The best waterfalls in Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes

The road into Salazie doesn't ease you in. One minute you're driving through Saint-André, and the next the walls of the cirque close in on both sides, green from top to bottom, with water running off them in places that don't even look like they should hold a waterfall. Cascade du Voile de la Mariée is the one everyone comes for, but it's really just the introduction to a day that keeps handing you more cascades than you can photograph.

We started at 8am from a hotel on the west coast, which meant a decent drive before we even reached Salazie proper. Our driver stopped in Saint-Denis so we could pick up lunch at a supermarket, since options thin out fast once you're up in the cirque. By 10am we were in Salazie itself, at a small church with a garden attached. I'll be honest, we didn't dig into the church's history much. It's a modest building and we were eager to keep moving toward the waterfall everyone talks about.

Finding the Voile de la Mariée Viewpoint