Today was our second day of cycling. During breakfast, the barge left Avignon and headed down the Rhone for a few kilometers. We docked not far from the village of Aramon. There is not much to see, however, where we are docked. John and I were ready to go!
As we were riding, we went through a number of small and generally not terribly interesting little towns. The old hill stop settlement of Fournès was by far the most arrestingly beautiful.
We stopped briefly at an olive oil mill.
John and I have been to more than a few of these places over the years, and we feel like we could probably give the spiel. So I paid less attention to crushing the olives and more to the scenery around the area. Provence looks a lot like Southern California.
But if you look more carefully, there are some important differences. California is largely composed of granite. Southern France, however, is mostly limestone and sandstone. This part of the world was obviously an prehistoric seabed that the pushed upward by the movement of the African Plate upon the Eurasian Plate. The chalky soil means that many plants will not grow all that well here. So the people of Provence have worked to identify plants, such as olive trees and lavender, that seem to tolerate the generally dry conditions and the more alkaline soils.
We rode into what seemed like a small city. Antonella warned us that we needed to stay together and be careful as we rode. Maybe as if to put us all in a more cautious mood, she gave us a small stop by a French cemetery. All of us were struck by the ceramic flowers on the graves.
The highlight of the day was a visit to the Pont du Garde, the famous Roman aqueduct. We arrived here at lunch time, and John and I decided to have lunch before we went over to take a close look at the impressive ruin. But our lunch service was so leisurely that we actually never had a chance to go. Fortunately, we had the best table at the restaurant — I think they do this sort of thing to Americans because they know we are going to tip them — and we had a stunning view of it.
It took absolutely forever for our food to arrive. I always think of Mexico as the home of the leisurely meal, but somehow France, at least here in the south of France, meals take even longer. John and I had ordered the usual three course menu du jour. The food was absolutely superb. John ordered the “crazy plate” as his dessert. There were enough sweets here for an entire family of twelve!
The rest of the day was a fairly quick but hot ride back to the barge. We stopped briefly in a little town along the way.
I keep being surprised by how almost empty all these towns in Provence seem. Do people live here, but work elsewhere? Are these second homes used on weekends? Or are some of these houses more or less abandoned? I have read about how the French countryside has lost much of its population in recent years and the crisis facing French agriculture.
This evening we worked on our plans for the end of the trip. We had left the last few days open, but finally decided that we will spend the last few days visiting our friends in London and I will be spending at least part of my birthday there!
