Beware of nice looking ladies..

Les Mees is a French village situated in the department of the Alpes de Haute Provence, near Digne-Les-Bains.

This area is known for its very peculiar geological rock formations, called "Les Penitents".





The name is inspired on the conic shape of the rocks, next to the village, which evokes a groups of monks wearing long pointed cowls (like those worn by the Capuchin monks).

The Legend says that this group of monks was transformed to stone by the devil after having looked at a beautiful woman (without even having been able to touch, those poor monks..!!).

Anyway, the official story tells us that the shape is mainly the result of erosion on the rocky surface. It's irregularity in terms of cohesion provokes the special shape of the rocks. The rocky surface ("substrate") is called the "Formation of Valensole", a conglomerat formed by an accumulation of subalpine residus between the end of the Miocene and the beginning of the Pliocene, and is several meters thick.

The rock formation is about one 1 kilometer long and atteins a height of 114 mètres.