Another adventure filled day in Provence! The morning started off cool (high 40s) and calm, but warmed up as the day progressed (low 70s); sort of like Camelot. Thursday is market day in both Eygalieres and Loumarin. Eygalieres was our first stop mainly in an effort to find another spoon made with horn for Clay. Within the first block we found it!
The market starts at the top of a long hill and the small village is quite charming with stone buildings and lots of greenery. We meandered through the market and enjoyed the peaceful walk. Loumarin looks close on the map, but it took awhile to travel there. This village, while beautiful, is much more lively. The market is bigger and there are many more people. We bought into the vegetable coring man’s demonstration and purchased both a vegetable corer and special scissors. We’ll use these to make slices of carrot stuffed potatoes for our dinner (in New Orleans) which will include brandade with our pretty vegetable concoctions.
We lunched at L’Orneau after Allan and Clay shared a dozen fresh, salty oysters at the market. One of the highlights of Loumarin is the 15th and 16th century castle. We moseyed though the village back to our car and drove up to the castle.
About 6 rooms in the renaissance part of the castle have been restore and we were able to explore them. The fireplace above was built in the 1500’s and used motifs reminiscent of the 1492 discovery of America. The harpsichord is in the music room which also is warmed by a huge fireplace. The interior was quite cool, well insulated by the limestone walls and I would surmise that the big fireplaces do a pretty good job of warming the huge place.
The fierce dog gargoyles functioned as drains for the gutters as well as protectors of the castle. And we learned that in medieval times, spiral staircases are usually built clockwise so that enemies coming up have a hard time swinging their swords whereas defenders coming down have plenty of room. This part of the staircase did not adhere to the general rule, probably because it is so wide.
Part of the adventure in the next leg of our journey was getting there. Clay drove up and over the Luberon mountains, along tiny winding roads and switchbacks that were quite difficult to maneuver. We hoped at every turn that no vehicle would be coming our way. We rode through Bonnieux and other small towns on the way to Oppede le Vieux. This lovely, quiet village was all but destroyed several times, but more recently people are beginning to return, renovate and repopulate the area just outside of the old walled city. The rest of the adventure involved getting from the parking lot halfway up the mountain to the village that was perched on a rocky outcrop about an hour’s hike up. The path was beautifully maintained with wildflowers all of the way up–it was wonderful to be out in the open air and the bees enjoyed the sweet smells of the flowers as much as we did. The view of Mt. Ventoux and the Luberon Valley from the path was breathtaking.
The church and an old castle are at the top of the climb. The ruler lived in the castle and the people in the walled city below. The castle is still in ruins having last been all but destroyed in an earthquake in the 1700s. The church as been restored as have the paths, but everything else in the walled city is as it was left years ago.
Clay found a walking stick to help with the hike down the mountain and we piled in the car and headed back to St. Remy. 
Clay and Connie cooked duck confit, baked sweet potatoes, fresh asparagus and salad and after hors d’ oeuvres and wine on our patio in the beautiful evening air with frogs to serenade us, we ate the gourmet meal and retired.
Nancy
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