Dallas in dining room-Aixe en Provence
Dining Room!
A landmark fountain in Aixe en Provence!
Arle
Arle-South of France
Colosseum-Arle
On the streets of Arle
3 August
After breakfast we said goodbye to Frances and Christina and headed off. Probably a bad omen but we took a wrong turn within a couple of minutes and had to retrace our steps.
Arrived in Arle with out too much difficulty and took a train ride around the city as we only had a short time here. An attractive and very ancient little town where Van Gogh spent a short time, but lost his ear as a result of an argument with another famous artist whose name escapes me at the moment.
We saw ancient ruins of a fairly complete amphitheatre, which is still used for bullfights and concerts (AC/DC coming soon), and the Theatre Antique, a half round amphitheatre that is also still used. Roman influence is still very evident in Arle.
Left Arle and headed for Aix en Provence. This was a straight-forward journey until we arrived at Aix. Trying to find our hotel, which we eventually found situated right in the heart of Aix in a little one-way street proved to be a nightmare. Very vague instructions that lead us down tight one way streets, up one way streets the wrong way and some serious car backing with heavy bollards on each side of the road, glaring impatient French drivers etc made the introduction to this place all but positive. Two hours later, we stumbled on our hotel, which had no parking, then further vague instructions to a parking building across the other side of a large, very busy round about with many main roads coming off it, in the centre of the city, added further "colour" to this place. The central round about with a very historic fountain in the middle of it has been not so fondly renamed "that f######g fountain".
I must say the cold beers that evening with dinner were some of the best in my life.
We dined at an Irish Pub that was the most French Irish Pub I have been to. In fact neither of even noticed it was one until well into a very tasty French styled meal.
A pleasant stroll later in the evening down the Rue Mirabeau, a main avenue created many centuries ago by the Romans, past market stalls back to our hotel, Hotel de France, built in the 18th century, finished off a trying day in a lot more relaxed fashion.
4 August
Well we thought the drama of driving in this area might be over. After breakfast we set out to return the car to the Aix Gare railway station on the way to Marseille. We thought we would get instructions from the information centre to set us off in the right direction. Again, following directions down one-way streets that we couldn’t enter we finally found the motorway to the station. Poor signage again led us to take a few wrong turns, and after backtracking and going up and down the motorway, we finally returned the car and returned to Aix by bus.
We took a train ride around the city, which provided a very interesting commentary on the history and development of the city, along with a good description of places of significance. After this we walked around the city, retracing some of the places we had seen earlier, finally settling for a quiet beer and wine to finish off the afternoon with a spot of people watching.
Many tourists here, but you also get a sense of the local people being very fashionably dressed, they certainly look smart, even in this very hot weather.
This evening we dined just below our hotel at a restaurant specializing in tasty crepes, and followed this with a final stroll down Ave Mirabeau looking at the market stalls along the street that stay there until well after 10.00pm.
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