Up to Notre-Dame de la Garde

Jardin de la Colline Puget

Marseille's oldest public garden, a steep hillside of switchbacks, shade and harbor views.

The Jardin de la Colline Puget is Marseille's oldest public garden, and it's the reason this climb doesn't run in a straight line. The prefect Charles Delacroix imagined it in 1801 as an extension of the promenade that had replaced the old south ramparts, the cours Pierre Puget. Work dragged on for more than fifty years, done by charity workshops, with earth hauled up by donkey and repeated landslides slowing everything down. The garden got its current name in 1872, and in 1878 a bust of Pierre Puget was set on top of a column near the entrance.

The sculptor faces the city and turns his back on the sea, a detail locals like to notice. The paths zigzag up a 1.3-hectare slope, so take the switchbacks slowly and use the shaded benches. From the upper terraces you can already see the masts in the old port below. At the top gate, the final ramp to the basilica begins across the street.

Rampe Notre-Dame

The final steep ramp, where the gilded Virgin appears above the switchbacks.

This is the Rampe Notre-Dame, the last hard stretch of the climb. The road cuts up the limestone flank of the hill in tight hairpins, and the grade is steep enough to slow anyone down. As you round each bend, the bell tower of the basilica comes and goes above the pines, with the gilded statue of the Virgin catching the light. That figure is 11.2 metres tall and gilded with gold leaf, and it has watched over the city from the top of the tower since September 1870. Behind you, the old port drops away, and the sea wind gets stronger, a reminder that this ridge was a lookout long before the church was built. Keep climbing; the ramp levels out at the basilica's front gate.