleys follow one another here, but they are not always connected in the way you imagine. You can find yourself only a few kilometres from the next valley and still have to travel a long way to reach it. You cannot simply turn around and try again.
Perhaps the valleys themselves are asking us to slow down. To return to a more essential kind of mountain biking, where a line drawn on a phone is only a possibility. Once you are out on the mountain, you still have to read it, interpret it and discover whether it can truly become a journey.
A Road That Seems to Have No End
The second day is planned to perfection. At least on paper.
We leave the van in Sambuco and begin climbing a gravel road that seems to have no end. We gain altitude until we reach the ridge, and ahead of us the next valley begins to unfold: Val Maira.
Following some of the lines of the Stone King Rally has always been one of my small dreams. Riding up here today, I feel as though I have finally taken that dream out of its drawer. The mountains are cold, dark and hard. There is no one around except us and a shepherd watching over her flock from above with her three loyal dogs. A solitary figure in a scene that seems to belong to another time.
It is our first encounter with Occitan culture: not something displayed inside a museum, but a way of living in the mountains that still survives here.
We continue climbing towards the Sentiero dei Fiori.
It may sound like a cliché, but up here you truly feel the mountain on your skin. The vast natural basins, the silence and the dark walls force you to stop and respect everything around you. To watch the chamois disappearing towards the peaks. To release the tension of riding an exposed, rocky trail while crossing a meadow filled with edelweiss.
Just when you think the day is over, you realise that the mountain still has something left to give.
One final descent takes us back towards Sambuco. More rock, more deep gorges. Then water and mountain streams accompany us all the way down to the valley floor. Before leaving Valle Stura, we make one last detour to Colle dei Morti. At almost 2,500 metres, a statue of Marco Pantani emerges from the rock and looks out over the mountains where, during the 1999 Giro d’Italia, he delivered one of his most memorable performances.
Another small dream coming true along the way.
The Mountain Changes Shape
Another stage is complete.
We load the van, fit everything back into place and set off once again. We cross one valley and then another until we finally reach our campsite. This time, we are in Val Varaita. A campsite is a little like a large open-air apartment building. Everyone greets one another, everyone has a story to tell and, in the evening, conversations continue beneath a sky filled with stars.
Here, the mountain changes shape.
It becomes softer and more colourful. There are forests, lakes and Monviso, appearing and disappearing behind the clouds. Even the colours seem different: deeper and more defined. The trails change too. The rock of Valle Stura gives way to roots and softer ground. We ride through small hamlets where the houses reveal an identity still deeply connected to Occitan culture. Some have been restored with respect for their original architecture; others continue to carry the marks of time.
Sail façades, carved stone doorways and roofs covered in traditional stone slabs are more than architectural details. They are visible traces of a way of inhabiting the mountains, building with what the mountains themselves could provide.
We continue to climb.
Monviso keeps playing with the clouds, revealing itself for a moment before disappearing again. The forests begin to thin, the colours shift once more and, little by little, we reach the border.
On the Border
We are at the border. We are on the border.
On the line between France and Italy, or between Italy and France. It depends on which way you choose to look at it. On one side lies Val Varaita, with its pastures and expanses of pink flowers. On the other, the immense Queyras stretches towards more French valleys and then, who knows, perhaps even farther.
Our singletrack runs right along that invisible line.
It is not a difficult or angry trail. It is a narrow line that disappears into the landscape, among the flowers, the grass and mountains that seem to continue forever.
This is a journey. It has not simply been about climbing so that we could descend. It has been about living in the mountains. Staying high, where the altitude takes your breath away and the constant changes in elevation slowly wear you down without you even noticing.
By the end, your legs are heavy, but your heart is full of beauty.
The trails are simply the excuse. The real journey is everything in between.
Continue the journey