the villages of provence

Provence is dotted with many very picturesque villages. L’abbaye de Sénanque is a popular photo spot as it is surrounded by lavender fields.

Although the most popular quaint villages are also very touristy and have big, crowded not-so-quaint pay-carparks.

The weather in provence was just brilliant! It was dry, warm and breezy. I think it only rained once (and only briefly) over the 10 days we were in the south of France.

There's a rating system for beautiful villages in France. This is the view from Gordes, a 'plus beaux village' (the loveliest of beautiful villages)

A grave overgrown with lavendar at a cemetery in Gordes.

Looking at Gordes from the nearby hill down the road.

Having experienced the Pont du Gard the previous day, all I wanted to do was find more swimming spots! Joe found this village - Fontaine-de-Vaucluse, which has a gushing source of spring water.

The water was just so incredibly clear! The beautiful emerald colour is the reeds growing in the riverbed. All I wanted to do was jump in!

When we finally got to test out the water we realised why there was no one swimming, and why the water was so incredibly clear and algae-free - it was freezing! I could not keep my foot in the water for more than a few seconds.

Walking upstream, there is a still looking pool of water which is the source of the gushing river. This pool is incredibly deep - in 1985 a small robot submarine went down 315 m into the pool, and found no bottom (source).

The next few days we trawled through a few more quaint villages...

Also stopped to see some Roman ruins at Glanum.

and arrived at Aix-en-provence, a most pleasant artsy town where Van Gogh used to hang out.

This seemingly uninteresting courtyard...

was actually the subject of a Van Gogh painting.

We explored a lot of alleyways... 

and we took a LOT of photos of cool looking doors...

With my swimming urges still unsatisfied.. we searched far and wide for a nice creek or lake... and arrived at this pebbly lake Plantain at Peyrolles-en-provence which used to be a quarry redeveloped into a recreation park.

Despite the busy road nearby and the unsightly power lines in the background, it was a very peaceful spot.

This was about 8pm as we were leaving the lake... isn't the sky just beautiful!

avignon & pont du gard

Our adventures continue in France, as we go to visit Avignon! Look how happy Grace is to be here. Or maybe she's just thrilled that we made it here alive! (it wasn't that bad!)

Avignon is a castle town, which used to be on the border of france at a time before it moved further south. The castle walls are mostly intact and house the touristy old town.

Lots of interesting old walls.

Little space invader hiding in the gutter. 

If you purposely don't see the modern day commercial parts, then walking through the residence areas inside the castle walls can be kind of eerie and strange.

Castle! (from behind) Actually I think it's the papal palace.

The main square was quite a nice place to sit and absorb the atmosphere. We found some shade and ate.

Nearby you can find a high spot to see the half destroyed pont d'avignon. It kept falling down so they stopped repairing it.

It was a pretty hot day, so eventually we stopped exploring/wandering the streets. 

Later we got back on the road, heading for pont du gard! It is an ancient roman aqueduct, and its huge.

Pretty cool place - a perfect followup to avignon. AND we avoided the 15 euro parking tariff by coming after 7pm! What a feeling! 

There were people swimming in the river below. Grace really wanted to go swimming but we didn't bring swimmers.

Meanwhile we were still gobsmacked by walking around on this giant bridge thing. The scale was really somethin' from up close.

Look at me! I'm running! Actually I think I was scouting at this point, there was a very simple sign that read something like: Panorama: That way - but going that way there was a hundred paths that seemed to go bush.

This is the aforementioned sign. Good choice really!

We made it though, it was right around the corner. Top spot! Actually where I sat was little uncomfortable, but we were tired from a long day, and the view was great!

Now to Graces favorite bit! We wanted to go for a swim.

In the water though, it was pretty dangerous... you could get tickled to death by these little fishies.

Just before dusk there was a really pleasant atmosphere, contributed to by some frogs in the nearby sludge. You could hear them but they were hard to see.

So nice!

So many round skimming stones - hours of entertainment!

At about 9pm, it was time to go. This was a most awesome day, ending on a high note. If we are ever back in this part of the world again, we're definitely coming back here.