Something different - Monday 30 June

St. Saturnin map

Our last full day in Provence.

A bad nights sleep lead to Allan going back to bed after breakfast while I completed blogs.  So it was late morning when we hit the road again.

First to our local - St. Saturnin - to find yet again it was largely closed.

Then off to Bonneiux - where we had lunch last time with the kids,  With more time to explore it was a fascinating place - again with shops dug into the side of the hill.  And as usual it seemed we were always walking uphill!

Great views though!

Antique shop in a cave

Bonneiux 2009

Bonneiux 2014

We took some photos from up top and then tried to find somewhere to eat out of the wind which had come up significantly.

View from Bonnieux

Lunch was interesting, I had tomato tartar and steak tartar, while Allan had grav lax and duck kebabs.

Then we entrusted our navigatrix (the most polite thing we call the GPS voice) to take us to Ansouis.  It doesn't help that she slips in wrong directions every now and then, saying right and showing left, taking us through carparks and scary little streets instead of main roads.

Ansouis

We went to Ansouis largely because it had "Musee Extradordinaire", basically a museum with weird stuff in it.

The museum is run by the children (in their 50s) of Georges Mazoyer who spent decades diving around the world.  This had all the stuff he collectedon his travels along with his quirky paintings and sculptures.  Quite bizarre.

Outside the Musee

They even had a blue grotto with sea creatures hung up in it.

After the musee we came home via some brief clothes shopping in Apt.

In search of caves - Sunday 29 June

Time to explore further afield.

This time we thought we'd explore some caves/grottos.  First however to Roussillion.  Yes again.  It is so pretty that we had to have our fill of it.

Today was an exhibition of old tractors and vintage cars.  Which explained the haystack tractor we saw previously.  We were treated to the sight of rather large vehicles making their way through narrow windy streets.  No room for pedestrians!

We couldn't decide where to have breakfast in Roussillion so skipped it all together.  We did however visit some cool shops (many dug into the side of the hill) before the next leg of the the journey.

Les Baux

Grottoes du Thouzon beckoned.  Unfortunately when we arrived, they were closed for at least two hours until the next tour.  Fortunately I had a cunning plan and we ended up at les Carrieres de Luminaires at Les Baux.  Check out their web site http://carrieres-lumieres.com/en/home

Wow!

Stunningly different part of the country. s soon as we arrived we knew there would be something special.

Some of many sculptures

The whole site is an old and massive quarry which has been converted to show films plus light & sound art exhibitions.  The spaces are huge and the ceilings are many stories high.  When you walk into the first exhibition it takes some time for your eyes to adjust, but they do it's amazing!  We couldn't take photos or videos, so please go to the site. 

Essentially they have multiple projectors projecting coordinated and changing images on all surfaces of the quarry including the massive pillars, walls and floor.  This was accompanied by a musical sound track.  We saw three shows, Klimt the Austrian artist, imagery from old Austria and one with cool imagery of playing cards and cogs and clocks (very steam punk/Alice).

We also saw briefly in another room a movie by French director Jean Cocteau - the Temptation of Orpheus.  It was actually filmed in the quarry in 1959.

We left feeling very pleased we had made the effort.  By now it was around 1:30 and we hadn't eaten yet, so thought we'd head into Les Baux.

Oh la la!

Apparently most of France shuts down on a Sunday, but not this gloriously touristy perched village.

Les Baux

Lunch at Les Baux

Completely different stone to Roussillion and the rest of the Apt region.  Shops are mainly dug into the sides of the mountain.  

We had lunch first with an amazing tomato salad (five varieties) which has made me want to grow  heirloom varieties at home.  The we set off to explore - feeling our calves from the day before.

Allan literally got soft-soaped into buying some tourist wares.  This gorgeous young Frenchwoman massaged his hand with this special soap and essential oils till it was smooth...  He couldn't say no after that.

any colour as long it's white

Some unusual shops there.  One with only white clothing, one filled with lollipops (reminding me of Ben wanting haard candy on our last trip).

Candy plus

View from Les Baux

Overall a great day!

Keeping it Local - Saturday 28 June

Our lounge

After our big day of travelling we thought we'd hang around St. Saturnin d'Apt.  Rather bravely we thought we would walk UP to the village for breakfast.

Still nicely hot here (around 27C) and the terrain was definitely up!

Kitchen/dining

Part of our journey to St Saturnin

After feeling quite pleased to get there (actually it wasn't that far) we stopped at cafe and had the ubiquitous Continental breakfast, croissants, jam, fruit juice and coffee.  Refreshingly  that was all they had and they just brought it out.

We have to say that everyone has been wonderful with service and very friendly even with our language difficulties.

St Saturnin has typically narrow streets, cream ochre stones and very old buildings.  It probably falls within the the definition of a perched village, if not there is still a lot of variation in heights.  It also is (compared with Paris) quite clean although not everyone obeys the signs.

Breakfast

No translation needed

After breakfast we explored the streets.

Next we braved climbing up to the 11th century portal and church.  That's right - it's a thousand years old!

11th Century Portal + lavender

With all the ancienty ruins there are always intriguing sights hidden away.  You just have to look out for them.  For example, before we got to the church we looked behind some bars to find a forgotten crypt.

Ta da!

Bars in wall

Lady within

We couldn't enter the church, but the exterior was worth seeing.

Jay-suss!

ye olde church

Bells ring out the time here and in many of the villages.  However we suspect that the bell-ringers are either forgetful or drunk.  Or have a tradition we don't know about.  Because only half the time do the number of strikes ring true!

Drunken bell ringer

We also walked down to the dam, which had some large fish in it and a snake.  Allan's got this thing about snakes in the grass in France.

Afterwards we walked back to the local shops and picked up supplies for lunch and tea and headed back.  Our calves certainly felt it the next day!