East to Gordes

It was just 20 miles east to our next destination, the free aire is 1½ miles short of the hilltop village and I think a few hundred feet below in altitude. Walking up to the village from the wooded aire, one is suddenly exposed to a stunning view of the village across a deep gorge. It is obvious that there has been no shortage of investment in the area with the roads and buildings being immaculate. It’s the sort of place where people with money buy property or holiday, we just park our ‘home’ in a dusty car park and enjoy the surroundings.

The bikes haven’t turned a wheel since Spain, so this afternoon was an ideal time to fire one up and head to the next hilltop village. The battery wasn’t fully charged, but there was still enough power to rack up 16 miles on turbo with juice to spare.

The village of Roussillon is red, all the houses are red and it’s built atop a red rock. Situated in one of the biggest ochre deposits in the world, Roussillon is famous for its magnificent red cliffs and ochre quarries. Although it gets the, ‘One of France’s prettiest villages’ accreditation, for me it was on the tacky side of touristy. I must be turning into a Provence village snob, having been spoilt with L’Isle sur la Sorgue and Gordes, and with so many more to see!

The lavender fields don’t come into bloom until July but I was fortunate enough to see them in their infancy. So far Provence has been a delight!

It's 'early doors' for the lavender fields but nice to see.

Roussillon

Life in Provence

Les Baux, Avignon and L’Isle-sur-la-SorgueAvignon

Thursday saw us visiting the hilltop village of Les Baux, then Avignon for a few hours before we headed east to L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue. It was blowing a gale with no sign of the sun so sightseeing became a tad difficult, especially at Les Baux with it being perched on the top of a rocky outcrop, so unfortunately no photos there. We probably didn’t do Avignon justice but what we did see of the huge medieval city centre was très remarquable. Seventy miles driving and several miles walking told us it was now time to rest and what a lovely place we have chosen for that!

Thursday night was ‘le foot’ night with City v United on TV, unfortunately the staff who promised me during the afternoon, that it would be on, were not on late shift when we returned, and the evening staff couldn’t get it. Let’s just say something must have been lost in translation. Anyway, the bar had a very large selection of beers which we started to sample, not all of them obviously, 7€ a pint for 8% alcohol content saw to that! We hadn’t been there long when 3 English speakers walked in, Rob, his sister and their mum. They were from Los Angeles, Rob is teaching English as a foreign language in Madrid, something I queried in my usual subtle way “How can an American teach English”? Fortunately he saw the funny side. His sister was on her way back from serving as a U.S. soldier in Afghanistan (respect), so bizarrely they all arranged to meet in Provence! As she has done triathlons and Rob ran the Madrid marathon last week you can imagine there was plenty to talk and drink about!

L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue

The source of the Sorgue river is about 5 miles to the east in Fountaine-de-Vaucluse, and when the river reaches L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue it parts naturally before rejoining on the western side of the town. The island this created became a fishing village, and many of the streets are still named after fish. The river also encouraged the growth of a spinning and weaving industry and during the peak there were as many as 66 water wheels harnessing the natural power. Just 15 water wheels remain and we did the recognised walk taking them all in.

The main industry now, other than tourism, seems to be art and antique galleries and shops of which there are over 300 in the town! We have thoroughly enjoyed seeing what people have produced with such innovative ideas. 

Avignon

L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue

We were taken with 'wellie dogs'!

One of These Days....

One of these days we will stop more than one night in the same place, not even the beautiful town of Uzès and the fact that the free aire was at a vineyard could keep us there. What a transformation from our time in Andalucía, where we spent several days in several places.

We knew this part of the trip would be different and at some point we will slow down, but at least we are doing sensible mileages now, only 12 today south to Remoulins on the Gardon river. The reason for coming here was to visit Pont du Gard, a Roman aqueduct built about 2,000 years ago and still remarkably well preserved, much like us really. Apparently it is the most visited historical monument in France.

Rachel and I aren’t big into museums and the like, but we do enjoy scenery and impressive structures such as this. The lady, for want of a better expression, in the tourist info centre in Uzès, said that there was no way of seeing the aqueduct without paying 8.50€ per person even if we biked or walked there. We thought this was odd, so after an early lunch at the aire in Remoulins we took the (not so) scenic walk route to the aqueduct which was 3½ miles. Saw the aqueduct and walked across it completely free of charge and took the more pleasant and shorter 2 mile walk back. And no, we hadn't jumped the turnstiles! A GR & PR route crosses the lower bridge therefore it has to be free to all cyclists & walkers. All in all a very good, if tiring, day.

Our aire at the vineyard

On the walk back to Remoulins

Sommières & Uzès

We may not have hit Provence just yet but we are definitely in a lovely part of France! After the disaster of Balaruc-les-Bains we have had 2 great towns, and not just because the aires there were free!

This aire is a France Passion one, businesses who allow vans to park on their land for free on the hope (presumably) that visitors might buy their produce. Well this is a vineyard so I don’t think they need to worry on that score with these particular guests!

