Vallée d'Héas and the Cirque de Troumouse
While Gavarnie draws the crowds, the Cirque de Troumouse — reached by a narrow toll road up the Vallée d'Héas — offers an even wider glacial amphitheatre in near-total solitude. At 6 km across it is technically larger than Gavarnie, yet on a weekday in June you may share it with nothing but marmots.
The Drive and the Walk
The toll road (€4 per car) climbs 14 km from the hamlet of Héas through increasingly dramatic gorges before emerging onto a high plateau ringed by 3,000-metre peaks. The plateau itself is almost lunar — a vast bowl of rock and alpine grass with a small statue of the Virgin Mary at its centre that appears utterly surreal against the scale of the mountains.
A 4 km circular trail around the plateau rim takes about two hours and passes the Lac des Aires, a shallow glacial lake that mirrors the cirque walls on still mornings. The views south into Spain are unobstructed and extraordinary.
The Valley Below
The Vallée d'Héas is itself worth lingering in: the hamlet of Héas has a pilgrimage chapel rebuilt after an avalanche in 1915 and a small auberge serving home-cooked mountain food. The valley road follows the Gave d'Héas through forest and meadow, and isard (Pyrenean chamois) are regularly spotted on the slopes above.
Héas sits 8 km from Gèdre, which in turn is 10 km north of Gavarnie, so combining both cirques in a single day is entirely feasible — start with Troumouse for the solitude, then descend to Gavarnie for the famous waterfall walk in the afternoon.
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