Reims

09.09.18
Homeward. 6 hour + drive to Reims. Our cheese purchases carefully packed with frozen bottles of water and ice blocks and a lot of hope that they wouldn't deteriorate over 2 day journey in the car. Not helped by the fact that the hotel didn't have a fridge! We succeeded though, cheese made it.

French motorways a dream drive, but 80 odd euros for paege from South to North though.

Our last French dinner in the busy pedestrian street along from the cathedral in Reims and back to sleep in the functional Ibis Styles hotel across from the canal where there are moorings, mostly taken up by huge barges. We will be coming through here on our boat next year, can't quite believe it!

We managed to get an earlier Shuttle, and arrived back in England around 2pm. We had been forewarned that there were long hold ups on the M20, so we headed for the coast road home which of course was incredibly slow. A huge contrast to the pleasant French roads we had travelled on.

At least the weather is still good back home.

  

Sur la pont

07.09.18
After a day that started and ended with a heavy thunderstorm and on which we gathered goodies to take home with us: Carmargue rice, chestnut honey and wine, we drove to Avignon and wandered this historic town with its papal palace and 12th century broken bridge. The shepherd who laid the first stone of the bridge under instruction from God, has a tomb here where miracles occur.

More huge hotel boats on the Rhone but nowhere-to-be-seen moorings for smaller craft as we will be. We are hoping we are wrong and that we will be able to visit this town and Arles again from our boat, we shall see.

We found a quiet square further into town than the touristy area, through narrow streets of expensive shops. We had lunch of champignon risotto and creme brûlée with tonka  bean cream and fruit sorbets , yum.

Sur le Pont d'Avignon
L'on y danse, l'on y danse
Sur le Pont d'Avignon
L'on y danse tout en rond

Back for a swim and wine and our hostess appeared to say goodbye as she thought we were leaving tomorrow! A bit of panic thinking that she had new guests arriving, but she hasn't and in fact on checking our booking we are booked until Sunday, phew! Off to Sommiere market again tomorrow - more goodies to take home with us!

Course de Tau

05.09.18
Back to Saintes Maries de la Mer for 3.30 start of the bull run. We bought our tickets,  a mere 2 euros, and headed into the arena. Concrete step seats in the glaring sun with no shade anywhere were not comfortable but luckily it was not crowded and everyone filtered in gently. The tannoy shouted - we couldn't understand what intermittently with some brass band sort of music and eventually the 10 Raseteurs ( the trained runners) made their appearance. Each one had his name announced and raised his arm to acknowledge and then they casually jumped the barrier with no effort at all ready for the start of the show.
At a long horn blast the gate was opened for the first bull to enter the ring ..... and nothing appeared! Then after a minute or two a bewildered bull ran out, stopped and gazed around. At this point the Raseteurs  jumped in to join it, goading and running at him to try to snatch the rosette and tassels from his head. These young men  are so agile that you tend to overlook the danger of this, the bull becomes more agitated and paws the ground, twisting and turning to try to butt the protagonists. When he actually butts the wooden barrier in frustration you realise how powerful those horns are. It is thrilling to watch these athletes duck and dive from their handsome predator, confounding the bull by changing direction after grabbing for his head and running like crazy to leap the barrier  and hang from the railings like a monkey before swinging back in for the next try. There appeared to be 2 teams of 4 plus a chief 'goader' for each team. They have a metal 'claw' (crochets) fitted to their fists to enable them to hook the rosette and/or the tassels. When they manage it, they raise it triumphantly to applause from the crowd.
Each bull is only in the ring for 15minutes, sometimes they do not voluntarily leave when the gate re-opens, you can understand their confusion! To get them out another bull with a bell appears - clearly his 'leader' which he meekly follows offstage to loud applause. Some of them jumped the barrier themselves and one tried very hard to get back through the gate, standing on hind legs and virtually nose to nose with spectators.

