While waiting for the Calanques to be officially recognized, the Mercantour National Park remains the most recently established of the nine national parks. For the second year, part of its staff traveled to Nice to present its action plan for 2009 and beyond.
Pierre Commenville, the deputy director, did not hide the fact that the major task would be the adoption of the new Charter that concerns 28 municipalities. He has given himself two years to have it accepted, proceeding in stages. The first will be accomplished through 18 consultation meetings with the valley populations and local stakeholders, where a call for ideas will be made, happening in May and June.
The second, in the fall, should consolidate the recommendations and take on a “Grenelle” style format—no doubt the discussions will still be very animated. It will be one of the files on the desk of the new president who is expected to be appointed on May 18 to succeed Gaston Franco, who has reached the age limit.
Another major “project” is including the Park in the UNESCO World Heritage List by capitalizing on its twinning with the Maritime Alps Natural Park established in 1987, on a request now made by France and Italy, not to mention its privileged location at the crossroads of several climatic influences, a mountain inhabited that plunges towards the sea and its prominent cultural heritage.
Nature Festival this weekend on May 16 and 17
But you might say, all this is about files, procedures and what about us, the public? What are we going to do for us? First of all, it’s the 3rd Nature Festival, this weekend, featuring no less than 30 outings organized in the six valleys of the Park with the motto “nature accessible to the general public”.
Small groups will be formed to allow park rangers to effectively transmit their knowledge, to spark new interest in nature, and even in this little-known job of park ranger. It’s advisable to book your spot by registering in the various valleys.
You might have the chance or the privilege to participate in one of the most ambitious systematic inventories of living organisms (ATBI+M) that started in the Mercantour two years ago.
Did you know that the Park boasts 3,450 species and that a “pool” of two hundred researchers, mainly from Europe, has formed to better understand the fauna?
Local institutions and naturalists collaborate on this inventory—why not you? Just for a weekend, become one of those taxonomists or scientists who describe living organisms and group them into entities (taxa) to name and classify them.
You will not yet be able to download the various interactive hiking trails as the website www.mercantouralpimarittime.com will only be operational from June 1st, 2009. You will then be able to retrieve a description and the most important points to visit according to your interest, and cross-border trails will also be added, a little patience.
In contrast, you will be able again to use the Eco-Guide, a small handheld computer combined with GPS, a digital guide easy and fun to use for everyone. A European innovation launched in 2008, already copied but that’s also the price of success, all information about which can be found at www.e-coguide.com. Four magical sites but only for three valleys that will offer a dozen itineraries based on difficulty. An illustration indicates whether it is suitable for tennis shoes, high-top shoes, or hiking boots, with sounds to discover animal calls, radio chronicls from a park ranger, and nature’s curiosities signalled by a bird song, to mention just a few features.
Equipment will be available at certain locations for a modest sum of €5 for the day. 2009 will be a year of recruiting depositaries (hoteliers and small businesses) of this equipment, who will set this rental price but who must also be very motivated to interest the public in using it as Karine, in charge of the project, precisely explained.
A new milestone for this equipment will be reached this summer with the launch of a trail for the disabled, with technical devices adapted for the visually, motor, and hearing impaired, in the town of Larche (Lauzanier Valley – Ubaye).
The last release of bearded vultures
If one wants to stay in the field of new technologies but this time for animals, one must mention the last release of two GPS-equipped bearded vultures. The event will take place on June 5th in the Mounier mountain range (Haute-Tinée) in the presence of His Serene Highness Prince Albert, whose Foundation had already participated in this conservation program in 2006, Chantal Jouanno – State Secretary for Ecology – and Alain Bougrain-Dubourg, president of the LPO, with the participation of French, Italian, and Monégasque children.
A mobilization that has been crowned by births in the Ubaye Valley and in the Southern Alps, praised by Hervé Parmentier, the Park’s “Sustainable Development and Partnership” manager. This bird, considered one of the largest in France, only reappeared in the Alpine sky around the 1970s, and its continuity is not yet fully assured, as humans must forget their predatory instincts and learn to preserve nature and its wildlife.
Of course, all this will not be done without the children and schoolchildren of the Alpes-Maritimes, Italy, and the Principality of Monaco, nor without links to Corsica and Sardinia to confirm the presence of bearded vultures in the Alps.
You can find out more about the Mercantour National Park-Maritime Alps Natural Park on the website [www.mercantour.eu](https://www.mercantour.eu).
Also, do not forget the competition to find the identity of the Park, which we presented last April 28th and the deadline for submission of documents has been set for June 30, 2009. Enjoy this nature responsibly in your desires to pass it on in good condition to our children.
