It can be hard to leave Arles - it’s market day and Van Gogh awaits
It is all the same - substance vs flash, brains vs brawn, distance vs experience. This may be a convoluted way of explaining our philosophy that the distance you go doesn’t really matter, when the place where you are in is still calling to you to explore.
Arles has 2 market days - Wednesday (today!) and Saturday. We can never turn down a market, so we left our bags and bike at the hotel and wandered for miles enjoying this multicultural market. At times, we were reminded of our time in Istanbul, but most of the time there was no mistaking that we were in Provence. The produce, cheeses, meat, huge circular pans of paella full of seafood, beautiful fabrics typical of Provence were proudly from the region. Of course we bought some local cheese and some tapenade. Yum.
Then we decided to explore more of Arles’ history and visit des Alyscamps. Of course, there is a Van Gogh connection here as both he and Gauguin were inspired to paint here - so we found another of the paintings on the Van Gogh tour.
We attempted to find a store that sold lightweight sandals for both of us, but we struck out. It was finally time to move on and it was afternoon.We knew when we started out that we would be challenging the weather gods in trying to ride as far as we could before the daily thunder storm would hit. The humidity was with us all day and the skies told us that a storm was brewing.
Our ride today was through the Camargue region. White horses - chevals, Camargue black cattle with their distinctive horns and a landscape reflecting how far south we are getting. We saw olive trees, palm trees, sandy areas and flat terrain.
As we had feared, we needed to stop earlier than our legs wanted us to. Or perhaps that’s not true, as yesterday our legs and knees had major workouts climbing tall steps and walking miles on the cobbles of Arles. Anyway, when we came out of the Intermarche Supermarket in St. Gilles, the sky was very black and thunder was developing. So we’ll stop.
It is only 630 km to Barcelona. Tomorrow we’ll ride!!
So many samples and we tried as many as we could. We chose a 2 year old hard cheese with much flavour.
These types of smoked sausage are great for travelling as they do not require refrigeration. Our favourite was made with the Camargue cow. It was so tender and tasty.
This cheese looks appealing with such vibrant colours, but it wasn’t our favourite. The ingredient that colours each cheese is basil, tomato and lavender.
Steve Miller/GrampiesDid you try sny of these coloured cheeses? We did a few years ago, and found them interesting but not our favourites. Reply to this comment 6 years ago
Barry BartlettTo Steve Miller/GrampiesNot our favourite either- we opted for a hard 2yr cheese full of flavour and character. Reply to this comment 6 years ago
Arles is a multi cultural city and this is very much reflected in the market. The setting for the market is on the ring road that is just outside the fortiifed wall of the historic centre. The Saturday Market is even larger and stretches for 7km.
A few photos of the diverse offerings at the market.
Oh the paella looked so yummy. If only it was lunch time, we would have bought some. The paella was generously fillled,with prawns, mussels, clams, chicken and veggies. It smelled divine.
We stayed at a Hotel Acacias (a Brit Hotel) for 2 nights. It was a good find with a killer location in the centre of the action and a view from from our room of the ancient wall. The hotel was very well run, comfortable and quiet, plus they stored our bike in their own car garage. The room was quite small so only one person could be mobile at a time, but the price was unbeatable. As usual, we self catered, using our wee kettle to make tea and coffee with muesli and bread/peanut butter for breakfast.
we Have finally pulled ourselves away from the market and are heading out.
Today we sought out a few more of the Van Gogh points of interest where he painted. This is in Jardin d’ete and the image of the painting is positioned as he saw it.
Does Barry look like he is strutting down a catwalk? Well you aren’t far off. The lovely smooth walkway is part of a massive construction effort to prepare this cemetery for a fashion show the end of the month. There are rows of lights, fog machines set up amongst old ruins of sarcophagi. It’s kind of crazy. And all of this, including the yet to be paved walkway will be removed.
Despite the strangeness of the scene with modern technology strewn amongst the ruins, we spent some time here and found it to be worthwhile and very interesting.
Van Gogh and Gauguin both immortalized this historic monument with paintings here. Here is the image by Van Gogh. This is also a point of interest along the Van Gogh tour.
Des Alyscamps is a bit out of the old town but worth a visit. The ravages of history and vandalism has reduced this special place to only one road of sarcophagi. During the Middle Ages, sarcophagi we’re stolen and used as feeding troughs for cattle.
What a pretty and interesting bird. Their long beak is used to find food deep in the water and soil. They are loving the water in the fields from the heavy rains the past few days. Their habits reminded us of oyster catchers at home, but their colouration is quite magnificent.
Like the Camargue cattle, the white horses are emblematic of this region. We are drawn to their gentle faces, as they were to us. Two,of them trotted over when we stopped.
Well, the navigator made a mistake reading the route, but we made it through. It helped for the navigator to get off and find the way as it was a bit tricky.
