Circular loop from Anost

Head to the village of Anost and park in the Champ de Foire car park, near the Town Hall and the Post Office, where the “Les Galvachers” eco-museum is located.

(S/E) From the car park, walk past the Ecomuseum and the Town Hall and head up Grand Rue des Galvachers to the left. Walk past a petrol station. Further on, at the junction with local road (VC) 16, turn left towards Les Grelaudots via Rue du docteur René Roy. At the end of the street, turn right.

(1) Walk up Rue des Grelodots to join the D2. At the junction, turn left onto Chemin de la Croix de Joux. After a right-hand bend, the path continues straight on to cross the D2. Continue along this stretch, ignoring the crossroads further on with a wooden cross in the centre. Climb a few metres and turn left, just after the house at number 11.

(2) After skirting it on the right, the path turns right and crosses the D2 again. Head straight on to follow the signs for Notre-Dame de l'Aillant. As you climb, near a stand of fir trees, admire the landscape on your left. At the first crossroads of tracks, turn left (signposted Notre-Dame de l'Aillant).

(3) Walk a good hundred metres to reach the site where a cast-iron statue of "the Virgin and Child" stands, to which a commemorative plaque is affixed.

(4) Retrace your steps to the junction and turn left, following the signs for “Base de Loisirs”. When you reach a T-junction, keep left onto the white track and follow it straight ahead (passing through a barrier with a ‘No Vehicles’ sign). At a sharp left-hand bend (elevation 645), leave the white track and head straight ahead up a path through the woodland.

(5) It winds its way to a first junction of tracks where you must keep to the right. Further on, using a tree that appears to be in the middle of the path as a landmark, turn right about twenty metres before this tree, onto a wide but barely visible path. Follow it down, keeping to the left. It winds its way until it reaches a stream at the bottom of a valley. Cross the ford and immediately follow the stream upstream on the right, passing through patches of accumulated dead wood. Then, it feels as though you’re passing through a ditch before reaching a crossroads where you must turn sharply left to follow a wider, better-maintained path that leads onto the Poterons forest road.

(6) Nearby, there is a picnic area with a shelter and benches and, on the other side of the track, a wild boar enclosure. From the end point, head left onto this tarmac road and follow it all the way to the Maquis Socrate memorial.

(7) At the crossroads, leave the forest road and turn right towards “Maquis Socrate and Lavault de Fretoy” along a white gravel path. At the next crossroads, continue left along the same path; then, when you reach a fork, keep left, leaving the gravel path. Follow the main path at all times, guided by the signposts at junctions indicating the direction of Maquis Socrate. The route ends where the path crosses the La Rainache stream near the island of the same name, where one of the Maquis’s camps was set up.

(8) Reconstruction of a living area with the infirmary and kitchen. Information sign along the path. A little further on to the left, at a stream flowing down the hillside, follow the path to the left of the stream to discover a magnificent lake at the top. Return to the original path and continue the route to the left to reach the Pierre du Pas de l’Âne shortly afterwards (information). Continue along the same path for another 100 m, then turn left.

(9) The forest path climbs steeply in places. Almost at the top, when you reach a fork, keep left. On the plateau, the path becomes grassy. Turn left at its junction with a white path. When you reach a five-way junction, just after rounding a bend to the left, take the second path on the right.

(10) Follow it until it joins another white track. Turn right. It goes round the Mont du Tureau des Grands Bois or the Télégraphe on the right. At the first junction of white tracks, keep left to reach the civil aviation radar tower built at an altitude of 800 m.

(11) Go round the site on the right, via a path not shown on the IGN map which descends through the broom. At the edge of a wood, at a fork, turn left. It descends further to pass at the foot of the spur of a fir wood and then, at the end, joins a wider, more open woodland track.
Turn left to climb up and reach another crossroads of tracks. Take the second on the right. Follow it until you reach the white track visible on the left. Turn right and follow it straight ahead to a large crossroads.

(12) Continue straight ahead into the woods, then turn left twice in quick succession. Follow the path marked with a horizontal blue line within a White Rectangle. Go round the two fallen trees. Descend to a crossroads of tracks. At this point, turn right and then immediately left so as to descend the fairly steep slope diagonally until you reach a perpendicular path below. Follow this path to the right (white horizontal line on trees). After a left-hand bend, it leads onto a white path. Turn right.

