By 4×4 · July 2026 · French and Italian Alps
Transalpine, the Jeep along the ridges
Eleven days, a Jeep, a rooftop tent and a ridgeline between France and Italy. An organised raid in the middle, the Route des Grandes Alpes to come home, and the confirmation that, deep down, we are a travelling party of two.
- Duration
- 11 days · 9–19 July
- High point
- Col de la Bonette · 2,802 m
- Tracks
- Finestre · Salt Road · Parpaillon
- Vehicle
- Jeep Wrangler Rubicon · rooftop tent
9–11 July
The approach, from pass to lake
The Great St Bernard first, a lasting love. Then, above La Thuile, a loop on foot: a small lake among fragrant larches, a pass, and the plunging view over Courmayeur, Mont Blanc and the Grandes Jorasses. We could not have dreamt of a better start. First night in the rooftop tent, lulled, so to speak, by the roar of the Rutor torrent.
The Little St Bernard unrolls like a ski run all to ourselves. Lago di Verney, its bogs and its faintly Icelandic air. Tignes in the rain, the awning holding firm through the storm, the Iseran in the clouds, then Bonneval-sur-Arc and its stone lanes. In the evening, a real bed in Lanslebourg and our friends again.
On foot · The hikeLago d'Arpy and the Colle della CroceLago d'Arpy · 2,066 mMap, figures and photos →
12 July
Finestre and the Sestriere ridges
Mont Cenis on a Sunday is a funfair: motorbikes, bicycles, camper vans. The Colle delle Finestre wipes it all away. Hairpins first, then the track, long and magnificent, and that traverse across the mountainside climbing gently to the ridges of Sestriere.
In Switzerland, driving such high mountain tracks would be unthinkable; here, it is a privilege. First bivouac two kilometres from Briançon.
13–14 July
Gilba, Vernante and the passes of Piedmont
A hundred and seventy kilometres of every kind of ground: tarmac, gravel, sand in the heart of a working quarry, and finally a real climb to the Colle di Gilba, where the Jeep could finally show what it can do. Bivouac in a clearing at the top, raclette in the open air.
The next day the passes follow one another, the Po plain stretches out, and Vernante unfolds its hundred and fifty Pinocchio frescoes. A spritz, then Limone Piemonte, once a crossroads of the salt trade.
15 July
The High Salt Road
The day we had been waiting for. More than fifty kilometres of track above two thousand metres, balanced on the ridge between France and Italy. Long ago, mule trains carried salt from the Mediterranean to Piedmont along this line; today the only cargo is memories.
The drops impress at first, then enchant. At every bend the landscape seems unable to get any better, and yet it does. Down to La Brigue, an almost deserted medieval village, then the Col de Turini of Monte Carlo Rally fame.
16 July
La Bonette, on the Moon
Saint-Martin-Vésubie still bears the scars of Storm Alex. Above La Colmiane, a dizzying track gives fair warning: “do not use in wet weather”. The sky threatens but holds. A mountain pasture restaurant, then the Bonette, the highest road in Europe.
At 2,802 metres, wind, grey skies and bare rock make it feel like driving on the Moon. A fearless young deer, marmots, and that evening a scorpion found while pouring the prosecco for our spritz. Where did it come from? A mystery.
17 July
Parpaillon and Serre-Ponçon
Last day of the raid: the Parpaillon track, where you pray not to meet anyone coming the other way. The tunnel, bored between 1891 and 1900 at 2,643 metres, has been closed for two years by rockfalls. A U-turn, and a long detour along the turquoise waters of Lake Serre-Ponçon. Hardly a punishment.
18–19 July
The Route des Grandes Alpes, just the two of us
Just the two of us again, and that suits us fine. The Route des Grandes Alpes links Nice and Thonon: 720 kilometres, seventeen passes, some 17,000 metres of climbing. Each pass is more beautiful than the last; we keep stopping. The Izoard and its Casse Déserte, its spires of cargneule rock, a lunar scene.
At the Lautaret, hunting for a geocache, we came across a small chapel set back from the road. It remembers the seventeen men executed there on 11 August 1944. A place of overwhelming simplicity.
The next day, the Cormet de Roselend and its turquoise lake, first discovered on foot years ago, with its wonderfully photogenic chapel. Les Saisies, the Aravis, the Colombière, Les Gets, the Col du Corbier, the Pas de Morgins, and one last track up to our mountain pasture. The loop is closed. The finest thing about a journey is that it always makes you want to set off again.
