The balconies of Aiguebrun by mountain bike

La chapelle Sainte-Marie, d’une sobre élégance construite au Moyen-Age, était autrefois l’église paroissiale. Drôle de localisation me direz-vous ! Mais avant la construction du village actuel, l’église répondait aux besoins des fidèles du château voisin et de la population rurale dispersée.

La vocation première du Centre de sauvegarde de la faune sauvage, situé dans la plus grande discrétion juste en amont du Château (on aperçoit d’ici le sommet des volières), est de recueillir les animaux sauvages en détresse, de les soigner et de les réinsérer, au terme de la convalescence, dans leur milieu naturel. Avec les menaces croissantes qui pèsent sur ces populations, chacun de nous peut jouer un rôle crucial pour protéger la faune sauvage. Ainsi, en balade, si vous trouvez un animal sauvage blessé, avant de contacter le Centre de sauvegarde (Tél. 04 90 74 52 44), il est important de suivre les procédures en suivant les fiches conseils de la LPO PACA, gestionnaire du site (pour des raisons sanitaires, le site est INTERDIT au public et ne se visite pas).

The Château de Buoux, of medieval origin (12th and 13th centuries), is now an educational centre of the Luberon Regional Nature Park.

The Aiguebrun takes its source of the north side of the Luberon to flow into the Durance on the south side! Three explanations to this illogical route: 1) The weakened zone, faulted and collapsed between Grand and Petit Luberon will collect run-off waters to the south. 2) The Luberon mountain, by rising, caused the depression of the river that was already there (antecedence phenomenon). 3) The drying up of the Mediterranean Sea, about 6 million years ago, will further accentuate this depression.

With their straight bills, woodpeckers drill through tree barks for nesting purposes or for extracting wood-eating insects (woodborers). In the Luberon, the Great Spotted Woodpecker (black, white with red dots) mixes with the Lesser Spotted Woodpecker (smaller with less red), the European green woodpecker and the Black Woodpecker (rarer, resembles a crow with a red cap). True social housings for insects and bats, these older trees host a multitude of inhabitants in woodpecker holes, the cracks of branches, under the ivy...

Across, on its rocky spur, the Fort of Buoux has been, for a very long time, the cornerstone of the defence system of all communication through the Luberon. Occupied since prehistoric times, it was fortified in the Middle Ages. Never stormed, it sheltered a garrison and civilians until it was dismantled on order of Louis XIV in 1660, to prevent it from falling completely into the hands of Protestants during the religious wars.

Truffle, "Rabasso" in Provençal, is a fungus that lives on the roots of holm oaks, white oaks but also Aleppo pines... It was a farmer from Saint Saturnin-les-Apt, not far from there, who started the cultivation of truffles by transplanting oak trees known to host truffles in their root system. In winter, truffle hunters and their dog go out in search of the famous "black diamond".». The Vaucluse department is all the same the first French producer and Provence produces more than three-quarters of the national production.

Spike Lavender (commonly known as French Lavender) (Lavandula latifolia), with broad white leaves, is a Mediterranean plant. The English lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) with narrow leaves, is more of a mountainous plant (up to 1500m). Although the English lavender is sometimes cultivated in the mountains, it is usually the Lavandin, a hybrid of the two species and more productive, that we see in the fields. Warning, these crops are the result of hard farm work, please do not pick!

The small stone huts or bories you see everywhere in the Luberon were built with stones extracted from the fields by the farmers at the time. Today it is still the same problem for farmers of the Luberon, who have to clear their fields of stones several times a year. And even if the sale of stones allows them to earn some money, these stones are a scourge for agricultural equipment, breakage and wear being common.!

The name Claparèdes comes from "clapas" which means "pile of rocks" in Provençal. Many dry stone huts are on this plateau which goes from Castellet to Lacoste on about 10km. An old cereal land, the cultivation of lavender is now the most widespread on the plateau.