Gros Bessillon fire, inland Var

Why did a fire that was already out come back?

It was never quite out. The fire began at Pontevès on 21 July and ran through the Gros Bessillon hills for over a week before the préfecture declared it contained on the evening of 28 July. Contained means the perimeter has stopped growing, not that the ground inside it is cold. In Provençal garrigue and old pine, heat sits in roots and leaf litter for days.

Then the mistral arrived. It is a dry northerly that funnels down the Rhône valley and fans east across the Var, and it can turn a smouldering stump into a running fire in minutes. That is what happened on Friday 31 July, west of Correns. The préfecture ordered evacuations that evening across Correns, Montfort-sur-Argens, Le Val, Carcès and Châteauvert, pushed by FR-Alert to every phone in the affected cells, and a campsite near Correns was cleared alongside residential streets.

Reignition after containment is normal in a hot, wind-exposed massif. Do not read "under control" in a headline as "holiday back to normal". The préfecture used three words for this fire in three weeks, and they mean different things. Fixé, on 7 August, meant the perimeter had stopped moving. Maîtrisé, on 11 August, meant crews had the fire held inside that perimeter. Éteint, out, has still not been said.

Which villages and roads were actually cut?

This is wine and farming country, not a resort strip, so the disruption is about reaching places rather than places being destroyed. The reignition hit Correns, Montfort-sur-Argens, Le Val, Carcès and Châteauvert. Cotignac, Barjols and Brue-Auriac were caught in the earlier phase of the same fire in late July.

On the roads: the RD45 between Châteauvert and Correns closed, the RD22 between the RD13 and Montfort-sur-Argens went to emergency vehicles only, the RD13 from Cotignac was cut at the Les 4 Chemins junction on 1 August, and the RD562 between Carcès and Le Val closed. These are exactly the roads a satnav picks to cross the hills between the A8 and the Verdon, and it does not know they are shut.

The unwinding has been staged. The préfecture lifted the evacuation order for the northern neighbourhoods of Le Val, and Montfort-sur-Argens residents were allowed home on the evening of 1 August. The RD45 is the one still shut, and it is the road most likely to be offered to you as a short cut between Châteauvert and the Correns valley. Var Actu, relaying the department's InfoRouteVar service, reports it closed day and night until 21 August, with traffic sent round through Le Val by the RD554, the RD562 and the RD22.

Are the Var forests open, and what happens if you walk in anyway?

Some are, some are not, and this is what catches visitors who are nowhere near the fire.

The Var préfecture divides the department into nine forest massifs and grades each one daily. The grade decides whether you may enter, and it is published every evening for the following day on an access map. Green and yellow mean normal access, orange means restricted and discouraged, red means closed to the public outright, footpaths and forest tracks included.

The grades move both ways, and they have moved both ways this month. On Saturday 1 August every massif in the Var was shut. By Tuesday 4 August four were closed. On Thursday 6 August eight were closed again. Over the weekend it eased right back: on Saturday 8 August and again on Sunday 9 August the Haut-Var was the only massif closed, with the other eight at severe risk. On Monday 10 August it tightened again, with the Sainte-Baume, the Haut-Var, the Maures and the Centre-Var closed for the day. By Wednesday 12 August nothing was closed at all. On Friday 14 August all nine were rated severe with none shut. On Saturday 15 August the Haut-Var alone was closed, rated very severe, with access, movement, walking and work all banned, and the other eight held at severe risk where regulated work stops at 1pm. For Sunday 16 August the préfecture is reported to have dropped the Haut-Var back to severe alongside the Sainte-Baume, the Maures, the Centre-Var and the Estérel, with the Monts Toulonnais, the Corniche des Maures, the Îles d'Hyères and the Plateau de Canjuers at moderate, and nothing closed.

The Maures and the Corniche des Maures sit behind the Gulf of Saint-Tropez, the Estérel is the red rock between Fréjus and Cannes, and the Îles d'Hyères are Porquerolles and Port-Cros. None are near Correns. They are graded on how hot, dry and windy the whole department is. If your trip is built around walking, trail running or vineyard paths, check the map the night before rather than at the trailhead. Open fires and barbecues are banned near woodland, as is smoking on forest paths, and that is enforced.

You are booked into a gîte or campsite next week. Now what?

The coastal Var was not affected by this fire, and the A8 and A57 stayed open, though rest and service areas on both have been shut as a precaution on the worst days. So if you are inland, ring the property and ask two questions, not one. Are you open. And: is the road to you open, by which route. The second gets missed, because a gîte can be undamaged and still unreachable. Owners in this valley know the road status before any website does.

If they are open and reachable, go. Provence Verte in August is vineyards, Thursday markets, river swimming at Correns and Carcès, and hill villages that are not on fire. Cancelling Cotignac because of a fire near Correns is like cancelling Bath because of something in Bristol.

If the property is evacuated or unreachable, you have firmer ground for a refund than most travellers realise: a préfectoral evacuation order is a documented act of authority, not an opinion. Ask for it in writing, with its date. To move rather than cancel, the Luberon gives you the same hilltop-village-and-vineyard trip untouched by this fire.

Wherever you stay, keep your phone charged. Evacuation orders here went out by FR-Alert, which reaches foreign handsets on French networks without you signing up for anything. The Var used the same machinery again on 14 August, for a lightning fire near Rians that had nothing to do with this one.

What does a burnt hillside mean for the rest of the year?

Access restrictions outlast the flames. Burnt woodland stays closed for weeks and sometimes months, because standing dead pines fall without warning and crews need clear ground to work hot spots. Marked paths, GR routes and walking apps show open long after the ground is legally closed. The signage on the ground is the authority.

The less obvious risk arrives with the rain. A burnt slope has lost the roots and litter that held water back, and Provence takes its rain in short violent autumn storms. Burn scars shed mud, ash and rock into the valleys, which here means onto the same departmental roads that closed for the fire. Expect intermittent closures around Correns, Montfort-sur-Argens and Châteauvert through the autumn on days with no fire at all.

The préfecture is planning for exactly that. On 14 August it published the framework for the work to come across the communes burnt by this fire and by the Taradeau and Les Arcs fire of July, agreed with three intercommunal authorities: securing the roads, taking out burnt timber that is now dangerous and putting it into the timber trade, and building fascines across the slopes to slow runoff and erosion. A technical group including the CNPF and the ONF will decide where the work goes first, and the state is funding six-month contracts through France Travail to staff it.

The recovery paperwork started earlier. On 11 August the préfecture published the first steps for people caught by the fire: register with your mairie whatever the damage, put your insurance claim in by 31 August, and collect replacement identity papers free of charge at Carcès or Barjols. Emergency payments from the CAF, psychological support and legal advice are being coordinated through the sous-préfecture of Brignoles. On 14 August it passed on the regional health agency's advice for people cleaning up: no dry sweeping, no leaf blowers and no pressure washers on ash, gloves and an FFP2 mask instead, wash and peel anything out of the garden, and see a doctor if you get more than a passing smell of smoke. Masks were sent to Montfort-sur-Argens, Correns, Carcès, Cotignac, Le Val and Vins-sur-Caramy. That is the phase this fire has now reached.