we had a nice påske ferie/easter break last week in the south of France -- starting in Provence 'round Avignon and St. Remy de Provence, then Antibes on the Cote d'Azur with my cousin (thanks Ken!) and a day in St. Laurent du Var before flying out of Nice (a 2 hr, 15 min flight from CPH).
The Road to Ruins: St. Remy de Provence / Glanum and Les Baux de Provence
First stop was Provence: St. Remy de Province/Villa Glanum Hotel near the Roman ruins which we really wanted to see. It should have taken us a bit over 2 hours to get there via our trusty little rental car Jacques les Bleu...
but due to, erm, a couple of navigation errors it was closer to 3 hours.
The hotel we stayed in was nice and very close to the Roman ruins at Glanum (though a tad over-priced... I won't book through accommodationz.com again... too many hidden costs).
Van Gogh painted a picture of our hotel and the surrounding olive groves during his final year spent at the Sanitorium (just across the street) which is now a museum dedicated to him.
St. Remy itself is about a kilometer away down the rather busy D road. It is a nice, provincial French town with loads of restaurants. Apparently Nostradamus was born there, Gounod lived there, and so did Princess Caroline of Monaco for a while (the Grimaldis used to own the place). We had a couple of decent meals there (the hotel restaurant was actually pretty good so we used that as well).
But the real highlight is the Roman ruins at Glanum just up the road. We'd never seen such large-scale Roman ruins before, aside from Bath in England, but this was a full Roman settlment, still being excavated and restored (since 1921)
it was very exciting to explore the ruins which included temples, residences, public baths and a still-running spring which was the reason the original Celts founded a settlement at the site in the first place (Glanus was a celtic goddess . Here, you can see the 'temple of Hercules' the Romans built around the spring, with the inscription to Agrippa, Augustus' son-in-law, on the stones
We spent hours clambering around the site, Malcolm searching for 'Roman soldier bones' and Susan and I just taking it all in. There are some good views over the valley towards St. Remy from the adjacent hilltop
There are also great hiking trails going way back into the Apilles around the site; Lots of unfamiliar evergreen trees and the lovely smell of wild thyme and herbs everywhere...
You can see all of our Glanum photos here
Les Baux de Provence
Just up the road into the Apilles is the ancient hill town and castle of Les Baux (from baou or 'rocky spur' in Provencal, apparently). There were quite a few tourists the day we visited, and the place was chockablok with shops selling all things reminiscent of the medieval and Provencal, but it is still a beautiful and dramatic setting and well worth the visit. There's a great view of the Alpinnes and the surrounding valley from the castle.
Malcolm was especially intriguied by the functional trebuchet (which they demonstrate once per day)
and the scenes of battle (note the prized toy crossbow he's clutching)
so we had to put him in the stocks for a while to calm him down
You can see all of our Le Baux photos here.
Sur Le Pont d'Avignon: Avignon and Pont du Gard
Next it was a short drive to visit Avignon and the famous Roman aqueduct at Pont du Gard. Avignon (and the famous bridge astride the Rhone river) is a lovely city and former papal seat during turbulent times in Rome
(Unfortunately the automatic machine that makes DVDs with you signing the famous song karaoke-style was out of order when we arrived, otherwise would have done that :))
We checked out the bridge and palace and took in the lovely view before buying a picnic lunch and taking the short drive to the Pont du Gard.
The Pont du Gard (a Unesco World Heritage site) was quite breathtaking
It was built around 19 BC (took about 3 years and 800-1000 workers) with no mortar (only stones) and it was part of an aqueduct system that carried water 50 KM to what is now Nimes... with a grade drop of only 17 meters the entire length. Amazing, and still standing after more than 2000 years.
We had a nice picnic there... and Malcolm took an interest in fishing in the River Gardon, more on that later in the post.
You can see all of our Pont du Gard snaps here.
Cote d'Azur: Antibes and thereabouts
We then pushed on to Antibes and the Cote d'Azur, staying with my cousin Ken and his wife Sylvia who graciously put us up for a few days in their new vacation place
Antibes was a nice (and very wealthy) French town with lots of cafes and street scenes like these guys playing les boules
and this woman busking/signing Spanish songs
They also had a great outdoor market where you can find lovely provencal olives, cheeses, herbs, meats and fish.
The day we visitied, Malcolm had his makeshift fishing rod (a stick with a string and a rock on the end) with him and was fascinated by the fishmongers table, who saw him eyeing the fish with his rod. One of them then gestured that I give him Malcolm's rod, then took a fish off of the ice and put the fish on the end of Malcolm's line, much to his (and the onlookers') delight. It was very sweet... too bad I didn't have my camera at the ready.
In fact, just about everywhere we went, Malcolm scored something free from the person behind the counter such as fresh strawberries or a chocolate easter egg. As in Italy last year, we found that the French are generally very nice and accommodating to children nearly every where we went including restaurants.
Antibes is also notable in that it is one of the few sand beaches along the rocky French Riviera, which Malcolm loved.
We also had a walk in the nearby Parc de la Valmasque which was a nice break from the crowded coast
all of our Antibes snaps are here.
Cannes/ Isles des Lerins
On a friend's advice we took the passenger-only ferry from Cannes to Ste. Maurguerite/Isles des Lerins. Cannes itself had horrible traffic and wall-to-wall shops, so we didn't dwell.
The Isle de Sainte Marguerite, though, was lovely, with almost no inhabitants and no cars, beautiful umbrella pines and cyprus and the gorgeous azure sea and blue skies as backdrop
We had a pcnic at a stone table on the shore, and hiked the length of the island and back (6 Km in all). It was just great... the woods and dirt paths looked like the Mediterranean thousands of years ago. If the water was warmer (it was April, after all) we could have had our pick of a number of secluded coves and had a nice swim. A great day trip -- snaps are here.
St. Laurent du Var
The last night we stayed at a Holiday Inn in St. Laurent du Var (actually a good deal for the money w/internet rate and only 10 mins from NCE airport) and kicked around the beach there - no shortage of decent restaurants along the harbor and a nice sand beach for Malcolm to play for the partial day we had left before the flight
We found a restaurant along the beach with live music (OK it was some woman singing with her synthesizer) which Malcolm loved, so we fashioned a guitar out of paper for him and he 'performed' along with her up near the stage. It was great... he was dancing around and moving to the music and looking to her for visual cues as he 'performed'. I love it that he has no fear of these things :).
Conclusion
The south of France was a lovely little week-long getaway. But after a few days here I'd say the Cote d'Azur is really not our speed: It's over-built, there's waaay too many cars for their streets and parking, too much of the waterfront is privatized and what remains is very crowded. Plus it smells too much of money for my liking. It just seems so *anachronistic*.. the trips of these wealthy people with their yachts and dogs who think they're making the scene in Cannes or Nice... it's like Southern California with smaller roads and better food. The few parts that are not built-up or choking on cars are nice though.
The Cinque Terre in Italy is much more unspoiled, beautiful and less expensive, and Provence was more our speed. Still, it was interesting to visit.
