"To the South of France, where the Rhone is
thrown in the sea,
it is an almost desert country, called the Camargue, where still live wild herds
of horses "
- Crin Blanc of Rene Guillot
On the track of Gardians
The sun rises on the pond of Vacarès, nimbant of gold plain water of the lagoon.
Hats, ponchos and boots, the riders progress slowly through the “sansouires” (marshes).
Between the green tufts of the salicornes (ingredient essential to the
manufacture of the household soap), the ground is cracked, and one sees that and
there effleurer layers of salt. Of a tumble of reeds, on the wet banks, takes
off an ashy héron which planes a long moment on the motionless étendeus. In the
already hot air of the morning, the horses bran themselves - camarguais of pure
souce, with their dress clear gray, their insane cinière and their broad shoes,
perfectly adapted to the marshy grounds. In column, they skirt banks of Vacarrès,
follow the dam of Five-George, go up to the ponds of Méjanes. Soon the horizon
seems to disappear, drowned in this immense liquid landscape which formed, while
mixing, water of the Rhone and the Mediterranean.
Savage, the Camargue?
During centuries, the man however deeply modified his landscapes, preventing the
incursions of the sea and channeling the risings of the river. Here, the level
of water permanently is controlled. Vaccarès is the centre piece of all the
hydraulic system of the delta: this vast lagoon of 6.000 hectares, where water
does not exceed 2 meters of depth, makes it possible from now on to irrigate “to
measure” the rice plantations of the Camargue. But nature also took again its
rights there. Thanks to the creation of the Regional Natural reserve of the
Camargue, in 1972, thousands of birds come to nest on the small islands of the
lagoon: foulques and plunger ducks, grèbes, will hérons…
To explore this territory with dubious banks, nothing is worth the excursion
with horse. On kilometers of sentirs prohibited with the cars, sansouires,
tamaris, falls (ponds with estival draining) and lagoons alternate. With their
couchers of sosleil magic, when the ponds clarify reds in releasing pink
flamingos. To horse and with a good guide, one can pass everywhere, including on
the herds, these immense private properties devoted to the breeding of the
bulls. It is enough to push the gates which delimit the fields. Thus, one
approaches with more close to the life of the breedings camarguais. An old stone
farmhouse directed full south, back with the mistral, a treillised vineyard
where the vine is rolled up, of the stables to shelter the horses: in the north
of Vaccarès, in the flat landscapes of the Small-Camargue, the herd of the
Large-Huts is located by far.
Here, the guardians are the heroes of the daily newspaper. Charged with
supervising the herds in semi-freedom, they know each piece of their semi-watery
territory. In spring, these riders gather the young animals to mark them with
red iron. Each herd has its blazon, which will make or demolish its glore in the
arenas, at the season of the races to the cocorde. And all the year, it is
necessary to sort the herds and to move them of a grazing ground to another.
This work, the occasional riders can take part…
Equipped wild between sky and sea.
To join the sea, one crosses the Small-Rhone in boat by the vat of the Savage:
on board, the horses have priority! Then one crosses through the dunes.
Headlight of Gacholle with Holy-Marry, on kilometers, extends an immense,
separate beach grounds by a cord of dunes. In these great spaces, happiness is
at the end of the support of the horse: to gallop with the short-nap cloth of
the waves on fair sand, to go along the dunes where the wind makes shiver sea
reeds… A midday, one stops for a barbecue in the shade of the pine forest: with
the menu, tapenade, grills with the wood fire and vintage of the country. At the
end of the roads of the Camargue, at the end of the delta, the white church of
the Holy-Marry-of-the-Sea takes care, heart living of a small very white
village. It was strengthened during the One hundred Year old war, to protect it
from the incursions of the pirates who devastated Provence by going up the Rhone.
In her crypt, rests Sarah, the owner of the gipsies, venerated for her black
hair and her darkened skin. This simple maidservant accompanied, says the legend,
Marie-Jacobé, sister of the Virgin and Marie-Salome, mother of the Jean apostle,
in their escape out of Palestine.
And each year, on May 24, of the thousands of gipsies lead his statue on the
beach in procession.
Source: Point of view - May 2002 - article of P. Desclos