After yesterday’s ride, John and I decided that maybe we should try heading off on our own and getting as much of the ride finished before the heat became too intense. It was a great idea, but we still could not quite beat the triple digit temperatures and the mistral wind.
We started the day early, about 6:30 in the morning. Connie, our captain, was up already and helped us get our bikes off the boat and to the dock at Vallabregues. We did a quick circuit through this town and headed out into the countryside. I was more than a little nervous about riding on our own. Two years ago, when John and I did a bike ride through southern Italy, we had been provided with a bike GPS. But today all I had was a little flip book attached to my handle bars with directions and a few simple maps. Still, as we rode, I began to figure out just how the bike navigation could work even without GPS. The book had a long list of directions for the ride, many of them fairly unhelpful like “Turn left on the unmarked road once you have crossed the bridge.” I despaired of following things like that! However, once I started to pay close attention to the cycling odometer on my handlebars, all of this was far easier because each of these directions was at a particular kilometer mark on the trip. It was not always perfect. Sometimes the bridge was at 6,8 and not at 6,7 as the directions indicated. But they were close enough for me to lead the two of us over the planned route without getting lost.
We rode for about fifteen kilometer through flat farmland. The routes provided did a good job of keeping us off main roads and away from traffic. The farm fields looked pretty in the early morning light, and there was still a bit of mist in the air. Our first stop was at the village of Barbentane. We found a cute little square with a few cafes and a post office, none of them open at this time in the morning. The directions called for us to go under and arch and up a steep street to find the medieval center of town. Here the directions were not particularly helpful, and we never did quite find the turn off to the medieval fortifications and the Romaneque church. Instead, we found ourselves at the edge of town by the cemetery.
We decided to just push on. After a while in France, one set of ramparts looks pretty much like another, and I am sure we will see more walled towns as we continue our trip. The directions then send us towards the Moulin de Bretoule, an eighteenth century windmill. John and I were certain we had follow the directions perfectly here, but failed to see any windmill. I was starting to get really annoyed until I turned around. We had been standing in front of it for five minutes puzzling over the flip book!
John cannot see an old wooden door without doing his Holman Hunt knock on the door.
By this time it was barely ten o’clock, but the heat was already getting intense. We pushed on towards our next destination, the Abbey of Saint Michel de Frigolet.
There has been a monastic presence on this site for well over a thousand years. Benedictines established the first monastery here. About a hundred years later, it became the home of a community of Norbertines, a semi-monastic order of priests who live in community but work in parishes, schools, and hospitals. The Norbertine community disbanded there after about three hundred years, and the monastery more or less fell into ruin. A few other groups took control of the property and attempted with limited success to reestablish monastic life in this isolated and somewhat harsh environment. The French Revolution put an end to all religious orders in the country, and the Abbey of Saint Michel was seized by the state and sold. The property passed through a variety of secular owners for sixty years until a priest named Edmund Boulbon purchased it in 1856. Boulbon had initially sought to become a Trappist monk, but his superiors felt that he was not suited to their community and suggested that he might wish to become a Norbertine. He apparently readily accepted this suggestion, and he convinced Pope Pius IX to let him reestablish Saint Michel as a Norbertine community. The abbey was rebuilt during this time, and the buildings that visitors see today are basically nineteenth century construction on medieval foundations.
The interior is dark but colorful, a hallmark of that period.
Every surface that could be painted was painted with sappy pictures of the saints.
Various historical styles were mixed together without any sense of either their artistic integrity or what mixing them together might look like. In this small chapel the neo-medieval is combined with elements of Byzantine and Rococo art.
Still, at points even an art snob like me found a bit of spiritual inspiration in the abbey.
We did not stay too long. The flip book suggested having lunch here, and there appeared to be some kind of restaurant, but it was not open. John purchased a drink and an ice cream, and I bought a little souvenir for my office at home. We left the abbey about the time that the group tour started to arrive.
Our next stop was Boulbon, a charming medieval town. Just off the town square, at the Cafe du Commerce, we found our friends Zöe and Sandra having lunch. Sandara is wearing the bright green jersey and Zöe is wearing the purple one. John is sitting at the table next to them. I believe that they were the only three people in the restaurant who were not smoking. I have heard that smoking rates have fallen dramatically across France, but so far on this trip I have seen little evidence of it.
John and I were hungry and decided to have lunch there, too. I ordered the camambert salad. What finally arrived — French restaurants at noonday seem to assume you plan to spend at least two hours there — was a large round of cheese baked with honey. There were also a generous portion of pomme frites, several pieces of a prosciutto-like ham, and a handful of lettuce leaves with two cherry tomatoes. It was absolutely delicious, but it certainly stretched the definition of what constitutes a salad.
The service had been so leisurely that by the time we had finally begged and pleaded for the check, the group from the boat were all there. Antonella told us that they had arranged a tour of the town with a local guide, and that we were more than welcome to join them. It had to be at least 105 in the shade when the tour departed from the town square. The guide spoke in French and Antonella translated into English.
They discussed a late medieval statue of Saint Christopher and how a hospital had been established here.
I tried to pay attention. I mean, as readers of this blog know, this sort of stuff is what I love the most. But I just couldn’t follow what people were saying. We walked on to look at the castle and the battlements.
Again, the guide was full of information, but it was so hot I just didn’t care. I found myself taking random pictures of plants instead.
Around this time, John asked me if I really wanted to stay to listen to the rest of the tour. I honestly admitted that, no, I just wanted to get back to the boat and toss myself under the air-conditioner unit. So we took one last look around at the landscape
found our bikes, and went on our way.
