Allo! Allo!
It’s us, from the lovely city of Orange! (Yes, still...) Got up this morning and headed to the Triumphal Arch; only a short walk away. Had it all to ourselves, as R read about it from our “Roman Sites of Southern France” book. (Very good, by the way, although a tad out of date as to closures and hours.)
Took some pictures from various angles, and then headed back toward town. Have some errands that are going to need doing tomorrow, our last full day in France before we push off to Italy via Spain ... Found the second laundromat (can never have too many) and also the Poste, as tomorrow will be the day we lighten our load considerably – ALL of the miscellaneous stuff we have been gathering and the French guide books will be heading home. Laundry opens at 7; Poste at 8:30, and is right across the square. Looked at a variety of hairdressers, and still haven’t made any decisions – other than it needs cutting desperately, and tomorrow is probably the day! Stopped for some chocolat chaud for me and café for R, then back to the hotel and voila, there was our car! (There is underground parking somewhere around, and the car just magically appears and disappears when needed!) The small square in front of our hotel is just that ... SMALL ... but R was wonderful backing the car around and heading out ... while I have been enjoying all of the bells and whistles of the larger vehicle, when it comes to parking and really tiny streets, YEK!!!!! Headed to Vaison la Romaine via some VERY small roads – just beautiful countryside, and definitely shorts and t-shirt weather! (By the way, talked briefly with a couple from CO who had just come from Tuscany – asked if we’d brought our umbrellas, as it rained every day they were there! We did, but hopefully the unstable weather has been moving through; we’ll just have to see when we get there!) For now, truly enjoying the marvelous sunshine! Makes the poppies absolutely GLOW! Have decided (probably said this before) that the Flanders poppies are my favorite flower in all the world! They grow wild by the millions here; they’re everywhere, sometimes just one or two by the side of the road, and sometimes whole fields full. Like balloons, poppies make me smile! So...on to Vaison. Found the town centre easily and parked actually between two architectural sites! The tickets to the site include the museum and a really good audioguide for the whole town! What a deal! The museum is small but good, with some nice pieces such as the silver bust of a man unearthed in one of the excavated houses. We toured the museum and the theatre (not nearly in as good a shape as the one in Orange, but it is still used for performances) and then decided to have lunch. Found a little café overlooking the excavation and had salads – mine, Salade Nicoise withOUT the anchois (anchovies...) (and yes, it can still be called a Salade Nicoise even without the fish...) R had a Salade Tuscan, with lettuce, tomatoes, mozzarella and LOTS of anchovies! (He’ll be sleeping in the car tonight, let me tell you!!) Nice lunch; beautiful day! Then tackled the second archeological site across the street. Three really BIG houses, as well as some shopping streets. I’m just to used to being so careful and not touching anything (I think of it as the “Kartchner Cavern Syndrome”) that the fact that you can actually walk on the walls and climb the stairs is a little hard to handle! The homes had lovely big interior courtyards and pools – somehow those clever Romans piped in water galore; they even had flushing toilets of a sort! Unreal! By this time it was fairly late in the day, and we decided to return to Orange...via yet another back road. We’ve included some pictures of the day – notice all that sunshine! SO nice after the weather we had at the end of our stay in Sarlat! We are now just about recovered from our travels, and are contemplating dinner .... so, more later!
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