Circular route in the southern Hardt Forest

Parking is available in the car park at Place du Colonel Gauvin, near the fire station.
‘Colonel Gauvin’ bus stop. Distribus.

(S/E) From the car park, cross Rue du^6e RIC (at the pedestrian crossing) and follow Rue du Rhin until you reach the church.

(1) Turn right towards the church and walk round it on the left-hand side. Opposite the cemetery, turn left to leave the church grounds and take the path on the right which runs alongside the wall until you reach the edge of the forest.

(2) Head up into the forest. The path is sometimes overgrown but very quickly reaches a four-way junction, marked by tall pine trees.

(3) Take the path on the left heading south-east. The path gradually turns to the left before returning to its original direction. After an open stretch beneath high-voltage power lines, you’ll reach a horse paddock. Note the fleur-de-lis boundary marker on the left inside the paddock, directly beneath the high-voltage power line. Carry on, with the fence on your left, until you reach the crossroads surrounded by piles of wood at the far end of the paddock.

(4) Turn right, then immediately left towards the south. At the next crossroads, in a right-hand bend on the wide path, you have two options:

1) Continue along the wide track, then turn left towards the D66 to rejoin the route and reach the point (6).
2) Let the wide track branch off to the right and continue straight ahead (the option chosen on the map and in the description). Stay on this path, ignoring any side tracks. After a left-hand bend, the path descends towards the edge of the woodland and a housing estate. Stay in the woodland on the right, following the edge. At the next right-hand bend, a few dozen metres further on, don’t miss the small grassy path branching off to the left for a possible round trip.

(5) Follow this narrow path for about a hundred metres until you find, on the left, the small gate leading into the courtyard of the Bartenheim-la-Chaussée Chapel.
Benches, a playground, a pétanque court and the two stork nests on either side of the chapel make this a very pleasant spot. Retrace your steps via the gate and the narrow path.

(5) At the crossroads, turn left and carry on straight ahead, ignoring the side paths. Climb the embankment until you reach a wide path marked with yellow signs. Head left towards signpost 184. Further on, after a right-hand bend, leave the forest and follow the path to the right of an access ramp to the A35 motorway. Turn right into the southern entrance to the forest and follow the cycle path known as the ‘percée centrale’ for about 50 metres.

(6) Turn right towards the picnic area (which is in a state of disrepair). Then take the path on the right at the far end of the area. After a left-hand bend and a crossroads, it leads to a hunting shelter on the right-hand side. Head towards the shelter until you reach the edge of the embankment overlooking a large “wallow” for wild boar; a small downhill path leads down to it.

(7) Retrace your steps to the crossroads you passed earlier, turn right for about 150 m and rejoin the central clearing. Continue right along this wide track for about 500 m, before a bridge spanning a ditch.

(8) Turn 90° to the right. Further on, at the junction near the yellow sign 180, turn left and pass under the high-voltage power lines. Ignore all side paths until you reach the junction at sign 171.

(9) Go down the embankment on the right and carry on straight ahead. At the junction, continue straight ahead. The path approaches a housing estate and passes by a curious armchair on the right-hand side. A few metres further on, the path enters the housing estate, passing between two properties. When you reach the street, turn right and then left to reach the car park (S/E).

The yellow signs indicate the presence of an underground natural gas pipeline. The red ones are for high-voltage power lines. The numbers on the signs are in hectometres. You will walk 900 m between signs 180 and 171.

Having been vandalised on several occasions, the picnic area is no longer maintained by the local council.

The Hardt Forest:

Over the course of 2 million years, the Rhine has deposited large quantities of alluvial material (sand, gravel and pebbles) from the Alps onto the Alsace plain. It is on this stony ground that the Hardt State Forest stretches for 30 km between Fessenheim and Bartenheim
Originally owned by the Habsburgs, the Hardt Forest reverted to Louis XIV following the Thirty Years’ War, from 1648 onwards. It became state property in 1789.
Boundary markers once marked the boundaries of the forest; each is engraved with a number, a date and the fleur-de-lis, the symbol of royalty. One of them can be seen just before the point (4).

The southern part occupies the Lower Alsace Terrace, south of Ottmarsheim, overlooking the Rhine alluvial plain. The soil is dry and poor, supporting only coppice woodland—a mixture of mainly oaks, hornbeams, maples, black locusts and fruit trees, dominated by a few pines.
The Southern Hardt is the largest natural hornbeam forest in Western Europe and is home to dry grasslands that are rare in Europe, which have earned it special Natura 2000 protection.