Travel Guide Digne-Les-Bains

This town on the edge of the Digne Pre-Alps smells of lavender. Renowned for its lavender cultivation in the surrounding area, lavender is celebrated on the first weekend of August during the Corso de la lavande, a festival not to be missed. A museum traces the history of this symbol of the region: lavender in the Dignois region from 1900 to the present day.Situated at an altitude of 600 m, it is also at the heart of Europe's largest geological reserve, the Unesco Geopark of Haute-Provence, where you can admire an ichthyosaur fossil and the surprising ammonite slab. With a population of around 17,000, this tourist and spa town boasts over 300 km of signposted hiking and mountain-biking trails, a local via ferrata, a lake and an aquatic complex. As far back as Antiquity, its hot springs attracted the Romans. Later, Christianity took root here, on the site of today's Notre-Dame-du-Bourg cathedral, under which the archaeological crypt (900m2) now stands. The Musée Gassendi, the Musée-Promenade and the Maison de l'écrivaine Alexandra David-Néel are also well worth a visit. And don't forget Andy Goldsworthy's art refuges, which combine contemporary art and rural heritage on a walk through the Unesco Geopark, the Clues de Barles and its grandiose landscapes, or the charming little train des Pignes, which takes you to Nice every day, with its narrow gauge and steep mountain passes.