About 20km north of Collobrières, this sanctuary protects one of France’s most endangered species, the Hermann tortoise (Testudo hermanni ). Once common along the Mediterranean coast, it is today found only in the Massif des Maures and on Corsica. In summer the best time to see the tortoises is in the morning and late afternoon. Watch them hatch from mid-May to the end of June. A great palaeontology trail has vicious-looking models of the tortoise’s ancestors lurking among the bushes.
The site has a well-documented trail from the clinic, where wounded tortoises are treated, to egg hatcheries and nurseries, where young tortoises (a delicacy for magpies, rats, foxes and wild boars) spend the first three of their 60 to 100 years.
