Sentier karstique de Rioz

Sentier karstique "d'un rail a l'autre"


Useful Information

Location: Sewage trement plant at D15, southest Rioz.
(47.411987, 6.062455)
Open: no restrictions.
[2023]
Fee: free.
[2023]
Classification: TopicSentier Karstique KarstKarst SpeleologyKarst cave
Light: bring torch.
Dimension:
Guided tours: self guided
Photography: allowed
Accessibility: no
Bibliography:
Address: Sentier karstique de Rioz, Office de tourisme Pays des 7 Rivières, Place du Souvenir Francais, 70190 Rioz, Tel: +33-384-91-84-98. E-mail:
As far as we know this information was accurate when it was published (see years in brackets), but may have changed since then.
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History


Description

The Sentier karstique de Rioz, named after nearby village Rioz, is also called Sentier karstique "d'un rail a l'autre" (Karst trail "from one rail to the other"). This is probably the least advertised karst trail of France as we found only two pages listing it. One of them is a youTube video showing volunteers, obviously cavers, cleaning the trail and the karst features with a lawn mower. The other is a blog post telling about the cleaning which was in 2014. The logical guess would be that there are no volunteers any more and trail is not maintained, the sites overgrown.

There are actually two possible trailheads. One is at the exit of the N57 at Rioz, at the roundabout towards D15 are two fishponds, the trail is behind the fishponds in the forest. It follows the valley and the turns right into the side valley of the Ruiseau des Ermites brook. There are two karst springs, first the Fontaine des Dorpes, then the Source des Eremites, where the small brook starts. Following the single lane gravel road there is a turn-off to the right which leads to three caves, the Gouffre le Petit Creux Fiot, Gouffre le Grand Creux Fiot, and finally the Chambre a Lillot Caverne. Then it returns to the gravel road. Following the road further a paved road is reached, which is the connection between Rioz and the village Montarlot-lès-Rioz. You can start the trail on both ends.

The municipality and the tourist office advertise 23 trails around the village, and one of them is actually called D'un rail a l'autre (From one track to another). The loop is much bigger and the karst features we found are only on a small section, but it is obviously the same track. And they do not call it karst trail.