I had been careful not to unpack much since we were heading out of here on Sunday morning. The night had been long but restful, and I felt cautiously better. I dressed, took daytime meds, and went to breakfast.
Au revoir, Carcassonne!
The serving area of the Carcassonne Hotel Mercure was a large, pleasant affair beyond the front desk. Our group was arriving a few at a time as I put my cereal and full plate together and headed for the room set up for us at the back of the regular seating.
After breakfast and a brief time in the room, I walked my bags to the reception area and sat waiting for Louis to summon us.
Soon we moved our luggage across the parking lot, and with the help of Louis and Nicolas, we loaded our largest suitcases and carry-ons in the luggage compartment of the bus.
We headed out into the hills around the town of Carcasonne, through the surrounding mountains, and toward the Mediterranean coast highway and northeast to Uzès.
I sat in my usual place two seats behind the back side entrance on the right side of the bus. I tried to rest, but at usual, I could not take my eyes off the French countryside. Soon, as I was looking out over to my right, I caught sight of big, blue water beyond the hills in the far distance. It was the Mediterranean Sea! As close as it was to Ben and me in Rome in 2012, we had not had time to go to Ostia, so now here was my first sighting of it. I alerted everyone around me as we continued to see it off and on. Then as we moved northeast, we saw the Med no more.
Something I will state now is that I am a survivor of prostate cancer. I was diagnosed with it in 2008 and had a prostatectomy that same year. Subsequent tests have shown me free of cancer. Nevertheless, some aftereffects remain, and one is that I have to go to the restroom more often than the average sixty-eight-year-old.
So those stops along the way were important. On this particular jaunt, Geraldine and I were talking across the aisle, and she mentioned that she really needed to go. Louis was up and moving around, so I went over to him and whispered what she said. Soon, he motioned for her to come to the steps of the exit, and he opened the onboard facility and showed her how to use it. When she came out in a little while, I went in next.
We would continue to do our stops, but this petite toilette was available to us in case of emergencies. No one abused the privilege, but if we needed it, we continued to use it for the rest of the tour. This was something Globus had not allowed us to do on an earlier tour in 2012. Again, I was very grateful to Louis and to Roadscholar for this much-needed option!
The original plan for this day was to visit the Pont du Gard first and then go to Uzès for lunch, but timing considerations reversed the order of things, and we were headed to the village for lunch first.
Uzès turned out to be a very beautiful little medieval town where French tourists and residents were much in evidence on this pleasant Sunday morning.
We emerged from the bus in Uzès.
I immediately admired the oleanders!
What a beautiful, awesome surprise this place was!
Nicolas parked the bus, and Louis made sure that we all moved around it quickly and onto the sidewalk well out of the traffic. Moving cars did pose a risk. Apparently in France, if one is in the street away from a designated crosswalk, pedestrians can be run over with impunity. In fact, in that case, the injured party might have to pay for damages to the car; I kid you not.
With this lovely thought in mind, we worked our way carefully up the hill to a stunningly beautiful church and bell tower which we would be able to view only from the outside today because of Sunday services going on inside.
Cathédrale Saint-Théodorit-d'Uzès (constructed in the 1600's)
As we approached the building, once a cathedral but now a parish church, I stepped up out of the narrow street onto the sidewalk, and an older couple behind shoved me forward, because they were still in the street and needed to move out of approaching cars. I suppose I wasn't moving fast enough for them, but considering my illness of the night before, I was doing well to be walking at all.
We made it up from the street.
Anyway, we managed to move out of harm's way while still remaining standing. Here we met our new guide named Isabella. She was an energetic, well informed woman who would be with us for the next few days. She was a breath of fresh air compared to the docent in Carcassonne.
City Hall
We made our way back past the city hall, through the streets by a really amazing high building with an ornately tiled roof. We went up one street where a market was set up for books and art work, and then finally we reached a really large, pretty town square.
We approach the entrance to the Duke's Castle.
Ornate tile roof
An organ grinder!
Here on the town square was an even larger market area set up with booths of art, crafts, ceramics, etc., with restaurants in the surrounding buildings. This was a major day of selling, and it was teaming with people. Even so, this was such a large area that it was not crowded, and since we had some time to kill before going to the Fille des Vignes for lunch, most of us circulated through the booths and tents gazing upon an incredible variety of art for sale.
We reach the town square in Uzès.
Sunday art market in Uzès
Personally, I was fascinated by the organ grinder to one side of the square. He did not have a monkey, and most people just walked past him as he played and sang in his corner, but one young couple with a little girl and boy went up to him and visited for a while.
