Sustainable stay in Pra Loup
Enjoying the mountains while limiting its impact is possible. In Pra Loup and in the Ubaye Valley, many accommodation providers, restaurateurs, producers, activity providers and local actors are gradually getting involved to offer another way of living your stay.
This page brings together our advice, our good addresses and a selection of committed actors to help you organize a more responsible stay, from your arrival to your return.
Prepare an eco-stay in Pra Loup
In Pra Loup, a more responsible stay is not just a few gestures or a logo displayed on a window. It involves a multitude of choices: the way you get to the resort, the accommodation you choose, what you eat, the activities you practice, the professionals you meet or the way you behave in natural spaces.
With this “Sustainable stay” selection, we want to go further and give more visibility to the women, men and establishments that take concrete action at their level.
Accommodation providers, restaurateurs, craftsmen, producers, mountain guides or activity providers: this page is designed as an address book and inspiration, called upon to evolve according to the initiatives of the territory.
The objective is not to offer a stay where everything is perfect. It is rather to show that there are already many ways to travel differently, to consume more locally, to limit certain trips and to better understand the territory that we have come to discover.
And above all: without giving up the pleasure of the holidays.
Coming to Pra Loup in a different way
A more responsible stay can start long before you put on your ski boots or hiking boots.
To reach Pra Loup, there are several solutions that can limit the use of private cars. The journey can combine train and regional transport, with possible arrivals via Aix-en-Provence TGV or Gap before continuing to Barcelonnette and Pra Loup. The ZOU! lines and seasonal shuttles then allow you to reach the valley and the resort.
Once you arrive in Ubaye, the free shuttles are also a real alternative for certain trips between Barcelonnette, the villages and Pra Loup, depending on the operating periods.
Choosing public transport when possible also allows you to experience your arrival in the mountains differently: less driving, less searching for parking and more time to watch the landscape go by.
And when the car remains essential, other solutions exist: carpooling, electric vehicles or grouping trips during the stay.
The right reflex: before your departure, consult the updated timetables of trains, ZOU! lines and shuttles in order to prepare your connections.
Sleeping as close as possible to the mountains
Choosing your accommodation is also part of the experience.
For this “Sustainable stay” selection, we want to gradually highlight establishments whose practices, location or philosophy allow you to discover the territory in a different way.
And to start this address book, let’s go to a rather special place.
Our address: one night at the Refuge-Hotel de Bayasse
At an altitude of about 1,800 metres, in the hamlet of Bayasse, the Refuge-Hotel de Bayasse offers a rather different experience from a classic accommodation in the resort.
Here, you don’t need to do much to get a change of scenery.
The refuge is located in a particularly preserved mountain environment, at the gateway to the Mercantour National Park and at the foot of the Col de la Cayolle. It is a stage on the GR of the Tour de l’Ubaye and the Grande Traversée du Mercantour.
People come to Bayasse to take their time : walk, observe the landscapes, enjoy the terrace, read, chat around a table or simply find silence.
The Refuge-Hotel offers rooms with private bathrooms and adapted for people with reduced mobility. There is also a relaxation area, board games and a library. And a detail that is quite revealing of the spirit of the place: there is no television in the rooms or in the common areas.
A choice that makes sense when, outside, the larches and peaks already occupy the entire screen.
An address where you can also discover the territory on your plate
The Refuge-Hotel is not limited to accommodation.
Its catering highlights local cuisine made from fresh and local products, especially during the meals served at the refuge.
This is exactly what we want to promote with this selection: establishments where experience allows us to create a more direct link with the valley, its environment and its products.
Bayasse then became more than a place to sleep: a real stage of the stay.
A hike, a dinner, a quiet night, then waking up in the middle of the mountains: sometimes, traveling differently simply starts by taking more time to stay somewhere.
Eating local, even in the middle of the slopes
A stay in the mountains is also told on the plate.
Favouring local products and short circuits when possible allows you to discover a destination through its flavours while supporting the producers, craftsmen and companies working in the area.
And this process does not stop when you put on your skis.
Our address on the slopes: O’Manu
For this first selection, we headed to O’Manu, located directly in the Pra Loup ski area, in the Péguiou sector.
The principle is simple: take off your shoes, order and enjoy.
O’Manu offers snack and take-away catering directly on the slopes, with an open view of the valley and the peaks of the Chapeau de Gendarme and the Pain de Sucre.
But if this address finds its place in our “Sustainable stay” booklet, it is also to look at what is behind the plate.
