Aix-en-Provence, April 9, 2010

We spent our last day with Denny and Ellen walking around Aix. Being a fan myself, I can appreciate a city that names a street after a black mule:
We headed down the Cours Mirabeau to the market near the Hotel de Ville, where we shopped for provisions for our farewell dinner. A moss-covered fountain on the Cours Mirabeau:

Denny with his hipster macarons:

Wow, were those tasty. I felt like being outside in the sun, so while the rest of the crew took in the tapestry museum, I walked to the Pavillon de Vendome, built by the Duke of Vendome to house his mistress in what was then the outskirts of Aix. I sat in the sun by these nice blobby shrubs and made a little vitamin D:

Trompe l'oeil paintings by Jean Daret at the Hotel Chateaurenard, painted in honor of Louis XVI's visit to Aix in 1660. Old Louis was so impressed by the paintings (I think it was the birdcage in particular) that he made Jean Daret his official painter.

After our fabulous farewell dinner of steak and oysters, rooftop kitty theater:

The following morning, Roberta, mom and I drove back to Paris.

Arles and the Camargue, April 7, 2010

On Wednesday we drove to Arles, a city on the Rhone river. I was completely blown away by how ugly the riverfront was - paved and industrial, about the same as the Los Angeles riverfront except older so the paved channel looks kind of cobble-stone-y instead of concrete. City scene in Arles:
Arles' leftover Roman junk earned it a spot on the World Heritage Site list. The amphitheatre, you have to hand it to those Romans, is still in remarkably usable shape:

Roberta was no longer able to hide her true feelings:

Perhaps Arles' greatest claim to fame is having triggered the rapid deterioration of Vincent van Gogh's mental health. Van Gogh painted some of his most famous paintings (and left his ear) in Arles. Easels throughout the city mark the site of van Gogh paintings, such as this cafe:

A family posing for pictures at the cafe in the painting:

Finding the easels was a fun treasure hunt. Look, a garden!

Just outside of town, look! Another easel! See? Isn't that fun? An awesomely rickety drawbridge, looking slightly more dreary than in its painting. Deterioration from the intense light of a bazillion flash bulbs? Probably . . .

South of Arles is the Camargue, the marshy delta of the Rhone river. The Camargue is home to an ancient breed of horses, the Camargue horse, a rugged little white Iberian horse. I love a white horse, easy to find at a distance:

Luberon, April 6, 2010

Uncle Denny and Aunt Ellen arrived in Aix on Monday. On Tuesday we all drove to the Luberon, a hilly region northwest of Aix. First stop was L'Isle sur la Sorgue, the Venice of Provence, situated on an island where the Sorgue splits into two streams:
Between watching ducks and studying the weeds in the stream, I was mesmerized:

I saw this in a shop window that was plastered with old timey ads. Kangaroo-recommended briefs! Hot, hot, hot!

We walked by the bank that was robbed in Peter Mayle's novel "Hotel Pastis", then fortified with drinks at the Cafe de la Sorgue . . .

. . . before driving up to Gordes for lunch:

The crew taking in the tight alleyways in hilltop Gordes:

Beautiful views of the town on the road in to Gordes:

The hills of the Luberon:

Last stop was Roussillon, another hilltop town known for the pink, red, yellow, and orange ochre pigments in the surrounding hills. Ochre cliff:

Making repairs on a stone wall with ochre-tinted mortar:

View of Mont Ventoux and the Luberon hills from the top of Roussillon:

Cassis, April 5, 2010

We were warned that Easter Monday was a holiday in France so all the fun places would be crammed with people, but we didn't really believe that it would be that bad. Wow, were we wrong - Cassis was mobbed. After many false starts (note to self: never again attempt a road trip in Europe without GPS) we eventually found Cassis, a typical though charming seaside tourist trap:
The coast between Marseilles and La Ciotat, including Cassis, is dotted with calanques, little coves with limestone walls, essentially Mediterranean fjords. We toured a few of the calanques by boat. This bluff marks the edge of the inlet where Cassis is located. Fodor's claims it drove Winston Churchill to paint:

Limestone!

On the tour boat:

Calanque En-Vau, the prettiest of the three we visited, with soaring walls and a little castaway beach:

Aix-en-Provence, April 4, 2010

We arrived in our awesome apartment on Rue de l'Opera in Aix-en-Provence on Saturday evening. The view of a steeple from the wee terrace at the apartment (I love it that there are lights on):
Easter Sunday we walked around Aix. First stop: a crafty, fun-stuff market on the Cours Mirabeau, one of the main drags in Aix. Mom and Roberta in their native habitat:

One of Aix's many fountains, at the end of the Cours Mirabeau:

Awesome overhanging leg on a sculpture on a building at the place de l'Hotel de Ville, where we sat and drank coffee:

In the 5th century Merovingian baptistery at Cathedrale St-Saveur:

Burgundy, April 1-2, 2010

Mom, Roberta and I rented a car at Charles de Gaulle and drove to Dijon, the capital of Burgundy. Noam's rule is you have to stay up until 8 PM on your first day to beat jet lag, so I death-marched mom and Roberta around Dijon once we arrived. Notre Dame in Dijon, awesome facade with a ton of gargoyles:

