Once again, only a brief interlude between posts. It’s like magic! If you haven’t yet, please read France Part 4 about Lyon and France Part 5 about the Musee d’Archaeologie in Apt and Jean-Pierre’s mosaic studio.
Well, the weekend started out with a bang. Thursday night, almost everyone went to the Cafe de Sade, and it was probably the drunkest night of the quarter. I know it was the most I’ve had to drink all quarter by far. Other than that, it was pretty much like every other drinking night in Lacoste though. I chatted up some of the locals, even though they’re a little creepy. It helped me work on my French.
The next morning, I got up bright and early looking forward to a trip to the Pont du Gard and Arles that I had signed up for the previous night. Unfortunately, my name was far enough down the list that I got relegated to the second van, which only ended up going to Avignon. I was disappointed, but Miles (who also got shafted into this van) and I made the best of it. After a short 30-minute drive from Lacoste, we arrived at the ramparts of Avignon, which are incredibly well-preserved and very cool looking. We parked at E’LeClerc and the group split up from there. Miles, Ashley, and I went into E’LeClerc (the Wal Mart of France, in case you forgot) so Miles could buy some new shoelaces.
Once Miles had his laces, we walked from E’LeClerc through the ramparts and into town. It was early enough that stores were just starting to open for the day, so we made our first trip to the art store, where Ashley bought some supplies. Along the way, I quickly noticed the large number of homeless people in the city. There were probably more per capita here than in Barcelona or Marseille. We then proceeded toward the historic district, and took note of a Vietnamese restaurant we passed along the way, thinking to return there for lunch. By the time we reached the main drag through historic Avignon, I really had to go to the restroom. We went to the office of tourism and asked if they had a bathroom (grabbing some brochures for our Treasures of Provence journals along the way). They directed us to a public toilet in the garden behind the office.
The garden, though pretty from afar, was rather disjointed and strange up close. We took some photos anyway, and I found the public toilet. I immediately wished I hadn’t. There was merde everywhere and the toilet was full of garbage. Needless to say, I did not go to the bathroom here. Finally I gave in and snuck into a hotel to use their bathroom. With that problem solved, we were able to move on and start scoping out the city’s historic sites. As we walked down the street, we were quickly distracted by the many shopping opportunities, including Zara and H&M. I made some very good purchases and H&M (a new hoodie and and a 2 euro shirt) and also ended up with two comic books from a newstand.
Finally, we made our way to Avignon’s chief site, the Papal Palace. We were prepared to go inside, but the fee was rather steep, so we made due with photographing the outside of the building and other interesting buildings in the area. We also were able to go up behind the palace, where we could see a magnificent view of Avignon and its surroundings. It was mercifully sunny, but very windy, to the point where I could hardly hold my camera still when taking pictures. After viewing the scenery, we found a strange little park built around a Gallo-Roman grotto-like structure. As with many of the other Roman ruins in France, we were able to just climb all over this ancient building.
After taking quite a few photos, we found our way back to the main street and started moving toward lunch. But first, we had to go into FNAC (the French FYE, only not a rip off) and back to H&M so that I could get one more shirt that Miles forgot to tell me about when we first went in. We were going to stop in one of the small shoe boutiques for Ashley, but the one she had in mind was closed for lunch, so we went back to the Vietnamese place and had a delicious and inexpensive meal. I was so happy to not have bland food! Following lunch, we only had about an hour left. Miles had wanted to visit a certain art museum, but we were out of time, so we settled for the museum’s gift shop and lobby displays. We made it back to the car with about 20 minutes to spare, so we went back into E’LeClerc and got some school supplies for much cheaper than
we would have at the school boutique. All in all, it was a very leisurely and enjoyable trip.
Saturday, in addition to being Valentine’s Day, was Miles’ birthday, and we decided we would go to Bonnieux that evening with a group of about 9 people to get a nice dinner and some drinks. Bonnieux is a town of about 2,000 people (seems huge compared to Lacoste), and it’s ‘walking distance’ across the valley. I put that in quotes because, while the distance isn’t that great, the wind, the cold, the hills, and the dark all combine to make it seem unbearable. We decided to brave it and left Lacoste at about 6:30 pm. When we arrived in Bonnieux sometime close to 8pm, almost every open restaurant told us they couldn’t seat our party. We were on the verge of despair, thinking that not only would we not be able to celebrate Miles’ birthday in Bonnieux, but we would all go to bed hungry, until McArthur discovered an open pizza restaurant. We had to sit in the bar for awhile, but we finally got a table and some delicious pizzas. Pizzas in France all seem to be served personal size, but they’re very crispy and come with pretty exotic and interesting ingredients. The highlight, in my opinion, however was the hot pepper they gave us to put on the pizza. Two flavorful meals in as many days made me very happy. After we ate and had some drinks (some more than others), we started walking home sometime between 11:30 and midnight. The walk home was cold, but the stars were absolutely beautiful. It reminded me of our trip to Wyoming when I was little…like really being able to look into space. We even saw some shooting stars. Nevertheless when I finally made it back to Lacoste (Miles and I got about 20 minutes ahead of everyone else), I was pretty excited to get into my PJs and jump into my warm(ish) bed.
