AT A GLANCE
Why go?
The Échelle de la Reine, or Queen's Ladder, is a striking staircase of 215 steps cut straight into the volcanic rock of Thueyts, in southern France's Ardèche. Rising through the Plaine de la Vernède at the foot of a basalt flow, it is a rare piece of vernacular engineering shaped as much by legend as by geology, and it links the village to the abandoned hamlet of Fargebelle and the dramatic natural site of the Pont du Diable.↗
Open free of charge all year and reached on foot from the village, the ladder rewards visitors with a hands-on climb up raw basalt, an orientation table with views over the valley, and the sense of following a path once said to have carried a queen of Auvergne to watch a battle.
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A staircase carved from the volcano
Thueyts sits on a platform of basalt, the legacy of eruptions from the nearby Gravenne volcano, and the Échelle de la Reine is the most tangible reminder of that volcanic past. Rather than being built up from quarried stone, the steps were worked directly into the living rock of the basalt flow, producing a steep, monumental climb that seems to grow out of the hillside. Locals compare the surrounding formation to the Chaussée des Géants (Giants' Causeway), the great basalt columns of this Ardèche valley, and the ladder's 215 steps lead you up through the very heart of it.
