FRANCE - NATURE

La Côte d'Opale - Le Site des Caps

The French Opal Coast covers the seaside holiday area of the Pas de Calais, from Calais in the north to Berck in the south, but also extends to Le Crotoy. It is known for its beautiful cliffs such as Cape Blanc Nez and Cape Gris Nez and for its wide area of dunes. The cliffs of chalk are very similar to the white cliffs of Dover at the other side of the Channel in England. Cap Blanc Nez does not protrude into the sea like a typical cape, but is a high point where a chalk ridge has been truncated by the sea, forming a cliff that is topped by an obelisk commemorating the Dover Patrol which kept the Channel free from U-boats during World War I. The headland's name is actually a French deformation of an original English name, Black Nen, deriving from the time when Calais was under English rule, and therefore its original meaning is Cape Black Nose.

The cliffs of the Cap Gris Nez are the closest point of France to England - 34 km (21 mi) from their English counterparts at Dover. Smothered in sea pinks and thrift, the cliffs are a perfect vantage point to see hundreds of ships from oil tankers to little fishing trawlers plying the waters below. On a clear day, the emblematic white cliffs of Dover on the English shore can be seen. The cliffs of Cap Gris Nez are made of sandstone, clay and chalk. They are mainly grey which gives the cape its name.

A nice stamp. 

Received from: sunsky

La Dune du Pyla

The Great Dune of Pyla (or Pilat) is the tallest sand dune in Europe. It is located in La Teste-de-Buch in the Arcachon Bay area, France, 60 km from Bordeaux.Pilat is sometimes spelled Pyla, hence the alternative name "dune of Pyla". More accurately, Pyla is the name of the closest town, Pyla-sur-Mer, which is part of La Teste-de-Buch municipality in the Gironde department. The dune has a volume of about 60,000,000 m³, measuring around 500 m wide from east to west and 2.7 km in length from north to south. Its height is 108 metres above sea level. The dune is a famous tourist destination with more than one million visitors per year. The dune is considered a foredune, meaning a dune that runs parallel to a shoreline, behind the high tide line of a beach. The dune has been observed to move landward, slowly pushing the forest back to cover houses, roads and even portions of the Atlantic Wall.

 

A beautiful EUROPA stamp.

Received from: sunsky

Haute Chaine du Jura

With a surface area of 11,000 hectares (including nearly 8,000 ha of forest land), la the Haute Chaine du Jura Nature Reserve is among the most important in France. There are seven large areas: the cliffs, the screes, the mountain forests, the wetlands, the high grasslands, the dry grasslands and the pine forests wrapping around the Crêt de la Neige. Eighteen communes share a part of their territory with the Haute Chaine du Jura Nature Reserve: Bellegarde, Léaz, Lancrans, Collonges, Confort, Chézery-Forens, Farges, Péron, Saint-Jean-de-Gonville, Thoiry, Lélex, Sergy, Crozet, Echenevex, Mijoux, Gex, Vesancy, Divonne-les- Bains.

 

Beautiful stamps.

Received from: Elise-57