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FRANCE 2012
Day 17, Wednesday, September 19
Marseille to Aigues-Mortes
It is hard to believe that this time next week we will be home.
After breakfast, we packed up and checked out. Our concern has been how
we were going to get our suitcases to the car since the car was parked
in a garage, four stories down on the other side of the Old Port. The
hotel desk person said that they would keep the suitcases; we could
bring the car in front of the hotel and double park long enough to load
them into the car. Kathleen decided she wanted to go with me on the
walk to the car garage, so I wouldn’t get lost. We found the car
easily and got out of the garage onto the street across the port from
our
hotel. Traffic was slow because of the construction, but we made it and
got our luggage.
Our TomTom(GPS) had a little trouble getting us out of town because
of the Old Port construction, but we made it. We certainly enjoyed our
stay in Marseille. It is a very large city, and where we were staying
was wonderful, the view from our hotel was spectacular. We didn’t close
our curtains at night, falling asleep looking up on the hill at the very
well lit Notre Dame de le Guarde and the lights around the Old Port, and
when we woke up we saw the same beautiful scene. I
would
like to come back some day when the area around the Old Port has been
restored.
We headed north back towards Avignon and Arles. It was
another beautiful day, but we encounter the Mistral Winds again, which
made it hard work keeping the car from blowing off the road. Our first
stop on our journey today was in an area south of Arles known as the La
Camargue.
It is an area that has been largely preserved in its natural state as a
botanical and zoological nature reserve. It consists of 328 sq miles.
Of particular interest to Kathleen was the Parc Ornithologique du
Pont-de-Gau, a bird sanctuary. We stopped to explor
e
it.
It would take several hours to go through the suggested tour
but our main interest was the flamingos. We walked some of the nature
trails and saw hundred of flamingoes standing in the marshy
waters.
They were beautiful. We saw several other specimens of birds in large
caged in areas. We spent over an hour there.
How would you like to sleep like this?
This preserve is about 4 miles from the town of Les
Stes-Maries-De-La- Mer. Legend has it that a boat abandoned to the waves
in the year 40, landed on the shore. It carried Mary, the mother of
James, Mary Magdalene, Martha and Lazarus, Mary Salome the mother of
James and John. Later the two Marys were buried here thus the name Les
Stes-Maries-de-la Mar. We drove
into
the town which has a population of 2,300, only to discovered that a
bull fight was going on. There was no place to park with campers
everywhere. We wanted to see the Mediterranean but there was a high
wall around the city, eventually saw a parking lot and entered it for 3
euros and drove out to a beach. It was beautiful. We tried to find the
famous church but the roads were blocked and there was no place to park.
About
15 minutes away was our destination for the day, the ancient town of
Aigues-Mortes, which stands for the city of "dead waters". In the midst
of swamps and lagoons, Aigues-Mortes is France's most preserved walled
town. In the early 13c, the French King, Louis IX (St. Louis) possessed
no Mediterranean seaport as such. In 1240, he acquired land from some
monks and built a fort and a sea port. In it was from this port that
Lewis IX sets sail on the 7th Crusade to co
nquer
Jerusalem. In 1248, 35,000 men launched 1500 ships towards Cyprus. The
Crusaders arrived in Cyprus 23 days later and met with some success
before being defeated. The king was captured in 1250.
Our hotel, Hotel Canal Aigues Mortes, is on a beautiful canal just
outside the city walls. We settled in and then decided to walk to
town. Between our hotel and t
own
was a bridge over the canal. Kathleen didn’t like this bridge, so we
thought the evening was in jeopardy, but she summoned the courage to run
across the skinny bridge, and all was saved. After a five minute walk
we were inside the walls. 
The whole interior of the city walls seems to be shops and
wall to wall outdoor cafes.
We
walked and around explore
the church of Notre Dame des Sablons. The
exact date of its construction is unknown. It was probably built
before the walls were erected, around the middle of the 13th century, at
the time of St. Louis. Its style is Gothic. The fall of the bell tower
in 1634 caused extensive damage, that made it unusable for nearly a
century. During the French Revolution, the building was use
d
for barracks and for salt deposit. It becomes Catholic Church in 1804
and was restored in a style classic neo-baroque. From 1964 to 1967 the
whole setting disappeared, including coffered ceilings, giving way to
the church much more sober and the medieval spirit that we see today.
In 1991 Claude Viallat, a contemporary artist , designed and
installed the modern stained-glass windows, which give the building a
light and extraordinary color.
About 6:30 we decided that we might as well take advantage of all of
these cafes. We have decided that all the French do is eat. We had
stopped at one of the rest areas before Arles and had quiche for
lunch. We looked at all the menus and choose a seafood café called
–Restaurant La Gardiane. We were the first ones
to
sit in the large outdoor café on the square. Most French people don’t
start eating until after 8:00, in fact most restaurants don’t even open
until 7:45. The two previous nights in Marseilles, we were the first to
appear in our restaurants. Every town that we have visited has had
hundreds of outdoor cafes and they are always filled with people eating.
We decided to have a starter. Kathleen had a goat cheese and bacon
salad. I had a pot of mussels- I couldn’t eat the all because I had
a
main course coming. For the main plate we both had a seafood cabob. It
was delicious. By the time that we started our main course, every table
was taken. It must have been a favorite as other places had a lot of
empty tables. Today has been very hot in spite of the winds, so I
didn’t think of wearing my jacket or sweater when we set out. It got
more windy and rather cold. We finished dinner early and went back to
the hotel.
