Pitons of Reunion

‘Completing’ France is a tough act, as its WHS include sites in four overseas territories scattered across the globe. The French Austral Lands are the hardest (9,000 EUR/28 days if you’re lucky to get a spot). Somewhat near in the Indian Ocean but much more accessible is Réunion, served by daily direct flights from Paris. This island is governed as an overseas department and its culture is very, very French. Réunion is blessed with its own WHS, the Pitons, Cirques and Remparts. 

The WHS area geographically is a bit complicated, although it would be hard to never set foot in the core zone while spending a few days on the island. Generally, it covers the whole interior, but, it’s a WHS with an enclave, three enclaves even: they are the villages inside the cirques. And, the WHS is slightly larger than the national park. La Maison du Parc in La Plain des Palmistes, which acts as the park’s visitor center, has a very clear scale model of the island depicting the park’s borders and the WHS extras. I discovered the WHS plaque there as well: it is situated in a flowerbed to the right, about 10m before you enter the building. This WHS overall scores very well on the scale of the WHS commandments, with the wonderful bespoke plaque, the scale model showing core and buffer zones, and the park also being free to enter.

For my deep dive into the park, I choose the Cirque …

Contrary to its neighbour Mauritius, Réunion island does not have a lot of beaches so most people (including ourselves) come for hiking.

Over the course of four days we did four hikes: (i) Trou de Fer, (ii) Col du Taïbit/Marla, (iii) Piton des Neiges, and (iv) Piton de la Fournaise. These and more hikes can be found on the website https://en.reunion.fr/organize/hiking-trails where also GPX tracks can be downloaded and practical information is provided (where to park, distances, …). However, we didn’t need GPX tracks since all hikes are well marked.

Whatever hike you do, it is recommended to do it before noon since later in the day the clouds come in limiting visibility and consequently blocking the nice view you hoped to have after climbing for a couple of hours.

Below some comments per hike we did (end of September):

Trou de Fer: large car park at the Gîte de Bélouve / start of the hike. In principle, this is a easy walk but the day(s) before we arrived it rained and during our walk it started raining again making the trail very very (ankle deep) muddy. We even considered turning back but in the end made it to the viewpoint which was worth the hassle.

Col du Taïbit: only a couple of parking spaces at the start of the route so start early (but alternatively there is a bus stop). The route goes up to the Col du Taïbit and back down to the …

Non argueably one of world's wonders. Tropical forests, cirques, volcano, steep mountains, canyoons, watarfalls, everything can be found there.

Reunion National Park covers relatively big area almost entire interior (except those around villages), easy accesible by foot (marked trails) or bus. For those with limited time the best starting point to see the cirques is either Cilaos or Salazie (both accessible by bus).

For visiting the volcano (Piton de la Fournaise) it is better to have your own / rent car good road from Bourg-Murat up to Pas de Bellecombe (free parking). Otherwise it is a half day walk up to Gite de volcano. Piton de la Fournaise resembles Teide of Tenerife but at least the crater area is much, much bigger.