Month: April 2019

Today was the final day of our beautiful vacation.  Allan and I bought  last-minute souvenirs and a suitcase to fit them in, relaxed in the sunshine and had lunch with the Kearneys at Gus Restaurant; the Arthurs spent the morning at Les Baux visiting Carriere de Lumieres and the afternoon touring St. Remy; the Williams shared the day with their daughter, talking, shopping and smiling before shuttling her to the train in Avignon; and the Staggs and the Kearneys spent the day in St. Remy shopping and visiting galleries and museums.  All of us took naps and relaxed one more time and finally had a long dinner at Bournissac, a French Country hotel in the St. Remy Countryside.

It has been a thoroughly relaxing visit to the south of France and everyone heads home with a renewed spirit.  Au revoir St. Remy!

 

 

One of the prettiest places overall in Provence is the Luberon Valley.   Bonnieux can be seen in the distance from this place in the hilltop village of LaCoste. We hiked down from the ruined chateau at the top of the village where the Marquis de Sade lived in the 1700’s. During the French Revolution, the castle was vandalized and largely destroyed. Pierre Cardin owns the castle now and it is in the process of being renovated.  Another famous resident of the well-know village is the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD).  They offer a yearlong immersion program in the history and culture of Provence as their study abroad program.

We also visited the small market in Roussillon, another beautiful Luberon Valley village, famous for their red ochre.

The buildings in this town are made from the red ochre stone which is typical of the area.  The colors of the buildings reflect the stone from the area.

On our way back to St. Remy we stopped at Chateau Romanin, one of our favorite wineries.  We were treated with two gliders above us and ultimately watched them land. To begin fight these gliders are pulled by a small plane  until they reach an appropriate altitude then let go to ride the thermals.  It looked like a peaceful way to see the valley from the air, but none of us was willing to try.  For dinner Anna and Vera returned to cook us another gourmet meal.

So much still to see and only a few days left!

It was market day in St. Remy and a bright sunny day.  The village center was filled with vendors as well as shoppers and we did our share to make it a success.  The painter that I like, Franck, was there so I bought a watercolor painting of the entrance to the asylum where Van Gogh spent a year painting.  Franck will label the painting on his Facebook page as “in a private collection in New Orleans, LA.”

After all of our shopping, we had lunch at Aux Ateliers, a lively restaurant in Maussane.  We had a very good meal and shared some good wine.  After lunch, pétanque took center stage in the large yard of the restaurant.  The word pétanque means planted foot because unlike the Italian boule, the players must throw the balls with a foot planted in a circle.  The basics are easy to learn and the men had a fun game.

Allan is holding the yellow cochonnet since he won the competition.  It was another great day with dear friends in a beautiful part of the world.

Following lunch near the fountain in Aix de Provence, ten of us (Connie had a rest day) rode mountain bikes from the bike store in Aix, our of the city, along a bubbling stream and past Cezanne’s windmill and on up the mountain.

In a sparsely populated part of the ride we enjoyed children in brightly colored clothes playing soccer, small olive grove and lovely flowers and green trees and bushes.  Once reaching the base of the big mountain, we rode on an unused forest road.  It was dirt with big and small rocks but we were well-prepared by our thick-tired electric bikes.

These bikes are amazing–the gears are all on the right side and are just one number (1-9) and on the left side is a small box that shows your speed.  If you push + the bike increases your effort by about 10%, + again by 25%, + again by 35% and the final + by 50%. The final + is for the big hills of which there are many when climbing a mountain.  Four – returns the bike to normal unassisted operation.

Our reward was this beautiful view of Mount Saint Victoire–painted by Cezanne at least 60 times. We talked with our guide about the four different hiking routes, each increasing in difficulty; and about hang gliding from the top.  I was happy seeing the mountain from our vantage point on the forest road.

Connie prepared dinner for us while we rode–duck confit that had been purchased in the market from a man who cans it himself, red rice from the Camargue, that special cauliflower that looks like a combination of cauliflower, broccoli and asparagus, asparagus with bernaise sauce and assorted ice creams with meringue for dessert.  It was great for all of us hungry bikers!

