Grotte de Choranche

Visit the Grotte de Choranche in southern Isère between Villard-de-Lans and Pont-en-Royans close to Royans and the Drôme region. The cave is an absolute must to explore in the Gorges de la Bourne at the heart of the Vercors Massif, a beautiful area where nature rules supreme, like the Cirque de Choranche formed by a huge swathe of curved cliffs. The area benefits from a Mediterranean micro-climate in the middle of an Alpine environment, so it has surprisingly lush vegetation where you find the entrance to the Grotte de Choranche. Visited for the first time by Oscar Decombaz in 1897, the limits of the caves are still being explored today.

Figuring among the most beautiful caves in France, Choranche takes visitors into a world where rock becomes poetry. The hour long visit never fails to surprise novices and seasoned cave lovers, with its superbly illuminated chambers and galleries. Walk alongside the Serpentine underground river past natural features like soda straw stalactites and cave salamanders. 

A marvellous underground adventure

The journey through the cave is an open history book of the Vercors. Follow the guide from chamber to chamber to find out all the secrets of Choranche. The thrills begin in the Salle d’Entrée, an immense chamber 60m in diameter with a vivid green lake. After explanations from the guide, move on to the Galerie du Siphon, site of one of the best-known features of Choranche : thousands of soda straw stalactites forming a sort of fine white lace curtain on the ceiling. Poetry is everywhere in the Grotte de Choranche and no more so than when you arrive in the Salle de la Cathédrale. Here, an enchanting son-et-lumiere show takes your breath away beneath a 25m high ceiling,  surrounded by breathtakingly beautiful walls, thousands and thousands of years old,.