A storm in late November 2024 tore one of its three main limbs off. Six months later an arborist looked at the wound and called the tree in very good health, with centuries still ahead of it. The oak stands by itself on a hilltop above the village of Venon, on open pasture, with nothing else of its height anywhere near. Seen from the valley floor it is a single dark mark on the skyline, readable from every direction across the Grenoble basin and the Gresivaudan, which is how it came to work as a landmark for people who have never walked up to it. Eighteen metres tall, five metres round, and somewhere around 300 to 400 years old. France labelled it an Arbre remarquable in April 2017, and about a hundred people came up the hill for the ceremony, which is a good turnout for a tree in a field. There is an information panel at the foot of it now, with a QR code. Every source we found calls it a chene and stops there. Nobody says which oak, and the acorn stalks would settle it in an afternoon, so if you go up and look, tell us what you see. One last thing. Visitors carve their initials into the bark, and each cut opens the wood to fungal decay in a tree that has already been through a storm. Leave the knife in the car.
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Getting there
On a hillside above the village of Venon, Isere, overlooking the Gresivaudan valley and Grenoble basin
You can recognise it as the single oak standing alone on open hillside pasture, visible as a dark landmark across the whole valley. It stands above the village of Venon, beside an information panel.
No rail station in Venon itself; nearest is Grenoble, then a drive/hike up to the hillside above the village (roughly 10km from central Grenoble).
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from. The story was written with AI from these sources, and readers who know the tree correct it.