Barcelonnette

Towns and Villages - by Provence Beyond

Villages > Barcelonnette

Nearby:  | 44 km | Colmars 44 km | Digne-les-Bains 79 km | Embrun 52 km | 63 km | Guillestre 50 km (via Col de Vars) | Jausiers 9 km | Lauzet-Ubaye 19 km | Meyronnes 20 km | 9 km | Saint Etienne-de-Tinee 61 km | 25 km |

Below: | Mexico | History | O.T. | Transportation | Sports | Hiking | Dining | Lodging Hotels |

This is a market town, with shops and open-air markets all the time. The area is also a center for mountain sports in summer and winter, and there's usually a lot of activity in town. The surrounding mountains and high fields are beautiful.

There are two very large churches in the town, one in the center and the other up at the end of the pedestrian streets [photo-2]. Both have high pointed bell towers, complete with gargoyles.

The town has a Mexican tourist office, the "Maison du Mexique". Near the Office de Tourisme, there's a small arcade of shops selling Mexican style products: clothes, souvenirs, etc.

Shop. Chapellerie "Au Nouveau Siecle" (to the New Century) [photo-3] is a very ancient hat shop with an ancient propiataire and some hats designed in another century. But a few modern hats as well, and we bought a blue-denim cap with a back flap to protect the neck.

4th of July Jazz Night (1998) on the main square with all its terrace café restaurants didn't please everybody. We overheard an early-morning conversation about one café owner petitioning the Mayor for permission to put up a big-screen television, and a client who couldn't understand why the Mayor scehduled a cultural event at the same time as the soccer World Cup quarter-finals.

Mexico

Barcelonnette has a special historical relationship with Mexico. From 1814 to 1955, habitants of Barcelonnette and the surrounding Ubaye valley emigrated to Mexico and established mainly textile businesses between Mexico and Barcelonnette. Since then, they, and others like them from this region of France are called the Barcelonnettes.

In 1814, the 18-year-old Joseph-Antoine Couttolenc made a trip from the Ubaye valley to Mexico. He must have made a success of it, because in 1821 the Frères Arnaud followed him. The Arnaud brothers' business did well in the new Mexican Republic, and in 1830 they brought over three old employees from Jausiers: Caire, Jauffred and Teisser. In 1845, Caire and Jaffred returned home -- each with about 250,000 Frs/gold.

The sight of this "fortune" started the rush of Barcelonnettes. At the turn of the century, there were 5000 French families from the Barcelonnette region registered with the French Consulate in Mexico.

About 90% of the Barcelonnettes remained in Mexico and became citizens. Enough returned, however, to make a permanent mark on the region. About 50 luxuriousVillas de Barcelonnette et Jausiers were built. Many of these fine old villas are still there, in good repair on their large shady grounds. The villa La Sapinière is not the museum of the valley. Our [photo-4] and [photo-5] show two of the villas.

History

Name
First record, 13th-c Barcilonia

Gallo-Roman: A roman site existed here.

Medieval: The town of Barcelonnette was founded in 1231 by Raimond Béringer V, count of Provence. He named the town as a diminutive of his native Barcelona. Barcelonnette was ruled by Comté de Savoie from 1388 to 1713. The town had a big fire in 1740, and was rebuilt after a another fire in 1761.

Office de Tourisme

Tel: *04 92 81 04 71; Fax: 04 92 81 22 67
Email: info@barcelonnette.net;   Web: www.barcelonnette.net/

Transportation

Access:
*Valence Gap Barcelonnette;
*Grenoble Gap Barcelonnette;
*Aix Sisteron Digne Barcelonnette;
*Aix Sisteron Gap Barcelonnette;
*Nice Barcelonnette.
- Bus, via Gap 68 km, Digne 92, Marseille 230
- Bus Marseille Gap Barcelonnette (2-3 a day, 4h30)

Train SNCF. Gap ; TGV Méditerrannée + bus connection Aix ou Marseille
Train TGV Paris Marseille (3h-3h20)

Airports: Marseille-Provence, Grenoble, Lyon-St Exupery

Sports

Regional sports here include:

• ULM - from the little airport [N?] of town edge
• paragliding:
  • Airwave - Ecole de Parapente, Ubaye
  • tel: (33) 492 81 34 93
  • action station is just out of town, East
• Rafting on the Ubaye
• Hiking
• VTT

Hiking

Maps:

IGN (1/25,000) #3539 O "Barcelonnette, Pra-Loup"

Didier Richard (1/50,000) #1 "Alpes de Provence"

Barcelonnette is located in the Ubaye valley that runs east-west, then curves northeast and north past Jausiers. To the north are the forested mountains of the Domaniale de Barcelonnette. South of the valley, the mountains rise up to peaks of over 2600 m.

There are many hiking trails in the mountains both south and north of the river. The northern slopes are more forested, and there are better possibilites for loop hikes.

Dining

Le Poivre d'Ane Restaurant
- Meals normal, and good.
- Wine: Dourthe 1997, a Bordeaux blanc, with a fine flavour a bit "floral", not as dry as other Bordeaux blancs we've tried.
- A nice courtyard terrace, quiet and cool. (The terrace restaurants around the main square were a bit too noisy for our tired souls at the end of a long day, with the 4th of July jazz concert there.)
- "Le Poivre d'Ane", literally "the pepper of the Ass" (Provençal: "Pebre d'aï)is slang for the herb sarriette, said to be an aphrodisiac for the ass.

Lodging - Hotels