Dijon's Notre Dame has a little owl statue on the side that people rub for good luck, so the owl has become a symbol for Dijon. Owls in the pavement mark the Dijon walking tour. I am a sucker for a cartoon owl:

On Friday we drove to Vezelay. The Basilique Ste-Madeleine, with its relics of Mary Magdalene (ewww), was a focal point of Christianity during the 11th and 12th centuries - St. Bernard announced the second crusade from there. Vezelay, from the parking lot:

Mom and Roberta in Vezelay:

I found the most gigantic almond meringues at a bakery in Vezelay. At one euro 50, you could feed a family of four:

Man that town was cute! View down Vezelay's main drag, Rue St. Etienne. Note the little white dots on the grass, sheep!

View of Burgundy from Vezelay:

On the way back to Dijon, we stopped at the Abbaye de Fontenay, a Cistercian abbey founded in 1118 by St. Bernard. The abbey was closed but the bathrooms were still open, score!

Saturday we drove from Burgundy to Provence. We had planned to stop at some of the vineyards outside Dijon, but it was pouring rain and about 9 in the morning, so we scrapped that plan and headed to Beaune. We toured the Hotel-Dieu, founded as a hospital in 1443. Fodor's tells me the tile roof and Flemish architecture have become icons of Burgundy:

We stuck it out for a while, walking around Beaune in the rain, then decided to screw it and search for nicer weather on the road south.

Paris, March 30-31, 2010

On the plane on the way over I sat next to kid traveling by himself. Totally great kid, we thoroughly reviewed our movie choices together and snarked about the crappy food, it was fun. At some point in the night he put his feet up on the empty seat between us and completely blew me away with a cloud of epic foot odor! What is it with 12-ish year old boys and stinky feet? I got to Paris and took the train to my hotel across from the Luxembourg gardens in the Latin Quarter: I had enough energy to walk around a bit and eat a salad, then I went to bed. Wednesday morning I had breakfast then started walking. Nice clouds above the Ile St. Louis (I apologize for being too lazy to figure out how to do accents on this thing.):
I walked to the Marais area north of the Seine toward the Jewish quarter. I purposely didn't look up exactly where the Jewish quarter is because finding the Jewish quarter in a city like Paris, where the Jewish population is a shadow of its former self, is a fun treasure hunt. I fairly quickly found this building, a nondescript synagogue, by two typical indicators, 1. a sign on the door saying "no visitors" and . . .
. . . 2. a cop standing out front. Sigh. Note to anti-semites out there, besides your many, many other flaws, you are really uncreative.
Another thing I found during my treasure hunt, a small memorial above the door of a building to several people who were deported and killed at death camps during World War II.
Here is the building with the memorial:
So creepy to see this in a neighborhood in Paris just north of the Seine. How could people have been deported from this place?

Neat graffiti:
I went to the Carnavalet Museum on the history of Paris as soon as it opened at 10. My French is so crappy that it would have taken me a year to get through just the stuff before the revolution, but luckily Rick Steves had a great museum tour in his book, so I followed that. The Carnavalet:
After the Carnavalet I headed to the Pompidou museum of modern art, but the line was stupid long so I skipped it. The Pompidou and the line:
I walked down past the Louvre, cut through the Tuilleries, crossed the Seine, passed les Invalides and stopped for lunch at Au Petit Tonneau. It rained a bit, then hailed on me briefly in the Tuilleries, so I was pretty soaked by the time I got there. I ordered veal. Noam hasn't had veal since the first time he saw one of those little white plastic caves where veal calves live and was completely horrified. I stopped eating veal soon after, but I figured I am in the European Union, they must have some anti-cruelty laws that protect veal calves. The meat was fabulous though not super tender, which I am thinking supports my theory. Au Petit Tonneau, yummy:

Self portrait with the Eiffel tower after lunch:

Self portrait with Notre Dame later in the afternoon:

The Memorial of the Martyrs of the Deportation on Ile de la Cite right behind Notre Dame, a memorial to people who were deported during the second world war:

Perhaps I am reading too much in to this, but the French are known for their pride in their language. All day long people humored me and waited patiently while I barfed out my lame and no doubt hideously incorrect French, then answered me in French and only switched to English after I gave up and switched myself. Except the woman at the deportation memorial, who immediately addressed me in English. Hmm. I guess only Anglophones bother to go to that memorial.

My feet were killing me at this point but I stopped at the Cluny museum of the middle ages. During the French Revolution, many churches including Notre Dame were pillaged. Some revolutionaries mistook the kings of Judah in Notre Dame for the kings of France and destroyed several statues. The heads were saved and buried. They were unearthed in 1977 by someone digging for something other than heads from statues at Notre Dame, and are now displayed at the Cluny. The heads of the kings of Judah:

Thursday morning at Luxembourg station, heading back to the airport to pick up my mom and aunt for a trip to points south: