Walk the Region – Puig de les Daines

with Tim and Chris Parker

A circular 2 1/4 hour walk from Collioure with good paths and lovely views. For those who know the area a lot of variations are possible in order to make a longer/slightly different walk. 333m of ascent. Yellow signs at some points on the route but it is not a waymarked route. Walking boots recommended.

Access: map IGN 1:25000 Banyuls, Col de Perthus, Cote Vermeille 2549OT

Start of walk

Park in Collioure (be there by 8.30am in high season if you want to find a parking spot!) OR after taking the Collioure Centre exit from the D914 and passing under it, turn immediately right into the valley (before first roundabout), descend to below viaduct and turn right to park near the start of the path to La Consolation (end of walk).

Walk back into town if you have used the second option for car parking. Start from the main road (D114) in Collioure opposite the Tour d’Avall and small car park at the Port Vendres end of town.

Drop down into Rue de la Coma Xerric.

The walk

Follow the street round to right then keep left onto Rue du Correc d’en Baus and look for Carrer de St Elme on left. Turn left uphill, past several properties to emerge on broad track where a footpath to Fort Dugommier/ Fort St Elme is soon signed on left.

Follow the narrow path upwards through trees. Path becomes broader and delightful views of Collioure open up. Continue ascent to emerge on road at ridge.

Chance here to visit Fort St Elme to left.

Fort Saint-Elme is privately owned and currently closed to visitors for renovation, but can be viewed from outside. It has an exceptional viewpoint over the Côte Vermeille.

The strategic importance of this ridge goes back more than a thousand years. A watchtower stood on the site of Fort Saint-Elme as early as the 9th century, guarding against raids from the sea.

Saint-Elme is the patron saint of sailors, an appropriate dedication for a fort overlooking one of the Mediterranean’s old maritime ports.

Turn right on ridge and follow footpath to right of road emerging at Fort Dugommier, (or walk along road), pass the Fort, continue to Col d’en Raixat. Note the stripped cork oaks en route.

Look at the fort  Dugommier not just as a ruin but as a remarkably self-contained military machine: its designers incorporated rainwater collection and ingenious thermal features so that its garrison could survive a siege for months. Ironically, by the time this enormous defensive work was completed, advances in artillery were already making such fortifications obsolete.

On bend at Col, ignore waymarked piste to left, walk a few yards and look for a narrow path on left just after 2 steel posts on left of the right hand bend. If you miss it, turn left at wide track also just round bend. Find a flat square area of shale. At far left corner of this square a stony footpath rises to Puig de les Daine with 360 degree views of coast and mountains open up at the summit. A good place to take a break.

The view from here is beautiful now, but these hills were once a battlefield. In 1794 General Dugommier’s French forces bombarded Fort Saint-Elme from positions around here, eventually forcing the Spanish garrison to surrender after a 22-day siege.

Turn right. A narrow tarmac road descends to right.

Option 1 is to follow this downhill.

Option 2 is to take the lower piste on right from Col, passing beneath ruins of Mas de la Colona. After Mas, turn left off this onto grass/earth track into vines then cut through vines to lower edge of vineyard and follow right to emerge on road – this cuts out a zig zag on the road.

Follow road downhill until a concrete track is seen on left going down into valley and more vineyards. Take the track downhill and follow it through vines to emerge at foot of “La Consolation” (footpath to Ermitage) on narrow tarmac road.

Turn right and walk under the viaduct back into Collioure. If you have put plenty of time on your parking ticket take time to enjoy all the sounds, sights, tastes and scents of this “paradise” of the Cote Vermeille!