Although the weather isn’t the wall to wall sunshine we had in Spain it has been reasonable until this evening, we are in for a night of heavy rain I think, but it’s due to pick up after that.

Here are some photos to give you a taste of what we’re experiencing, other than the wine.

Sommières

A van selfie en route to Uzès

Uzès

Adiós España

We said goodbye to Spain this morning after having 75 days here, but not before we visited (the closed) Dali museum. There was some seriously freaky stuff on the outside so goodness knows what was on the inside!

It was then 120 miles to a place just southwest of Montpellier. Balaruc-les-Bains is a small coastal town which we had reasonably high expectations of, after all it is on the Golfe du Lion which is home to some decent upmarket resorts. To say we were disappointed is an understatement. Never go there, it’s rubbish and if Rachel’s dad wasn’t reading this maybe I would use some different words. Whoever was the architect obviously had a holiday in a Butlins holiday camp and thought the buildings there were very avant-garde! Two, three and four floors high with flat roofs and aluminium patio doors straight out of when patio doors were invented! The most interesting thing we saw was a load of old geezers tossing their balls (photo attached) don’t get too excited.

Woohoo France, but think we'll give the snails a miss!

What a load of balls!

We returned to our van to find that we would probably be charged 8.50 euros for stopping the night in this dump. Now call me a miserable old skinflint but this was not going to happen, so we headed off 45 miles northeast to the beautiful little medieval town of Sommières, free aire, sun shining, perfect. The fact that we had to negotiate the Montpellier ring road during rush hour was a minor inconvenience to an experienced Wacky Races driver.

I can honestly say we both believe we have now ‘arrived’ on the 2^nd leg of our euro trip.

How much we love this sight even though the French
 have an uncanny knack of growing their trees in mirror wrecking locations!

Confused of Cumbria

We departed Girona about 11am and headed 30 miles northeast to the coast where we had arranged to meet Gill & Den Clarke.

Gill & Den lodged in our house during Christmas of 2015, but we were in Portugal and had never met them! Confused? You will be….

Gill & Den are Rob’s parents, Rob, Vicki and their family stayed in our house when their home was flooded during Carlisle’s Great Flood of December 2015.

As we had planned to head abroad in our camper that December (for a couple of months); we thought we would offer our house as a refuge until they could find somewhere more suitable, especially as Violet was only a month old! Gill & Den stayed there that Christmas. We thoroughly enjoyed seeing the photos of a large family having a great Christmas in our house whilst we were travelling through France, Spain and Portugal.  

Anyway, Gill & Den live in L’Escala which is 30 miles from Girona. Vicki & Rob are presently in America on holiday, but through the wonders of technology they knew where we were and told Gill & Den who said they would like to meet us. They treated us to a lovely authentic Catalan meal by their pool, and we had a great time chatting about pretty much everything.

But being the travelling types we are it was onwards and upwards towards France stopping for the night at Figueres, which I’m sure you'll know is the birth, and final resting place of Salvador Dalí. Gill & Den had told us to visit his museum which we planned to do tomorrow, wouldn’t you know it’s only closed 2 days this month and tomorrow is one of them!

L'Escala beach

nearby Montgo beach

Rachel tucking in to a lovely Catalan lunch!

The now infamous Gill & Den Clarke!

Whilst everybody else is posing for the camera
Bertie is about to snaffle some ham!

Girona

As we lay in bed this morning there was a strange sound coming from outside the van, it sounded like a hot air balloon, we opened the curtains to see……

  
When we left the aire we nipped down to the local Lidl where we saw a camper which looked like it had been modified from the film set of Raiders of The Lost Ark, yes that is a rocking horse on the roof, well the kids do need somewhere to play!

After Lidl it was 50 miles down to Girona.

Question: What have Girona and Wakefield got in common?

Answer: Absolutely nothing!

We expected Wakefield’s twin to maybe bare some kind of resemblance, but thankfully it doesn’t. What a beautiful city it is, Girona not Wakefield, as hopefully the photographs will show.

Tavertet and Vic

We headed 47 miles northeast to Tavertet, attracted there by the apparently amazing views. As far as strange villages are concerned this is right up there with Elterwater in the Lake District, it seems nobody actually lives there! The place is immaculate and very pretty, flowers, pristine stone houses, stone set streets, quaint church, but actually no people, no soul, no heart to the village. It seems that it has been almost purpose built for holiday makers, it reminded us of Duloc from Shrek, the only thing missing was the piped music. We’re sure it’s a mecca in summer and the walking and mountain biking in the area must be amazing.

The drive up was about 15 miles of hairpin bends which you know you have to come back down as there is no other way out of the place. Having walked around and taken in some lovely views we returned to civilisation at Vic and found an excellent aire for 5 euros. The historical centre is beautiful and tomorrow Rachel will treat me to a look around its very popular Saturday market, I can’t wait!

Vic

Some 'nugget'of a tourist spoiling the photo!