Saturday May 4, Nature Haute-Marne organized two beautiful independent, but complementary outings in the territory of Perrancey-les-Vieux-Moulins, at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., the meeting place was fixed at Place de l’Eglise.
At 10 a.m., Bernard Didier, host, first gave explanations about the first site to visit “Des Lavières”, to the more than thirty people present, people from all walks of life including around ten from the town.
The group of walkers then took the rue du Vieux-Pont, then the route de Voisines to head towards “Chauvelin”, “Roche du Four” then “Les Lavières”. The group thus discovered the old extraction site (furnaces) of the stones covering the local habitat, in places like craters, almost lunar places. A mineral environment and its very particular flora, plants of limestone scree and rocks, some of which are rare and threatened, such as the round-leaved saskatoon berry which is more of a Mediterranean plant. An elected official from the commune, present within the group, pointed out the separation wall between Perrancey and Saint-Ciergues. The participants moved, in places, on muddy ground, the return took place around 1 p.m., Place de l’Eglise, where the cars were parked.
At 2 p.m., discovery of the Perrancey cliffs (Roises climbing site) and the Lanvau valley. Departing from rue des Roises, new people joined part of the morning group, so this new group took the path near the telephone antenna, to begin the delicate descent towards the base of the cliffs (departure of the climbing routes) to discover the rocky chaos covered with sand cress and the rare mountain dog.
The group passed near the active tufa and a “fossil” tuff terrace, then went back up onto the plateau, to discover collapses in the cliff forming a mini-canyon and an extraordinarily narrow gorge. They returned to the cornice and were able to discover Saskatoon berry plants up close, and an original dry lawn with blue sesserium. Then, head to the “Combe de Lanvau” where walkers discovered springs and the tufeux stream, with very diverse flora. The return took place around 5 p.m., in pouring rain.
In the opinion of hikers from both groups, the host, Bernard Didier, proved to be a great connoisseur of natural environments and botany, through his explanations of the flora present on the ground and on the cliffs. He recalled the threat of disappearance of the Saskatoon berry on the Langres plateau. The people who made the two outings (morning and afternoon) covered a total of around ten kilometers, but all returned delighted with their discoveries, so they will no longer see the plants at the end of their feet in the same way.
