gardens outside the cave, in front of the cliff

Les Grottes de Villecroze, Villecroze

Network of caves with an interesting historical & geologic story

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These caves were formed some 700,000 years at the end of the last ice age. They are the the result of a slow calcification of plants and mosses in a huge waterfall that covered the whole of the current cliff.

The caves and a large part of the fields around the village belonged to the Benedictine monks of the abbey of Saint-Victor de Marseille. They used the caves, still in their natural state, as places of refuge in case of raids conducted by the Saracens in the 10th century.