First pick
Forêt de Bourou
Wood or forest
408 ha23 km of path
5 h 5 minto walk all 23 km of path
2 km south-westfrom the center
La Fontaine de Font Noblet
Directionsto a point inside
Photo: Marie-Lan Taÿ Pamart · Public domain8.1%of the land protected
Outdoors in Val-de-Cognac · protected areas, woods and footpaths
Almost every home in Val-de-Cognac is within 800 m of a park or wood
23% of Val-de-Cognac is mapped woodland. Footpaths add up to 43 km across Val-de-Cognac (0.7 km per km²). Waymarked hiking routes add up to 9 km in Val-de-Cognac. France has no Outdoors Grade yet: these are the figures, each beside the compared towns’ median.
Protected areas
8.1%
of the commune’s land
Compared town: 0.1%
Woodland
23%
of the land, mapped on OpenStreetMap
Compared town: 13%
Footpaths
43 km
0.7 km per km²
Compared town: 1.7 km per km²
Hiking routes
8.8 km
waymarked, GR and others
Compared town: 0.3 km per km²
Parks & woods
3
named, in or within 400 m of the commune
First: Forêt de Bourou
The sea
45 km
from the town center to the coast
Throughout this page, the Charente median and the France median are the median of compared communes (those with an overall grade), each figure its own median.
Against French towns
How Val-de-Cognac compares with French towns
Each figure against the 3,798 compared French towns (communes with an overall grade): the marked bar is the town’s, the line the median. Described, not graded.
Protected areas8.1%Share of the land in a national park, regional nature park, nature reserve or Natura 2000 site
70out of 100
Woodland23%Share of the land mapped as forest or woods on OpenStreetMap
68out of 100
Footpaths0.7 km per km²Km of mapped footpath and track open on foot, per km² of the commune
22out of 100
Hiking routes0.1 km per km²Km of waymarked hiking routes (GR and others), per km² of the commune
33out of 100
Percentiles among compared French towns; ties count half.
Towns its size
Val-de-Cognac has the 12th fewest footpaths per km² of 41 towns its size
The 40 compared French towns nearest in population (3,441 to 3,500 residents), by km of footpath per km². Hover for each one’s protected land and woods; click for its page.
From Sainte-Catherine (3.3 km per km²) to Crèvecœur-le-Grand (0.1 km per km²).
Every town in the comparison
| Town | Paths (km/km²) | Woodland | Protected | Coast | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sainte-Catherine Pas-de-Calais | 3.3 | 6.1% | 0% | 78 km |
| 2 | Moûtiers Savoie | 3.1 | 52% | 0% | 204 km |
| 3 | Lapugnoy Pas-de-Calais | 3 | 42% | 0% | 60 km |
| 4 | Verquin Pas-de-Calais | 2.9 | 5.5% | 0% | 62 km |
| 5 | Barbazan-Debat Hautes-Pyrénées | 2.6 | 47% | 0% | 136 km |
| 6 | Choisy-au-Bac Oise | 2.5 | 62% | 56% | 119 km |
| 7 | La Buisse Isère | 2.4 | 35% | 61% | 218 km |
| 8 | Haucourt-Moulaine Meurthe-et-Moselle | 2 | 34% | 0% | 278 km |
| 9 | Vals-les-Bains Ardèche | 2 | 73% | 100% | 125 km |
| 10 | Ligugé Vienne | 1.8 | 38% | 0% | 114 km |
| 11 | Culoz-Béon Ain | 1.8 | 57% | 22% | 267 km |
| 12 | Taninges Haute-Savoie | 1.8 | 57% | 28% | 268 km |
| 13 | Aubin Aveyron | 1.7 | 49% | 2.3% | 166 km |
| 14 | La Boisse Ain | 1.7 | 16% | 0% | 265 km |
| 15 | La Chapelle-Heulin Loire-Atlantique | 1.6 | 15% | 17% | 51 km |
| 16 | Lampertheim Bas-Rhin | 1.6 | 1.2% | 0% | 443 km |
| 17 | Saint-Sulpice-de-Royan Charente-Maritime | 1.6 | 16% | 16% | On it |
| 18 | Mauriac Cantal | 1.4 | 22% | 17% | 227 km |
| 19 | Les Belleville Savoie | 1.4 | 15% | 71% | 194 km |
| 20 | Saint-Jeoire Haute-Savoie | 1.3 | 64% | 0% | 275 km |
| 21 | Langeac Haute-Loire | 1.1 | 48% | 100% | 176 km |
| 22 | Saint-Ambroix Gard | 1 | 30% | 100% | 78 km |
| 23 | Artix Pyrénées-Atlantiques | 0.9 | 15% | 38% | 76 km |