(13) It descends steadily. Go straight ahead at a crossroads of tracks (sign prohibiting all vehicles), before turning right onto the first wide path that cuts diagonally into the forest. Follow this route steadily, ignoring any cross-trails. It emerges from the woods at a clearing and offers a fine view of Bussy and its surroundings. Head down the clearing to the right, keeping to the right at the junction with a small track. This leads onto the tarmac road of Maquis Socrate, at the end of a bend. Continue straight ahead.

(14) This road leads to Bussy. At the first crossroads, keep right into Rue des Hauts de Bussy. At the next junction, Les Roys, turn right to descend towards a T-junction. Then turn left.

(15) Shortly afterwards, at the last house, the road becomes a dirt track. Follow it straight ahead (^GR® signposted) until you reach the D88 at the entrance to the Pont de Bussy campsite.

(16) Cross the bridge over the main road on the left, then take the first stony track on the left (Grande Rue des Galvachers), which joins a street; take this street on the left as it climbs, returning to the junction you passed on the way out.

(1). Return to the Champ de Foire car park via the reverse route of the outward journey (Rue du Dr Roy, right, Grand' Rue des Galvachers, right to the Town Hall – Ecomuseum (S/E).

Route surveyed on 16/05/2023. Following forestry work observed on 05/05/2023, numerous clear-cut areas have appeared here and there. Consequently, some paths are rutted, have disappeared or their route has been slightly altered compared to the IGN map.

Benches at the foot of the statue of Notre-Dame de l'Aillant.
Shelter with benches at the Poterons picnic area.
Shelter and picnic facilities at the Maquis Socrate campsite and by the lake above (7).
Bring walking poles to aid your progress through the undergrowth and also for the ascents and descents, which can be steep at times.
Remember to bring a pair of binoculars to get a better view from the panoramic vantage points.

- A galvacher: a peasant cart driver or cartman, mainly from the Morvan region. Employed for logging in the forests.

- Notre-Dame de l'Aillant: a cast-iron statue placed on a stone pedestal, which in turn sits on a rock, built in 1878. A plaque was affixed on 15 August 1946 in gratitude to Our Lady for protecting Anost on 14–15 and 16 July 1944 from German troops who were preparing to set fire to the village. Originally, the statue was erected to protect Anost from hailstorms and to thank the Virgin Mary for her protection during the 1870 war.

- Wild boar enclosure accessible via a footpath, opposite the Poterons picnic area.

- Stele of the Maquis Socrate at the junction of the Route Forestière des Poterons.

- Site of one of the Socrate Maquis’s camps on Rainache Island, bordered by the stream of the same name. Georges Leyton (1912–1944) was a Resistance fighter from the very beginning, a career second lieutenant from 1940, known as Socrate. In February 1944, he established an armed group in an abandoned farmhouse near the woods of Maubous. In May, he withdrew to an isolated spot on the heights of Anost, then to the banks of the Rainache. The base camp, hidden on the island of Rainache, was accessible via a small footbridge and included a kitchen and an infirmary. By the end of June, a parachute drop enabled the new recruits to be equipped, following the Maquis’s reputation spreading beyond the borders of the Morvan. Ambushes, raids, supply runs… were the operations carried out daily by these partisans. On 10 August 1944, Socrate was mortally wounded by a German mechanised patrol at La Celle-en-Morvan. He died of his injuries just before the Battle of Autun, which marked the liberation of the southern Morvan. He was replaced as leader of the maquis by ‘Dédé’ Piella.

- Pierre du Pas de l’Âne (altitude 650 m): legend has it that, taking its usual great leap, the donkey of Saint Martin, the evangelist of Gaul, leapt from this rock all the way to the oppidum of Verdun to destroy Roman idols there. The scene is said to have taken place in the year 376, and the donkey’s hoofprint is etched there forever (petroglyph stone).

- Civil aviation radar tower at a place known as Tureau des Grands Bois or Le Télégraphe (altitude 800 m).

- On the way back, visit the Church of Saint-Germain d’Anost, built in the Middle Ages (12th century) for the apse and transept; remodelled in the 18th century for the sacristy and access to the bell tower, and in the 19th century for the nave and confessional. There are 12 stained-glass windows donated between 1935 and 1939; two recumbent statues (Jehan de Roussillon and his wife Isabeau); and several statues.

- On the Place du Champ de Foire in Anost, restoration of a ‘shoe-fitting station’ for oxen and cows.