Chateauneuf de Pape and Onwards

 

24th May


I have been struggling to migrate the blog over from windows live writer to blogger? The last two unfortunately, came out all over the place, and it took ages to edit into a readable fashion, lets hope this one is better.


The site is along side a forest, we took Max for a good walk this morning before heading into the village.













We are on the outskirts a 20min walk, and took a stroll in this afternoon, after spending most of the morning updating the maps on our Chinese satnav, we have been running around on 2013 maps, and installed March 2015 maps, lets hope it works, “It’s on borrowed time”
Another pretty village with character. The ruins of a medievil castle built in the 14th centaury for Pope John XXII, lies on the top of the hill overlooking the village. The commune is famous for the production of red wine and almost all the cultivable land is planted with grapevines.

What remains of the old castle, much of it was used to build houses in the village in the 17th century.

Tony Robinson and his time team have been here, hacking away with their trowels and brushes.

Plenty of establishments to sample the wines of the Rhone valley

 

The village was busy with many tourists, we sat outside in one of the many bars, and enjoyed a few drinks.

 

25th May

We found out it’s a bank holiday, so decided to stay on another day and just chill. Loungers out lying in the hot sun, I managed to get a few little jobs done and Sam took to the pool a few times while I looked after Max.

It has been really hot here the last few days, we are going to stay around the South for a little longer before making our way Northwards.

There are mostly Dutch here onsite, a heap more of them pulled in today, on what looked like an organised tour. A marshal with clipboard was taking names and organising them into bays, a  few Brit vans pulled in also, and parked on the far side, our paths have not yet crossed, unlike when we first got on the road, when I would seek them out to have someone to chat too, anyhow the Dutch speak better English than me, Kings English, no accent, ”you know what I mean”, they are very friendly. and hospitable.

This area of France is a nice, we’d like to stay longer. however tomorrow we will get back to roughing it on the Aires. tough life eh?

Something I noticed while walking into town yesterday, the fields are so rocky. Apparently sediment washed down from the Alps after the ice age?

This area of France and especially this campsite is a nice, we’d like to stay longer. however tomorrow we will get back to roughing it on the Aires. tough life eh? Well it actually it is, last night we sat outside, and got bitten alive by midges and mossies' 

The football season has come to an end, Chelsea were worthy winners, Swansea put out a reserve side in our last game, in what was a dead rubber, and got what they deserved. Our main players were sunning it on a beach somewhere, and those that played wished they were doing the same? All in all it's been a good season, no complaints, 8th isn't too shabby, Newcastle deserved to go down, and it's a shame West Ham didn't hold onto Allardyce, his attractive football will be missed?

Oh and no more Lawro to look out for, missing it already!

 

 

26th May

Today we set off for Chusclan, 17 miles away, an old town with character, it also has a co-operative winery like most towns and villages in Southern Europe. By the way we are back in Languedoc-Roussillon.

 

The Aire is free with a euro relais point, a nice setting opposite the co-operative and a few minutes into the town 44.14568 4.67735

 

 

Although the town itself is small, there are over 20 information signs in French and English doted around, telling the history of the buildings and the famous people who once lived there.

 

An interesting town, very quiet, there is room for 6 vans in allocated bays each with wooden tables, although there were 8 parked up at the end of the day, with two vans pulling in after dark.

27th May

Back into the Cote d’Azur, to the walled city of Avignon, home of the The Palais des Papes “Papal Palace” and the famous medieval bridge Pont d’Avignon both World Heritage sites. It took us awhile to find somewhere to park, all the Aires were expensive. You might as well have paid to stay on one of the many campsites, we only wanted to visit the place not buy it! We eventually found a spot by a park and ride over the bridge, we saw some vans parked on some waste ground, one of the drivers pointed to the end, I followed the road down to a roundabout and saw a No Entry sign, we took our chances and drove down it and parked behind all the other vans, and then walked across the bridge into the city.

The Palais des Papes is one of the largest and most important medieval Gothic buildings in Europe. One time fortress and palace, the papal residence was the seat of Western Christianity during the 14th century. Six papal conclaves were held in the Palais, leading to the elections of Benedict XII in 1334, Clement VI in 1342, Innocent VI in 1352, Urban V in 1362, Gregory XI in 1370 and Antipope Benedict XIII in 1394. The Palais is actually made up of two buildings: the old Palais of Benedict XII which sits on the impregnable rock of Doms, and the new Palais of Clement VI, the most extravagant of the Avignon popes. Not only is the final combination the largest Gothic building of the Middle Ages, it is also one of the best examples of the International Gothic architectural style.

