Aups

Towns and Villages - by Provence Beyond

Villages > Aups      

Nearby:  | Aix-en-Provence 81 km | Arcs 37 km | Barjols 25 km | Bauduen 16 km | Brignoles 40 km | Cotignac 15 km | Draguignan 29 km | Entrecasteaux 18 km | Flayosc 22 km | Fox-Amphoux 16 km | Moustiers-Sainte-Marie 35 km | Nice 118 km | 8 km | 46 km | 15 km | Salernes 10 km | Sillans-la-Cascade 9 km | Tourtour 10 km | Villecroze 8 km |

Below: | Gastronomy | Museums | History | O.T. | Dates | Transportation | Hiking | Dining | Lodging Hotels |

The houses date back to the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, and in their cluster you can find tiny streets, friendly cafés and plenty of shops. There's a square lookout tower (beffroi) and an 18th century clock tower topped by the iron-caged bell tower (in one on the attached photos, above). These wrought-iron belfries, called Campaniles de fer forgé, are one of the many wonderful sites of the Beyond region, and you could do a whole trip visiting just them.

La Chapelle Nôtre Dame de la Délivrance was built in 1852, on the ruins of a 12th-century chateau.

Update 2005

We originally put this Aups page online in Beyond in October 1995, one of our first Beyond villages. We've visited or passed through several times since then, but only took the time recently (autumn 2004, summer 2005) to take some more photos with better camera equipment.

We also took a leisurly second breakfast at on of the terrace cafés on the Place Général Girad, shaded by a gigantic plane tree, "tinkled" by the sound of the old stone fountain [ photo-6 ]; café au lait and a fougasse à l'huile d'olive-citron from a great bakery just up the street [ photo-7 ].

Gastronomy

Fougasse - The Aups fougasse is a large, round, thin tarte made with olive oil and lemon, and has a distinct lemon smell and flavor.

Museums & Sites

Aups has the Musée Simon Segal art museum (paintings), housed in what must have been an old church. It's a really fine old building on one of the streets in the center of town.

History

Name
First record, 11th century: Almis

Prehistoric: Natural iron deposits in the here made this an iron-age settlement, and bones have been found in the Plerimond caves, 8 km to the southeast.

Gallo-Roman: There was an oppidum (Roman fortified site), and there are Gallo-Roman vestiges at nearby Mousque, Plerimond and Raton.

Medieval: The area was ruled by the Seigneurie des Blacas. In 1574, the church was pillaged by the Huguenots, and in 1590 the Ligurians had their turn.

Office de Tourisme

Tel: 0494 70 00 80; Fax: 04 94 84 00 69
Email: aups83@wanadoo.fr

Dates

•Every Wed, Sat - Marché Provencal
•Truffle market (Thur mornings, late Nov-Feb)
•End Jan - Fete de la Truffe
•Every Mar - Carnaval
•2nd Sun May - Fête (Sunday before 12 May)
•3rd Sun Aug - Fête (Sunday before 15 Aug)

Transportation

Air. The nearest international airports are Paris and Nice. Internal flights are available to Marseilles and Toulon-Hyères.

 

Train. Mainline rail service, from Paris or Nice, is available to Les Arcs (station Draguignan-Les Arcs), Toulon and Brignols. The TGV from Paris also stops at Les Arcs. [map]

 

Bus. From Les Arcs, bus connection is to Draguignan and then Aups. From Toulon, bus connection is to Brignols and then Aups.

Brignols-Aups: 2/day (morning and afternoon), 7 days a week

Draguignan-Aups: Mon-Tue, Thu-Fri: 2/day (morning and afternoon); Wed, Sat: 2/day (morning)

 

Car Rental. the nearest car rental is in Draguignan

Hiking

Maps:

IGN (1/25,000) #3443 OT "Aups Salernes"

Didier Richard (1/50,000) #25 "Maures Haut-Pays Varois"; #19 (Haute Provence Verdon)

The area around the village has many farms and vineyards, so cross-country hiking is limited.
A couple of trails follow the roads south and southeast out of the village and then go through lovely forests towards Salernes, Villacroze and Tourtour.
There are some nice loops hikes east of the village in the wooded Montagne des Espiguières, that get up to 834 m (and 880 m further east).

Northwest of Aups there are several forest roads in the beautiful La Colle and Les Cugulons hills (with forested peaks in the 800-950 m range). You can get to this area also by a trail that goes northwest from the D957 road 6 km north of Aups. This trail goes up the ridge of Les Cugulons about 6 km to where it joins the Grande Randonnée GR99, the trail that goes along the southern part of the Grand Canyon du Verdon.

Camping

International Camping - tel: (33) 494 70 06 80; fax: (33) 494 70 10 51; Apr-Sept

Les Prés - tel: (33) 494 70 00 93; permanent

St-Lazare - tel: (33) 494 70 12 86; Apr-Sept

Dining

There are several café-restaurants and a couple of pretty good hotel-restaurants. On a Sunday noon in early Feb (2002) the restaurants filled up fast, so either start early or phone ahead.

Saint-Marc Hotel Restaurant ("Ancient Moulin à huile 1833")

We had an excellent Sunday lunch here. Excellent choices, cuisine, ambience and service, and decent prices.

Menus 15, 25 euro; four Carte Truffe selections, and other entries can have truffles added at 6 euro/plat.

La Provencal Hotel Restaurant

Menus 15, 20 euro; menu foie gras 23 euro

Looks great, and very popular (we were too slow, and turned away)

Lodging - Hotels