Sunday, I once again got up bright and early to go on another trip I signed up for. This one went to Ile-sur-la-Sorgue and Saint-Remy-en-Provence/Glanum. Thankfully, I got to go to the destinations I planned for this time. Miles had elected not to go on this trip, but Jamie did (mostly to see Glanum). Our first stop was at Ile-sur-la-Sorgue, which is famed for its antique market. It is a town on an island in the middle of the Sorgue river, which is fed by a cave spring, meaning the water is always a beautiful blue. Due to the rains we’ve been having, the waters were high and wild, which made for an interesting aesthetic. This particular day, however, was quite pleasant. It wasn’t raining, snowing, or windy.
We went through the first section of the market rather quickly, mostly in search of so
mething to drink. After picking up some sodas at a gas station, we looked more closely at the wares being sold. There was a lot of junk and a lot of food, but once in awhile we saw something interesting. It wasn’t until venturing further into the market that we realized some of the stores themselves were open, and that the market is HUGE. We spent about three hours just looking around with a brief stop for some delicious banana-chocolate crepes at a cute little creperie. I ended up buying a nice souvenir for my mom and an awesomely bad French 1980s comic book.
We left Il-sur-la-Sorgue at 12:30. Another group of students left earlier to go back to Lacoste since they did not plan to go to Saint-Remy and Glanum, so it was just me, Jamie, Jamie White, Claudia, Norma, and Daves. It was pretty nice having such a small group, since not very much coordination or strict planning was required. We got to Saint-Remy at about 1pm and were hungry for lunch by the time we arrived. Daves parked and left us to explore the charming medieval town for an hour and a half. Most things were closed since it was Sunday, so Jamie and I settled for sitting outside at a cafe. We had a very nice waiter who was very interested in and excited about America (especially Miami) and wanted to practice his English on us. Actually, he was the second person to tell us how much he loved America that day. The first was at the book store where I bought my comic book. He was also extremely interested in America and seemed to be particularly interested in New York, Miami, and the west coast. It was cool to me to have two regular French guys in two different towns completely shatter the “French people hate Americans” stereotype all in one day. We spent almost the entire time at the cafe, where Jamie had carbonarra and I had spaghetti bolognaise. Both meals were delicious, and the carbonarra was served in the traditional way with a raw egg poured right on top.
After lunch we headed up to the top of the hill behind Saint-Remy, where Glanum and the institution where Vincent Van Gogh was hospitalized and did many of his most famous works are located. We had the option to visit either site, but Jamie White, Jamie, Claudia, and I all chose to go to Glanum. Norma and Daves decided they didn’t want quite so much hiking, so they went to the Van Gogh exhibit.
Glanum is one of the best-preserved Roman sites in the world, and it was defin
itely one of the coolest places I have ever been. The site is huge, and visitors are able to simply climb all over everything (apart from a few things which are specifically blocked off). We took the opportunity to explore the entire site, and we were even able to look down into an underground area that is currently being excavated. We touched columns and sculptures, picked up a few pieces of rocks, hunted for treasure, and all in all enjoyed every minute of it. My favorite part was being able to see the complex and advanced drainage system, as well as the remnants of the baths. The cliffs and forests surrounding the town were also quite enjoyable. We spent at least two hours exploring Glanum before finally returning to the gift shop, purchasing a few souvenirs, and heading back to Lacoste.
Today, we had another class field trip. This one took us to Fontaine de Vaucluse, which is the source of the Sorgue river. Remember, the Sorgue? (It’s the river that Ile-sur-la-Sorgue is in the middle of). So, our trip was to the town where the spring that is the source of the Sorgue is located. We arrived at about 9:30am and the group split up after a short orientation from Daves. I walked around with Jamie and the painting professor, Craig Drennen. We went to the old (11th century?) Romaesque cathedral first. It was too dark to photograph, but interesting nonetheless. The cathedral also housed the 6th century sarcophagus of the bishop credited with slaying the dragon that supposedly inhabited the spring. The Gauls and Romans believed that a benevolent dragon lived at the spring and protected the town and granted
wishes. They threw gold coins into the ‘wishing well’ and were all in all very happy having a dragon. However, when Christianity came along, they needed to do away with such pagan beliefs, so they made dragons evil and made their heroes (e.g. Saint George) slay them in legend. Pre-Christianity, dragons were pretty popular in France, so nowadays, you see a lot of sculpture and architecture in the name of old Saint George.
After the cathedral, we wanted to visit the Petrarch museum. His house is located in the town and we were all three excited to see it. Unfortunately, the museum was closed, but we did get to walk along the Sorgue, which was particularly wild in this area and even more blue than at Ile-sur-la-Sorgue. In fact, behind the Petrarch museum, there was a whitewater kayaking course. Following a bit of confusion, we found our way up to the spring itself, where there were all sorts of rocks and cliffs to climb on. Near the spring, the river was at its very roughest, but the spring itself was as calm as can be, and impossibly deep. The cliffs all around were dotted with caves, and the scenery was to die for.
We walked back down into town, with a stop at the tourism office for some brochures, and realized we had a bit of time left, so Jamie, Craig, and I stopped in a cafe for a quick snack. It was the perfect end to my favorite Treasures of Provence field trip thus far.
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