Exciting stuff and 2 euros very well spent. At the end the gaurdiens race through the town on their white horses - another exciting spectacle, but unfortunately we were at the back of the crowd for this.

We went on to have a great meal of guardien beouf! The local dish of course.

Arles and the Carmargue

03.09.18

On the day my son starts his new job in the city, we take a trip to Arles and Saintes Maries de la Mer.

The Rhone at Arles is vast and empty, one solitary fisherman on a boat and 2 enormous moored trip boats, one like we had seen in Tournon. There appear to be no small craft moorings here and the concrete banks are high and steep.

Walking into this once again faded beautiful city, I am very aware of Van Gogh's sad life here. The yellow house where he lived with Gaughin no longer exists, but the cafe he painted in Place de Forum is still here although the pretty cobblestones are gone and it is surrounded by other cafes. It is painted yellow with yellow sunshades which cleverly evokes his painted night-time glow.

We wandered around and took in the amphitheatre and another Roman semi circular theatre - they clearly liked their entertainments! But it is the city atmosphere that captured our senses. More narrow side alleys, quiet, hot and sleepy away from the busier periphery roads. We ate our lunch in the park across from some young teenagers who were doing the same, but more noisily. Pete noted their care in rescuing their food bags which blew away at one point. They sensibly threw everything in bins at the end of their lunch. It's a shame to even be mentioning it I guess, but you rarely see the same respect in Britain.

We drove down through the Camargue and saw our first pink mingos 😀 as our grandson would call them. Lots of ranches with white horses for hire and other wild white horses to be seen on this flat marshy landscape. Saint Maries del a Mer is the capital of the Carmargue on the coast with several small beaches formed into man-made coves flanked by rocks which makes the sea invitingly still. Whilst having a drink at a bar across from the bull arena we read that there will be a 'course de toureau ' in 2 days time. Pete asked the barman if we needed tickets and understood that the system of pay is to put money in a hat! We intend to go and watch this local sport. In all the years I have come here I have never seen one.

We were more careful where we chose to eat and had the most delicious guardien boeuf - a local dish we had not found on menus until now.

Back to the gite, driving across the Carmargue in the dark with windows open  and cicadas whistling outside.

Market day

1.09.18
Off to Sommiere Saturday market at the crack of 10am, oops, when we meant to get up early specifically. We did manage to get a parking place though, just.

This gorgeous old town of little alleyways,  lacy rusting iron balconies and fading wooden shutters is bustling on a Saturday morning with a popular market. Bric a brac, clothes, jewellery and food stalls full of interesting stuff under bunting-strung streets. Of course we over indulged ourselves buying wonderful produce : cheeses of varying strength, salami style sausage (poivre and tomato), crusty pain de campagne, green beans, huge peaches, rosy pears, eggs laid yesterday. What a feast for later! Except we succumbed to lunch beside the river: smoked herring and potato salad, chicken drumsticks with pasta and cheese sauce followed by proper French apple tart. Oh dear, full up again!

The atmosphere was buzzing, a saxophonist busker playing a lazy mellow jazz completed the picture. And by 2 it was all being packed away and the streets swept and tidied, the town going back to it's sleepier self apart from the tractors hacking through with their trailers overflowing with grapes! They were courteous enough to stop at the crossing from restaurant to river front for our waitresses to convey their food; cauldrons of moules and plates of fish. Love it. We might have to come back next Saturday our last day, to stock up for home.

Back to the gite and a swim to try and work off some of that lunch! Great day.

Water jousting

31.08.18
40 minutes drive and we got to Sete, on the coast, but an island amongst canals and the link to the Canal du Midi through the Etang du Tau, another trip we will be doing one day. We identified the Port du Plaisance where we could moor but saw no boats our size - they all seemed enormous!

