My Lavender Route
Hiking in the mountains and herbal knowledge are two passions, which I can fully experience every year on holiday in my Drômeland.
As I approach the Col de Menée, the light and the sky change. Southern scents of rosemary, thyme and lavender warm my head and my heart. On the other side is the Drômeland at my feet, the town of Die and the gîte Abbaye de Valcroissant, at the foot of the Vercors, has been my place for years to explore and experience this herb region.
Here the southern plants lavender, thyme, rosemary and savory meet the mountain plants yellow gentian and edelweiss. But there is more, medical plants like madder and bearberry I met here for the first time in the flesh. And then there are the special pieslily, Aphyllantes monspeliensis and the false arnica, Buphtalmum salicifolium. Many plants with so many strange stories. A place full of spirit-uality!
La Drôme
The Drôme valley is not only a lavender region but, under the impulse of Flemings and the Dutch, has become a real herb paradise. There is the herbal processing company Fytosan in the town of Die, several herbalists of Red Conefed, Thyme, Sage and others in the Quint Valley, westward in Beaufort-Sur-Gervanne there is the beautiful aroma garden of Sanoflore. Southerly, in Bellegarde you will find the wild but still interesting remains of my own garden, with a number of rare plants such as wede, madder, Greek alant, wild wormwood and fireworks plant.
