Village des Mées

Les Mées, in provençal Lei Meas, from the occitan meya that means wheat furniture. The village counts around 3.600 inhabitants, and is famous thanks to the narrow rocks standing 100m high up from the village called “pénitents”.

Les Mées, in provençal Lei Meas, from the occitan meya that means wheat furniture, that reffers to the Penitents.
The village of Les Mées, that counts 3630 inhabitants, owes its fame to the narrow rocks standing 100m high up from the village.

The village offers a nice landscape on the Durance Valley. In the town center, we can see beautiful overstitched-stone houses, little narrow streets… The St-Roch Chapel and the church Notre Dame de l’Olivier are nice places to visit there are also several olives oil mill in the city that could be visited.

The Penitents
The Rocks above the village are called Penitents because of their long and narrow form, some people have seen in it a procession of monks wearing sharp hood. According to the legend, it could have been Mountain of Lure’s monks, petrified by Saint-Donat, during the Sarrazin invasions, and punished for being in love with young women.

Olive groves
Les Mées is the biggest olive-producer city of the Alpes de Haute-Provence with more than 80,000 olive trees around the village. There’s an Olive’s path in Les Mées marked in the olive-trees (3,6km) from the center of the village. 4 olive oil Mills, Olive museum, open from Monday to Saturday. Free access, info : 04 92 34 36 38