Vieux Chaillol
3,163 m, the highest point of the Champsaur

Vieux Chaillol is the highest point of the Champsaur, the valley running north from Gap in the French Southern Alps, and at 3,163 m it stands on the western edge of the Écrins massif. Stand back anywhere in the valley and it is the dark pyramid closing the skyline to the north-east, with nothing of its size for several kilometres in any direction. No glacier bars the way to the top. It is walked, in a day, without rope or crampons in summer.

At Altimood we have it in front of us the whole year, and when someone asks for a hard day on the hill with no exposure, it is one of the first summits we put forward. It also settles the I have been above 3,000 m question without becoming an alpine route (the Pic Turbat, one valley away, is the other kind) or mountaineering.

This article sets out the 2 ways up, with the figures and the trace for each.

The 2 routes up Vieux Chaillol

The summit is reached from 2 valleys, and the choice turns on the length of the day rather than on technical ground. Neither side has an exposed section, both want legs that have done some work beforehand.

Those are walking times only, breaks excluded. They come from our own calculator, run on the distance and ascent of the 2 traces on this page: 4 methods (Naismith, the German Alpine Club formula, the Swiss Alpine Club formula and effort-kilometres), averaged and rounded up to the next half hour. On a day that climbs this much the 4 are a long way apart, from 5 hrs 50 to 10 hrs 20 for the Chaillol side alone, so treat 8 hrs as a midpoint and shift it for your own pace, your sack and how long you stop.

Both sit high on our difficulty scale, 4 out of 5 from Chaillol 1600 and 5 out of 5 for the Champoléon circuit. If you are unsure where you sit on it, the 7-question level test gives you a marker in a couple of minutes.

In British terms, the Chaillol side carries about 200 m more ascent than Ben Nevis by the mountain track, over a kilometre less ground: a long Munro day with a steeper average gradient. The Champoléon circuit is Ben Nevis and half of it again, in one push. The altitude is the part that has no British equivalent, though it works in your favour here rather than against you: the summit is 3,163 m, the walking never goes higher, and the start at 1,600 m is already above the top of Ben Nevis.

Both routes want an early start. The upper third is bare rock on either side, with no shelter, and the afternoon storms of July and August leave nowhere quick to go.

Vieux Chaillol from Chaillol 1600

The short way, and much the busier of the 2. The small ski village of Chaillol 1600 puts the start at 1,600 m, taking 300 m of climbing off the valley floor. The path rises steadily to the col de la Pisse, traverses to the cabane des Parisiens, then works up through scree and slabs to the top.

It is there and back: you come down the way you went up. The logistics stay simple, and you can turn round at any point without being committed, which counts for something on a day of this length. At the cabane des Parisiens, the canal de Mal-Cros and its stone tunnels repay the detour if you are ahead of time.

If the day is short or the sky looks doubtful, the pic Queyrel (2,433 m) starts from the same car park and asks a good deal less: 11 km and 730 m of ascent, with a natural rock arch on the ridge and a view that already takes in the whole Champsaur.

• Start: Chaillol 1600 (Saint-Michel-de-Chaillol), 1,600 m
• Distance: 16 km there and back
• Ascent: +1,560 m
• Time: 8 hrs
• Grade: 4/5 (ascent, length, rocky ground high up)
• Season: July to October

• Distance :↔ 16.1 km
• Dénivelé positif :↗ 1563 m
• Dénivelé négatif :↘ 1567 m

Vieux Chaillol as a circuit from Champoléon

The Champoléon side starts 325 m lower, in the Drac Blanc valley, and the circuit closes naturally over the refuge du Tourond.

At 23.5 km and 1,960 m, this is one of the biggest walking days in the Champsaur. It goes in a day for someone fit who leaves before first light, but the arrangement that holds up best is to break it with a night out, bivouac style, high on the ridge.