| 24 | Ruffec Charente | 0.9 | 30% | 0% | 91 km |
| 25 | Bourcefranc-le-Chapus Charente-Maritime | 0.9 | 7.9% | 46% | On it |
| 26 | Ruaudin Sarthe | 0.9 | 34% | 0% | 142 km |
| 27 | Bréhal Manche | 0.8 | 3.9% | 1.8% | 2.8 km |
| 28 | Mirande Gers | 0.8 | 20% | 0% | 150 km |
| 29 | Saint-Cyr-en-Val Loiret | 0.7 | 33% | 36% | 214 km |
| 30 | Val-de-Cognac Charente | 0.7 | 23% | 8.1% | 45 km |
| 31 | Chanceaux-sur-Choisille Indre-et-Loire | 0.6 | 17% | 0% | 190 km |
| 32 | Varilhes Ariège | 0.6 | 17% | 2.6% | 116 km |
| 33 | Moult-Chicheboville Calvados | 0.5 | 8.3% | 6% | 19 km |
| 34 | Saint-Éloy-les-Mines Puy-de-Dôme | 0.5 | 23% | 0% | 290 km |
| 35 | Bournezeau Vendée | 0.3 | 9.3% | 0% | 35 km |
| 36 | Le Porge Gironde | 0.3 | 89% | 100% | On it |
| 37 | Le Mérévillois Essonne | 0.3 | 8.2% | 0% | 178 km |
| 38 | Hornaing Nord | 0.3 | 8.8% | 99% | 98 km |
| 39 | Villeneuve-la-Guyard Yonne | 0.2 | 18% | 0.2% | 227 km |
| 40 | Steenwerck Nord | 0.2 | 0.8% | 0% | 47 km |
| 41 | Crèvecœur-le-Grand Oise | 0.1 | 4.3% | 0% | 70 km |
The map
Parks, woods, footpaths & countryside
Tap a number to zoom to a park or wood. Tap a layer to hide it. The dashed line is the commune’s boundary.
Green: parks, gardens and woods mapped on OpenStreetMap, named or not.© OpenStreetMap contributors · INPN / PatriNat · IGN
Places to walk
Parks and woods to walk in, in and around Val-de-Cognac
Named parks, gardens and woods in the commune or within 400 m, the biggest and best-pathed first: Forêt de Bourou leads, at 408 ha. Directions go to a point inside.
Île David
Wood or forest · 380 m outside the commune
7.1 ha0.7 km of path
10 minto walk all 0.7 km of path
5 km south-eastfrom the center
Directionsto a point inside
Place du Champ de Foire
Park or garden
0.7 ha
Centralin the middle of Val-de-Cognac
Directionsto a point inside
Source: © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL): named parks, gardens and woods; sizes are the whole site.
Protected areas
8.1% of Val-de-Cognac lies in protected areas
The protected areas reaching the commune, and the nearest: national parks, regional nature parks, nature reserves and Natura 2000 sites.
Natura 2000 site
Vallée de l’Antenne
8.1% of the commune0.8 km from the center
Share of the commune’s land
Any protected area8.1%
Natura 2000 site8.1%
Designations overlap (a regional park can hold a Natura 2000 site), so the rows don’t add up; the first counts each piece of land once.
8.1% of Val-de-Cognac’s land is protected, more than in 70% of compared French towns; the median compared town in Charente has 7.4%.
Source: INPN / PatriNat, protected areas July 2026, Natura 2000 December 2024; shares of IGN’s commune boundary.
Footpaths and woods
43 km of footpaths and 9 km of hiking routes cross Val-de-Cognac
Paths, bridleways, steps and tracks open on foot, and waymarked hiking routes, mapped on OpenStreetMap inside the commune; woods are mapped forest and woodland, private woods included.
Footpaths
43 km
0.7 km per km²
Hiking routes
8.8 km
waymarked: 0.1 km per km²
Woodland
23%
about 14.3 km² of mapped woods
Km per km² of the commune · mapped on OpenStreetMap
Val-de-CognacCharente medianFrance median
Footpaths0.7
Hiking routes0.1
012 km per km²
Share of the land · mapped woods and forest
Val-de-CognacCharente medianFrance median
Woodland23%
0%50%100%
That is less than in 78% of compared French towns for footpaths per km², and for woodland more than in 68% of compared French towns. Hiking routes often follow paths and lanes already counted, so the two lengths overlap: don’t add them. 98% of Val-de-Cognac’s residents live within 800 m of a mapped park or wood, close to the typical town.
