Issue No.26

Alta Lumina
Climbing a gentle hill, past a small lake and
approaching a forest from which soft blue
and green lights lit up the sky, I had no idea
what to expect from my visit to Alta Lumina
in Les Gets. Lights, sure, lumina is a bit of a
give away. But other than that, I was
clueless. My friends at the tourist office had
been invited to test drive this new attraction
when it opened to the public for the first
time at the end of July 2020, and they hadn’t
stopped talking about it. “We’re not telling
you” they said when I asked them what it
was like. “You have to go see it for yourself.”
Alta Lumina opens when it’s dark. It’s
described as an “immersive, multisensory
experience that combines the poetics of
light, music, imagery, set design and
interactivity.” But if you asked me to
describe it in just one word I’d say “magical”.
Like being in a fairy tale
You enter the forest to hear bird song and
ethereal music and then follow the story of a
travelling music maker who, in his hot air
balloon, travels beyond the mountains. A
path takes you past the most extraordinary
light installations. I was absolutely convinced
it was a real actor in a hot air balloon taking
off right next to me when suddenly it
disappeared in the trees! There are what
look like thousands of flowers made of light.
Trees drip with shards of light like a torrent
of rain if it were made of sunbeams. I heard a
little girl say “I never want this to end”. But
this isn’t just for kids though they will love it.
If poetry were light and music – then this
enchanted forest is a spectacular sonnet.
If you ever read a fairy tale as a kid and
wondered what it would be like to be “in” a
land of fairy tales, I think this is how it would
look, sound and feel.
This is the only lumina night walk of its kind
in Europe though there are several around
the world. It’s a year-round attraction and
you can buy tickets on line: www.altalumina.
com/en/