Mountain pasture - Les Avals

Along this wilder stretch of your route is a mountain pasture where Beaufort, "the prince of the gruyères", is made! Arguably the best-known cheese of the Savoie region, Beaufort is a hard, pressed cheese. Its heel is concave-shaped, its texture smooth and its colour ivory (pale yellow). One round weighs about 40kg. There are 3 types of Beaufort: winter Beaufort, summer Beaufort and “Chalet d’Alpage” Beaufort.The pasture was once referred to as "the big mountain", a place where the shepherds would live for 100 days over the summer (generally from mid-June to mid-September). Back then, the locals talked of going up to or down from the mountain pasture: emmontagner (in Saint-Jean) and démontagner (in Saint-Michel).These days, the farmers keep this livestock-rearing tradition alive according to a precise calendar. Courchevel's pastures are still home to several herds which help look after the mountain and you can buy delicious cheese from there too.