The inner canals have extremely low bridges, so only small motorboats are moored and travel along them. However, the water jousting festival was underway - a surprise to us and we enjoyed the entertainment of this daft sport, that apparently dates back to 1177.  We watched the very young contestants determinedly lancing their rivals and the triumph when they managed to unbalance them into the water. Some that just stumbled and collapsed in their position on the 'ladder' at the back of the boat were extremely upset. The ones that went in just accepting, either being dragged into the support boats or casually swimming to the pontoon to get out and dry off. Good fun, the players in suitable white trousers and striped blue and white tops and the boats very jolly.

We walked all around the water: the Lateral Canal which leads out to the Etang du Tau. Once again it was baking hot and we were glad to finally relax in a restaurant, although we made the mistake of choosing one on a busy canalside street of many, all fish restaurants and the food was not great, sea bass aside. We will know next time to go further into the centre Ville.

Street parking  has to be paid for but we were pleasantly surprised to see that it is free between 12 and  2 - very civilised for people to have their lunch.

Aigues Mortes and Grau du Roi

29.08.18
Off to revisit other places I have enjoyed before. The Carmargue with  its wild horses, bulls and flamingoes is a place apart - it has a different feel to other parts of France and is unspoiled.

Aigues Mortes, the walled ancient city is a tourist attraction but still fascinating. It's narrow streets largely pedestrian only, are flanked with pretty houses, shops, bars and restaurants. It's centre square heaving with restaurants all al fresco under large sunshades. Plenty of eating choices here and lots of Carmargue beef (toureau) or 'gardien' beef. I couldn't help but have a memory of my Dad here not long before he died when the 3 of us came for a holiday, choosing to let my Mum and I wander the shops whilst he rested in a restaurant and had a crepe for his lunch before we took a boat trip and watched the majestic gardien on their horses rounding up the bulls. My parents had been coming here for years and it was them who introduced me to the area in my teens.

We went outside the walls to explore the waterways : the Rhone and Sete canal where plenty of pleasure boats were moored along with the trip boats. Another must of a stop identified for our future travels by boat. All along the coast from here are the salt flats where the water is pink (from the sea creatures I think). Sometimes flamingoes can be seen wading but we didn't see any this time. Carmargue salt is thought to be the best and very pure. Being true tourists, we bought some of course.

We went on to the beach at Grau du Roi - not a touristy place with little to remark about it and still as I remember it - a fishing port with  huge boats coming and going. A swim here in the Med - although it took a long walk out for it to become deep enough.

Pont du Gard - what have the Romans ever done for us?

28.08.18
Another amazing feat of Roman building is Pont du Gard aqueduct which was built to carry water from the source of the Uzes river to  Nimes.
Another blazingly hot day and I welcomed a swim in the cool river. I came here in my 20s and then you didn't have to pay to get on to the bridge - now it is one large museum. There were a lot of people enjoying the amenities as well as viewing the bridge and learning about it. Some daring young people were tombstoning from rocks into deeper parts of the flow, many were kayaking and plenty swimming from the little bays all along the banks. It is a magnificent sight and the river is clean and inviting.

Nimes

27.08.18
After a day getting used to our new home and getting in the food we wanted, we visited Nimes and it's fantastic amphitheatre. My knees and Pete's non head for heights prevented us from climbing to the very top to look out over this old city but we got close and got a feel for the amazing feat of construction managed by the Romans in 5AD! Everyone on any terrace would have had a perfect view of the brutal fights that went on in it's vast oval arena. I learned that arena means sand in Latin the name merely refers to the ground covering and not as I had always thought to a circular or similar shape. The Romans were truly a blood thirsty lot and the spectacles of gladiator fights, bear and lion confrontations became more and more viscous until the Christian community and some more humane members of the higher classes called a slow down to it all. The theatre was taken over as a fortress during wartime and now seems to be used as a music venue.

It was blisteringly hot to be walking a city, so we found a restaurant in a square where we had lunch. Pete had his first taste of Carmargue beef - it got the thumbs up. Me, paella, which was a mistake.

Nimes is a busy bustling  city with ancient Roman architecture and beautifully dressed ladies.