 

 

Pont d’Avignon was built between 1177 and 1185. This early bridge was destroyed forty years later during the Crusade when Louis VIII of France laid siege to Avignon. The bridge was rebuilt with 22 stone arches. It was very costly to maintain as the arches tended to collapse when the Rhone flooded. Eventually in the middle of the 17th century the bridge was abandoned. The four surviving arches on the bank of the Rhone are believed to have been built in around 1345 by Pope Clement VI during the Avignon Papacy. The Chapel of Saint Nicholas sits on the second pier of the bridge. It was constructed in the second half of 12th century but has since been substantially altered. The western terminal, the Tour Philippe-le-Bel, is also preserved

 

 





A fantastic city, with plenty of interesting places, inside the walled area there are a few squares, filled with tables and chairs supplied by the restaurants and bars to cater for the hungry or thirsty, also a high street with all the well known fashion shops, so much to see you’d really need a few days to take it all in

 

 

Andy Rafferty eat your heart out,



 

From Avignon we drove onto the second of our stops today to Pont du Gard, the worlds tallest Roman bridge, another World Heritage site, and back into Langoudoc.

The bridge is part of the Nîmes aqueduct, a 50 km-long structure built by the Romans to carry water from a spring at Uzès to the Roman colony of Nîmes. Built in the 1st century AD, the Pont du Gard is the highest of all Roman aqueduct bridges, and listed as a Grand Site de France in 2004

A remarkable structure, some of the blocks are over 10ft long and 2ftsq, all lifted over 150ft manually? The cost for entrance and parking 18€, every evening the viaduct is lit up with a thousand lights, accomplished with a sound and light show. There is also 15 hectares of Mediterranean gardens, crafted for thousands of years by locals to visit, if that’s your thing? all in all well worth it.

 

No diving off the Aqueduct?

Are you kidding!! The water is only about 8ft deep at best?

 

A prehistoric cave, there has been life around this area since the day dot

  

Dry stone huts, known as Capitelles

 

The tree was planted recently, a peace tree, in memory of the victims of the 2015 terrorist attacks on France!

After walking about today in the baking heat, it was also getting on, and we decided to skip another stop we had planned in Nimes to see the Roman Coliseum, “Arenes de Nimes” the best preserved amphitheatre in the world. We will have to catch that another time; we are all Roman’d out

So it was onto our stop for the night at Bellegarde 43.744499 4.518820. We passed many roadside fruit sellers, Cherries 3€ a Kg and Asparagus 4-5€ a Kg

Another free Aire beside a canal. “Canal du Rhone a Sete” A beautiful setting, we paid 12€ twice for a similar sites in Spain, and they wanted 18€ in Avignon this morning?

The site can get very busy as we later found out, fortunately we found a space between two French vans. Everyone has their furniture out, so out came the loungers and we sat outside till gone eight, a balmy evening without a cloud in sight

28th May

Because we didn’t arrive till late yesterday afternoon, we stopped here another day to look around, after breakfast a walk into the town. The outskirts are all new homes, while the centre is typically old French

 

Another co-operative

Butcher, baker and grocery stores

The town brought memories back of Horsham 20 odd years ago, when we first moved into Swindon road, we had all three of these stores on the corner; we used them all the time, until the large supermarkets sucked the life out of the town, like many others in the UK

We walked a different way back through the town and came across this house, with different sculptures of sorts, all made up from bits of scrap metal, and each was a tribute to someone or other. He drove a Jag and also had an XJS with welded bits attached, part of the display, and each sculpture had spotlights that illuminated in the evening

 

 

On our second recce of the day, we walked a different way over the canal bridge and saw more of this guy’s work, at a bar and local metalwork’s

Stopping at the bar as is customary, L’Oasis bar, we headed back to soak up the sun, till late in the evening. Max was again out run by a lizard, he is yet to catch one, not for the lack of trying

 

 

View’s from the canal bridge

 29th May

We missed out on the amphitheatre in Nimes, so today on our way to our destination; we stopped at the historic city of Arles, 20km away. We are also back in the Cote d’Azur

Stopping at the official free Aire 43.68162 4.63041, we parked up and walked into the centre. Arles is another city steeped with Roman history

Arles has many Roman buildings and artefacts, some are still used to date, like the amphitheatre which is used for concerts and bullfights, others like the Ancient theatre, built 1 BC, and the Roman baths have not stood the test of time, and unfortunately now in ruins

What remains of the Ancient Theatre and the Roman baths

 

 From Arles the Rhone becomes the Grand Rhone

After a few hours in Arles it was 60km to our stop for the night, a town called Saint Chamas 43.54613 5.03278

 

 

 

 

 
The Aire is aside a marina overlooking Lake Berre. free with euro relais point. There are cave houses here; built into the mountain, unlike Arguedos in Spain these are lived in, accessed from the other side

 

Strolling around town, I saw this on a Merc chassis

We’re parked near the water’s edge, a quiet spot, we were joined later in the evening by a French van, I would have thought this place to have been a lot busier

 

30th May

We stopped another day at Saint Chamas, the weather this morning warranted it, it’s so hot at the moment, and we don’t want to drive out of it and possibly find rain! We’re also are celebrating 200 days on the road today, a good excuse if ever to get drunk