O’Manu favours fries from a short circuit. An approach that makes it possible to bring the place where we consume as close as possible to the place where certain products are produced or processed.
Because a lunch on the slopes can also be an opportunity to think about something very simple: where does what we eat come from?
In this section, we therefore want to gradually promote restaurants and professionals who choose short circuits, local producers, seasonal products or suppliers located nearby.
The goal is not to turn lunch into an ecology class.
Sometimes all you have to do is order your fries, sit facing the mountains… and know that part of your meal has travelled less far to get there.
Discover the products and know-how of the valley
Eating local does not only mean choosing your restaurant. L’Ubaye also has craftsmen and producers whose work directly tells the story of the territory.
Jams, craft beers, cheeses, charcuterie, pastries and other specialities allow you to leave with a souvenir that you can really associate with your stay. It is also a way of preserving more economic value in the area: behind each product is a know-how, a company and often a local history. During a stay in Pra Loup, taking the time to push the door of a producer or to choose products made in the valley allows you to discover the Ubaye in a different way.
The press trip that inspired us to develop this approach was also an important part of these encounters: high-altitude gastronomy, local products and discovery of the work of the Gaillardises de l’Ubaye were an integral part of the immersion.
Consuming locally also means meeting the territory rather than simply crossing it.
Choose experiences that give meaning to the stay
The mountains are not just about the number of kilometres you walk or the activities you tick off a list.
Some experiences are valuable precisely because they force us to slow down. Walking in the snow. Entering a forest just as the sun disappears behind the peaks. Observing the tracks of an animal. Sitting around a fire.
This is also what we want to highlight in this selection.
Our experience: the Apér’Tipi
From Pra Loup 1500, the experience begins on foot.
With Tipi Ubaye, Bruno Maximin offers a walk of about 30 minutes at dusk before reaching a teepee set up in the mountain. The journey already allows you to change the atmosphere: gradually, you move away from the resort to enter the forest.
Then the teepee appears.
Inside, the fire allows you to find warmth after the walk. You sit around the stove to share a convivial moment with local cheeses and charcuterie, mulled wine or hot chocolate. The return is then made by torchlight.
The experience welcomes small groups, up to 14 people according to the currently published tourist information.
What we remember above all is not a number, however.
It’s a change of pace.
For a few hours, the mountain is no longer just a ski area. It becomes a forest that you walk through, a landscape that you watch change with the light and a place where you simply take the time to share a moment.
It is this philosophy that Bruno highlights through Tipi Ubaye: a mountain experienced differently, more focused on nature, conviviality and encounters. This experience was also one of the highlights of the stay told by Outdoor & News in Pra Loup.
Looking up when night falls
Staying for a long time also means learning to rediscover the night.
In a mountain area, darkness is a real asset. Of course, it allows you to observe the stars in good conditions, but it also plays an essential role for the fauna, flora and more broadly for the balance of nocturnal ecosystems.
Pra Loup and the municipality of Uvernet-Fours are fully in line with this desire to preserve the quality of the night. The territory belongs to the Alpes Azur Mercantour International Dark Sky Reserve, recognized for the remarkable quality of its night sky and for the actions taken to limit light pollution.
The municipality of Uvernet-Fours has also been awarded the “Starry Village” label, a distinction that highlights the efforts made to promote more reasoned public lighting and better preservation of the night-time environment.
Because light pollution does not only prevent us from seeing the stars. Too much artificial lighting or misdirected lighting can also disrupt the natural rhythms of many species: insects, birds, bats and other nocturnal animals are particularly sensitive to these changes in their environment.
Preserving the night therefore also involves simple gestures: avoid unnecessary lighting, favor appropriate light oriented towards the floor, turn off when not necessary or close the shutters when the rooms remain lit.
But preserving the night also means learning to enjoy it.
When the sky is clear, sometimes all you need to do is move slightly away from the illuminated areas and look up to discover a completely different side of the mountain. The Milky Way, constellations and the many stars visible above the peaks offer a spectacle that is sometimes forgotten in urban environments.
In Pra Loup, this richness is also highlighted through activities around astronomy, the discovery of the sky and nocturnal biodiversity, which allow you to better understand why darkness also deserves to be protected.
Taking the time to observe the sky, reducing unnecessary lights and finding a real dark night are therefore fully part of another way of experiencing the mountains.
Sometimes, to enjoy the scenery more, you can simply turn off the light and look upwards.