I shot a picture of this scene, because this couple exemplified the type of young French family that I had noticed several times already and would continue to see periodically throughout my time here. The appeared to be healthy, physically fit, moderately tall, and affluent. French children came off as beautiful, well-behaved, and pleasant to be around. The kids loved the balloon animals the organ grinder made for them.
French family and organ grinder
After a time of resting, taking pictures, and walking through the displays, we all entered a restaurant there on the square called La Fille des Vignes (Daughter of the Vines). Lunch usually came as a pleasant, delicious interlude between an active morning of sightseeing and an even more active afternoon--usually in a warmer, sunnier atmosphere than morning allowed. La Fille des
Vignes was just one more example of this.
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Lunch at La Fille des Vignes in Uzès, France
After a fine lunch and wonderful time in lovely, unexpected Uzès, we boarded the bus and drove a circuitous, rural route to the large, very impressive national park surrounding the Pont du Gard. We parked the bus and were led by our docent to an entrance/tourist center where we gathered in front of a large billboard-type map. Our guide explained where we would be going and stated that we would be seeing the largest intact Roman aqueduct/bridge anywhere and that it was built 2,000 years ago.
Isabella explains the layout of the park.
Visitors' Center at the Pont du Gard
It had originally been built to allow traffic across the valley of the Gardon River and to supply water for nearby Nîmes. We would soon see that pedestrians were still using it, and she stated that the water had continued to flow for several hundred years.
As we walked down the rocky trail to the beautiful Gardon River, we passed a large, gnarled old olive tree which the docent said had been transplanted to this location to replace an earlier version that had suffered frost damage.
Olive Tree
When we came in sight of the bridge, I was awed! It was huge! The Goths and the Vandals had missed this one. The afternoon was sunny and comfortable, so this north-south bridge was in shadow on its east side but in bright sunlight on the west. Then we crossed under it over to its west side. There the Pont showed very brightly in the full afternoon sun--in all its ancient Roman splendor!
I could hardly believe my eyes!
The Gardon River
'Neath the old olive tree
Look, Mom, no mortar.
Now we walk over to the west side of the bridge.
Gordon stares at the Gardon!
Am I living the dream or what?
French tourists were numerous on this beautiful afternoon. They seemed to love the place and were everywhere we went. That's a good thing; appreciating what you have and loving antiquity is what the world needs more of.
When we had seen and done our fill, we hiked back up the trail to the visitors' center for a senior stop before boarding the bus for Arles. We drove to Van Gogh's adopted city in the late afternoon and parked on a street called Rue Emile Fassin right in front of the Best Western Hotel Atrium.
Arles Best Western Hotel Atrium
The street had occasional cars going by the bus, and a bus-full of German cyclists was parked in front of us. Then a van pulled up behind, so Chris and I gingerly made our way to the back of the van and over to the safety(?) of the sidewalk. This walking behind a vehicle was apparently a European no-no.
A guy in the van glared at us out the window, heard our English, and asked, "Are you Americans?" When we said, "Yes," he loudly exclaimed, "Only Americans would be stupid enough to walk behind a moving van!" Then he backed up some more and drove off before I had a real opportunity to give him a piece of my tired, angry American mind.
Jack calmed me down and said, "Remember, Gordon, we're in his country." That did not calm me much, but this did turn out to be the only incident of its kind on the entire trip. The priest from Caen who had wished us well would not be happy with this guy. Obviously, we should not have walked behind the vehicle for our own safety's sake.
We were tired from another wondrous day of adventure and in unfamiliar territory. Soon we had our bags inside the lobby, and Louis gave us our room keys and told us when to return to the lobby for our walk to a restaurant.
I found my room easily and started to unpack. It faced the front street where we had parked and looked over the rooftops of the buildings across the street from the hotel. After a much-needed hour of clean-up and down time, I descended on the elevator and explored the large, clean, well-appointed lobby.
Louis met us and led everyone out the front and across the street. We walked north up a long flight of steep stone stairs to a level, tree-filled square with a big, beautiful carousel. It was lighted already, and children were riding it.
Le Boulevard des Lices--Arles
Then we turned to the right (à droite) up an important street called le Boulevard des Lices. After a few blocks, we turned north again (à gauche) on Rue Jean-Jaurès and walked through old Roman streets to a nice restaurant facing a square. We settled in for a fine dinner before returning to the hotel for a much-needed rest.
What we had done today was simply unbelievable, and so was my recovery from the night before! Tomorrow, we would tour this lovely, ancient little city. With a population of 50,000, it seemed like a small, Roman Denton. After lunch beside a former Roman bath, we would drive to the home of bauxite, Les Baux, and also visit an olive oil factory.