4 named hiking routes within 2 km
Other named walk
De Pons à Vénérand12 km
Via Sancti Martini - Camino de Zaragoza / Chemin de Saragosse5.1 km
Parcours Santé1.2 km
Parcours du Roy1 km
Source: © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL), extracts of October 25, 2026 (Geofabrik).
When to get out
The best walking months in Val-de-Cognac: April to September
Météo-France’s 1991–2020 normals at Cognac, 9.7 km away, and the daylight at the town’s latitude. Outlined months have long days, highs of 15 to 30 °C and little rain for the place.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daylight (h) | 9.0 | 10.3 | 11.8 | 13.5 | 14.9 | 15.7 | 15.4 | 14.1 | 12.5 | 10.8 | 9.4 | 8.7 |
| High (°C) | 10 | 11 | 15 | 18 | 21 | 25 | 27 | 27 | 24 | 19 | 14 | 10 |
| Rain (mm) | 72 | 51 | 53 | 65 | 62 | 60 | 45 | 53 | 63 | 76 | 88 | 84 |
July is the driest month (45 mm) and August the warmest (highs of 27 °C). 88 mm of rain falls in November, the wettest month. Frost comes on about 29 nights a year. The climate in Val-de-Cognac →
Neighbors
Next to Val-de-Cognac
The nearest towns of 2,500 or more, colored by the share of their land in protected areas.
CognacChâteaubernardChaniersJarnacSaintesPonsVal-de-Cognac
Under 1%1–10 %10–25 %25–50 %50 %+
Cognac and Jarnac have at least twice as much protected land.
How to read these numbers
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Protected areas. National-park cores, national parks’ outer areas, regional nature parks, nature reserves and Natura 2000 sites, from INPN. A national park’s core is strictly protected; its outer area and a regional park are charters between communes, not bans. Designations overlap, so the total counts each piece of land once.
- Woodland. Forest and woods as OpenStreetMap maps them, private woods included: woods nobody has mapped are missing, and a mapped wood isn’t necessarily open to walkers.
- Footpaths and hiking routes. Footpaths, bridleways, steps and tracks open on foot, then waymarked hiking routes (GR and others) measured apart. A route often follows a path or lane already counted: the two overlap. Paths nobody has mapped are missing.
- Green space nearby. The share of residents (INSEE’s 200 m grid) within 800 m, as the crow flies, of a mapped park, garden or wood edge. It measures nearness, not a way in. Guadeloupe and French Guiana have no grid: their pages say whether the town center is within 800 m.
- The coast. The straight-line distance from the town center to OpenStreetMap’s coastline, which follows the tide line into estuaries. A commune is on the coast when the coastline crosses its boundary.
- No grade yet. U.S. and UK towns have an Outdoors Grade; French towns don’t yet. Each figure is set beside the median of compared communes (those with an overall grade) in the département and in France, each figure its own median.
Questions about the outdoors in Val-de-Cognac
Is Val-de-Cognac in a national or regional nature park?
No, but 8.1% of its land is in a nature reserve or a Natura 2000 site.
Are there good walks in Val-de-Cognac?
OpenStreetMap maps 43 km of footpaths and tracks open on foot in the commune, 0.7 km per km² (the median compared town: 1.7 km per km²); 9 km of waymarked hiking routes cross it.
How much of Val-de-Cognac is woodland?
23% of the commune is mapped woodland, private woods included; the median compared French town has 13%.
Is Val-de-Cognac near the sea?
No: the coast is 45 km from the town center, as the crow flies.
When is the best time for walking in Val-de-Cognac?
April to September: long days, mild highs and little rain, from Météo-France’s 1991–2020 normals at the nearest suitable station.
Why is there no Outdoors Grade for French towns?
TownRatings grades the outdoors in the U.S. and the UK; the French figures are new and not graded yet. This page sets each one beside the median compared French town instead.
Sources: INPN / PatriNat (protected areas 2026, Natura 2000 2024) · © OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL (paths, hiking routes, woods, coast, gardens) · INSEE, Filosofi 2021 200 m grid (residents) · IGN Admin Express (boundaries) · Météo-France normals 1991–2020 · Medians and percentiles: TownRatings, over compared French towns, updated November 4, 2026. Under the Licence Ouverte / Open Licence 2.0 (Etalab).
Contains public sector information under the Licence Ouverte / Open Licence 2.0 (Etalab): INSEE, DGFiP, the Interior Ministry’s statistics service (SSMSI), the Ministry of Education (DEPP), the Health Ministry’s statistics service (DREES) and the Housing Ministry (Carte des loyers). Commune boundaries: IGN Admin Express.