The Fruit and Wine Route - Hautes-Alpes

Description

The Fruit and Wine Route takes you from the lookout point of Lake Serre-Ponçon to Rousset, then along the Durance to the gateway to Provence. It is an original and gourmet invitation to discover fruit and wine production.

The fruit and wine producers along this route will help you discover their land! Contemplate the hectares of orchards and vineyards, visit and taste products bursting with the flavours and aromas of the Buëch, Durance and Avance valleys.
Get away from it all and discover even more? Heritage and outdoor activities will mark out your itinerary such as the cliff of Céüze, the castle of Tallard, the site of the capped Demoiselles of Théus, the leisure center Les 3 Lacs de Rochebrune, or the lake of Serre-Ponçon, the highlight of this superb tourist route.

History:
Fruit production is very old since documents concerning fruit transactions have been found dating back to 1358. The real boom began in 1930 and developed strongly at the beginning of the 1960s with the setting up of new irrigation networks thanks in particular to the construction of the Serre-Ponçon dam. The lake thus formed, the first large artificial earthen reservoir in Europe, is a water reservoir allowing the irrigation of the Durance Valley.
The south of the Hautes-Alpes benefits from an exceptional sunshine which is particularly suitable for the orchards and vineyards along this tourist route. Along the route you will discover local producers as well as restaurateurs, and many perched villages, the castle of Tallard, between the vineyards of the Théus plain and the orchards of the Durance Valley which produce famous fruits: the "Gap pear" known since François I, the Passe Crassane, the Golden Delicious. The National Botanical Conservatory of Gap Charance preserves very old varieties of apples and pears.