What a great day!

Our drive from St. Remy to Les Baux today brought us to a different side of the village with a different view of Les Baux and the surrounding countryside.

We returned to Carriere de Lumieres and had a festive lunch in Les Baux at Cafe de la Musee afterwards.  The Van Gogh show was just as moving today as it was the last time we saw it. Every time we see it, I see new art that I never knew Van Gogh painted.  I’ve only seen a few of his portraits. After four days in London and three more in Lyon with old friends, John and Brooke joined our household.  Now we are eleven.  Tonight we had Anna and Vera cook dinner for us.  What a treat!  They were lovely and the typical French meal was delicious.

 

The wisteria we see as we leave each day has become more full and beautiful each day. Clay and Connie’s daughter Lynn became the 9th member of our household today.  They picked her up at the TGV station in Avignon just before noon.  Allan and I walked through St. Remy, this lovely French village.Julie and Jody washed and dried their dirty horseback riding clothes, rested and read.  We joined them in relaxing in the sunshine, reading and cloud-watching when we returned from our walk.  The clouds in Southern France are beautiful–the contrast between the blue, blue sky and the bright white clouds.

Each of us enjoyed the rest of the day in our own way and we spent the evening having wine and cheese and sharing life-stories.

Our planned excursion today was to the crau, a rocky plain southwest of St. Remy which was in ancient times where the Durance and Rhone Rivers joined.  For centuries it was an important ecosystem in the area because of its diverse landscape of short herbaceous vegetation and served as an important sheep grazing habitat. Recently, scientists have been active in researching how to restore the ecosystem since the area has been significantly changed through land-use practices of the military, industrial and agricultural owners.  We rode through the pine forest of the Parc Regional Naturel des Alpilles, past Les Baux and through Maussane before we saw the red “BARRE” sign and its associated yellow “DEVIATION” arrow.  We followed the single arrow but when we came to a fork in the road our GPS always managed to return us to the red “BARRE” sign.  This detour provided us a lovely ride along tiny chemins (paths) too small for more than one car to traverse.  We were in the hilly countryside near Paradou and saw some stony ruins on a hillside not far from a thriving estate, Mas de Barquet.

Thwarted by our inability to get past the “BARRE” sign, we decided to ride through Mouries and eventually ended up at Mas de Gorgonniere, one of those places we’ve been before for olive oil that was advertised to Clay as liquid gold.  We each bought some of the liquid gold and had a simple lunch in Mouries at Cafe de l’Avenir.

Two more couples joined us late this afternoon–Mike and Susu Kearney had spent the week before in Istanbul and Jody and Julie Stagg had just left their horses (for the week) in the Carmargue following a tour of Provence on horseback. The eight of us had a tasty dinner at home and heard tales about our friends’ adventures.

Early night since we have a full day tomorrow.

Allan and I walked through the alley behind our villa to a small path alongside a stream with blooming irises on the banks up Avenue Vincent Van Gogh to the Roman town of Glanum near the asylum where Van Gogh was treated for his mental illness. It was another gorgeous day so we walked through the olive groves and the edge of the pine forest along the Alpilles Ridge. We had a beautiful view from the ridge.The archeological excavation is fenced from the trail we walked so we retraced our steps and decided, once more, to visit the asylum.  Along the beautifully landscaped entry from the street, copies of Van Gogh’s paintings are placed where he might have stood to paint them.

 

 

This view from Van Gogh’s room changes through the seasons as the lavender blooms, the irises bloom and the fruit trees go from bare to blossoms to fruit.  We have only seen it at this time of the year, but I love the many different shades of green.

The asylum of St. Paul has always been a place of peace and healing.  Walking through and sitting in the grounds certainly left us feeling relaxed and we could imagine how Van Gogh was able to use his paints and the flora and fauna of the area to tame his demons.