• Start: Les Borels (Champoléon), 1,275 m
• Distance: 23.5 km circular
• Ascent: +1,960 m
• Time: 11 hrs
• Grade: 5/5 (length, ascent, a full day above 2,000 m)
• Season: July to October

• Distance :↔ 23.6 km
• Dénivelé positif :↗ 1957 m
• Dénivelé négatif :↘ 1956 m

The view from the top

At 3,163 m, Vieux Chaillol has no neighbour of its own height for several kilometres, and the view runs a full 360. To the north and east the summits of the Écrins National Park line up, the Olan and the Sirac to the front. To the south-west the hedged farmland of the Champsaur drops towards Gap, with the cliffs of the Dévoluy behind it. On a clear day the Vercors closes the horizon to the north-west and Mont Ventoux appears due south.

Ibex hold both sides of the mountain and will let themselves be watched, from where you are and no nearer. Chamois keep to the grassy slopes lower down, and marmots occupy anything resembling an alpine pasture. Early morning and the last 2 hours of light are when all 3 are out and about; through the heat of the middle of the day the ibex move onto shaded rock beneath the crest and take a good deal more finding.

The canal de Mal-Cros, water taken through the mountain

At the col de Riou Beyrou (2,695 m), where the cabane des Parisiens stands, a stone-lined trench sets off due east towards the lac de Mal-Cros. This is the canal de Mal-Cros, and it repays the detour. An imperial decree of 1853 allowed the Champsaur to take the meltwater of the upper Mal-Cros valley, on the Champoléon side, and carry it through to the far side of the mountain to irrigate the meadows of Saint-Michel-de-Chaillol, Saint-Julien and Saint-Bonnet. The intake is at 2,818 m, the distribution point at Chaillol at 1,750 m, and between the 2 the canal crosses the col de Riou Beyrou, then the col de la Pisse (2,354 m).

What is left on the ground can be walked: channels cut in dressed stone, traverses hacked out of the cliff face, and a vaulted tunnel 114 m long beneath a scree slope, crossed by head torch. The cabane des Parisiens was the site hut for the work crews. Water reached Chaillol in 1872, the branches towards Saint-Bonnet were finished in 1878, and those to Buissard and Bénévent never were. An association has been restoring the upper sections since 2004, so that stretch is waymarked and carries information boards.

Walking up Vieux Chaillol with a guide in 2026

The mountain guides at Altimood live in the Champsaur-Valgaudemar and guide this ascent as a day out, in a small group. Across the 8 to 10 hours the work is mostly pacing the group and reading the sky. If your pace allows for it, the stops are where the wildlife, the plants and the geology of Vieux Chaillol get their share of the day.

Our other trips in the Champsaur-Valgaudemar

1. 

   France | Southern Alps

   Écrins National Park Traverse

   From £527 – 5 days

   A 5-day guided trek through the wildest part of the French Alps.

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2. 

   France | Southern Alps

   Écrins Tour in 9 Days - Comfort

   From £1,762 – 9 days

   The GR54 stripped down to its highest passes, in 8 walking days, with a twin room and a daypack every evening.

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Vieux Chaillol is also the highest point of the tour du Vieux Chaillol, the regional long-distance route that goes round the massif in 4 to 6 days between the Champsaur and the Valgaudemar. If you are travelling out for a week rather than a day, the 9-day Écrins tour crosses this same country on its way round the massif, and a week built around your own dates and group can take Vieux Chaillol as its big day.

Practical information

Which map covers Vieux Chaillol?

The sheet to carry is the TOP25 3437 OT (Champsaur, Vieux Chaillol), which covers both routes end to end. The French 1:25,000 reads much like an Explorer sheet, with contours at 10 m. Above the cabane des Parisiens the waymarking thins out and the ground stops giving you landmarks: up there you navigate on cairns, on the shape of the broad ridge and on the col below you. Take your bearing off the map before the cloud comes in rather than after.

When to walk up Vieux Chaillol

July to October. Snow lies late on the summit section, and before the start of July the upper slopes call for an ice axe and crampons rather than a pair of poles. September is the best month: the days are still long enough for the Champoléon circuit, and the air is clearer for the view.

Vieux Chaillol in winter

The summit itself sits where committing snowshoe ground, ski touring and winter mountaineering meet. The valleys leading up to it are a different matter: they make excellent snowshoeing country, with lower objectives and days cut to the daylight there actually is.

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