Glanum was a fortified town built in the 6th century BC around a sacred spring, became a Roman city in 27 BC and was ultimately abandoned in 260 AD.  The archeological site shows it as a typical Roman city of the times with a forum, several temples, a market, an elaborate gymnasium and houses along the main street.

We were struck by the beautify of spring around the site–red bud trees interspersed with pine, cypress and the local nette tree.

We had a beautiful day and enjoyed our walks to/from this part of St. Remy.  Connie and Clay went shopping in town and enjoyed the cool weather in their own way.  After reading and relaxing the rest of the afternoon, we had an early dinner and went to bed. Thankfully, we did not hear the midwife frog last night.

For the last two nights, we’ve had an electronic sounding beep in our backyard.  All of us heard it as we tried to fall asleep–one of those annoying dings that skips a few seconds and dings again.  Last night before going to bed we explored the backyard and found that it stopped as it was approached so we knew it wasn’t electronic. We did not see it, but it is definitely a midwife toad.  You can hear its call in the youtube link.  The midwife toad got its name because the male toad carries a string of eggs on his back, protecting them with his highly poisonous warts.  These small nocturnal toads with big eyes are common throughout Europe.

Today was market day in St. Remy and all of us attended in the rain.  Unfortunately, not all of the vendors nor many of the shoppers braved the weather.  Clay got plenty of oysters and Allan bought some soap, but we weren’t there long.

Lunch today was at the house restaurant of a provencal hotel out in the St. Remy countryside.   The hotel feels very much like a French country home and prides itself on its guest rooms upstairs and comforts of the salon and outdoor patio.

La Maison Domaine de Bournissac is a Michelin starred culinary delight.  Our lunch was deemed a tribute to Italy, but the food was clearly prepared by a French chef.  Our first course was an aperitif of champagne and an amuse-bouche of a poached red pepper strip rolled around pesto sauce, a shrimp flash fried in panko bread crumbs, a fig stuffed with goat cheese and the tiniest tasty hamburger I’ve ever seen. Next we had artichoke risotto; the main course was chicken, prosciutto and asparagus roulade with yellow squash and dessert was a French style tiramisu.  The meal ended with a relaxing cup of espresso.

The hotel has an eclectic collection of rooster figurines throughout the downstairs.  This one is in the dining room.

This relaxing lunch was the perfect way to spend a very rainy day.  After returning home we read, napped and just relaxed until happy hour and Clay and Allan’s  oyster stew for dinner.

We took our time and left mid morning today heading southwest toward Fontvielle.  It is a typical small Provencal village–all of the buildings are plastered various light shades of ocher and the streets through town are tiny.  The site to see there was Alphonse Daudet’s windmill. He was a French author who famously wrote “Lettres de Mon Moulin” (Letters from my Windmill in English), a collection of short stories. The windmill was built in 1815 and continued to grind wheat until WWI when most of the men in the village were drafted and the wheat was requisitioned.

Next stop…Tarascon…We arrived in the center of town just as the market was closing so we walked through what was left but left hungry!  Lunch was at Bistro de la Place and after lunch we found Chateau de Tarascon.  Legend has it that the hybrid-dragon-like tarasque terrorized the area before Saint Martha “tamed it through a charm of hymns and prayers.” This is an artist’s interpretation of the monster.

On the banks of the Rhone River, Chateau de Tarascon is a fortress from the early 15th century and is considered one of the most beautiful medieval castles in Europe.

It is beautifully well preserved.  We toured the castle and enjoyed the restored rooms throughout the castle and the view from the rooftop terrace.Clay was swallowed by the fireplace in the banquet room (ignore the carpet, a modern addition).

Even the gargoyles are in remarkably good shape.  On another note, we were surprised to see that each of the bed chambers we toured had an indoor toilet that emptied into the Rhone River.  After climbing down the 8ish stories on a tiny stairway we browsed the gift shop and continued on our visit of close by small towns.  Our final village was Beaucaire and we simply drove through the tiny streets.

Our trip home was uneventful and we stopped at Maussane at a beautiful grocery store there for a few essentials.

Bon nuit!