Uzes, Avignon & the Pont du Gard

 Let me be a dog in Uzes

If I believe in reincarnation, which I kind of, sort of, do I want to come back as a dog in Uzes. We arrived in Uzes and settled into a really super apartment right in the city center.Uzes is a charming, small, leafy town about 20 miles from Avignon. On our first morning, we headed to the Central Plaza, and the open air market. Here was where I first realized how delightful it would be to be a dog in Uzes. It seemed that every human was accompanied by a pooch as they roamed the market stalls. Their nose’s twitching at the delightful smells, and their tails wagging as they greeted their dog friends. A good time was being had by all. The shopping and sniffing complete, human and pets settle down at a café adjoining the market and indulged in a dose of people and dog watching. It was obvious that being a dog in Uzes was a privilege and a delight. We spent our first day acquainting ourselves with the town, which we had visited several times before. However this time we were able to explore more of the interesting structures and places in Uzes, as the photos below will show.

The cafes that lined the Place aux Herbes made for great people (and dog) watching, as we sat under the Plane trees.

Uzes began life as a fortified Roman town as early as the 2nd century BCE. In the Middle Ages it became important in the trades of silk, licorice and linen. The streets are cobbled and narrow with stone buildings with shutters.

Even though the population is only 8500, there is a cathedral (now a church), a baroque church and this smaller church tucked away on a cobblestone street.

Deirdre waiting outside for the Medieval garden to open. Despite its name, the garden was only created in 2015 to contain plants from the Medieval period. It is located in a Benedictine Abbey from the 10th century.

This mural shows a young woman in the garden with prisoners looking on. The Tour de l'Eveque from the 12th century was used as a prison.

These fanciful looking creatures were scattered throughout the garden.

The Tour de l'Eveque contained graffiti left by prisoners, as seen in these two photos.

The view from the Tour du Roi, which dates from the 13th century. This shows St. Théodorit Cathedral with the Fenestrelle (the round bell tower) sticking up behind the church. This is the only round bell tower in France. The bell tower dates from the 11th century.

A view of the town from the top of the tower.

 

The Hamsa Hand or Hand of Fatima is seen here as a door knocker, and is used for protection against evil and bad luck. The Hamsa Hand dates back to 1500 BC and was first attributed with the powers to protect against evil and bad luck by Phoenician Jews. It was adopted by Muslims and called the Hand of Fatima. 

The interior of St. Théodorit Cathedral, which is now a parish church.

Some of the areas of the church, now a Protestant church, have been restored, but there is still more restoration necessary.

Saint-Ètienne church dates from the mid 18th century, was built in the baroque style and is listed as a French Monument Historique.

This stained glass window of John the Baptist baptising Jesus in in the church.

The Hotel de Ville of Uzes (city hall) was built in 1772. 

Deirdre in front of the entrance to the Duke's Castle. Uzes has had a Duke since 1088 and it still has a Duke. When the Duke is in residence the flag is flying. He was not in residence when we were there.

A major portion of the Duke's coat of arms is created on the roof using different colored tiles.

Here is the full coat of arms over the door with the motto "FERRO NON AURO", which translates as by iron not gold.

Since the Duke still lives in the castle, the tour was restricted to certain rooms.

The informal dining room was another of those rooms...

in addition to the Duke's private chapel.

The Duke also had an extensive wine cellar.

This Bernese Mountain dog also took part in the tour of the castle.

We rarely revisit places unless they have been particularly special to us. This was true with us as on this trip and we would also revisit Peyzac de Moustier in the Dordogne, lodging in a gite we had been to three years previous.

On our second day staying in Uzes, we decided to visit the Papal Palace in Avignon. Steven and Lee had visited it while on their own river cruise. We’ve been in Avignon before, but had never visited the palace.

So here’s the story which is rather involved, but I will try to simplify it. In 1309 the French king appointed the Cardinal of Bordeaux to be the new pope. The Cardinal, however, refused to move to Rome, so the French King installed him in Avignon. Popes reigned from Avignon for approximately 67 years before the papacy returned to Rome. In 1378, after the death of Pope Gregory XI (who returned the papacy to Rome in 1376) for about a decade during the "Western Schism" popes once again took residence in Avignon from 1378 to 1403. These are known as the antipopes and at this juncture, there were also popes in Rome. That’s a rather incomplete summary of the intrigues and power struggles involved. But let’s get on to the palace.

It is a little wonder that most popes died within a decade of moving into the Avignon Palace. I felt that I might die within several hours of being in the palace. As you will see from the photos, it is gigantic and consists of multiple stories of many rooms reached by treacherous, winding, in many cases, staircases. They did have one of the newest “guides“ to assist you in your visit. In each room there was a central kiosk. You would hold your tablet above the kiosk and it would load a virtual reality rendition of how that room would have looked during the time the popes were in residence.

A model of the Papal Palace showing the front, which stretches for nearly 200 feet...

and the back of the Papal Palace. There are ten towers altogether.

Despite its age portions of the painted ceiling and wall are still visible.

This polychrome, marble altarpiece depicts Christ on the way to Golgotha for his crucifixion.

These plaster figures in the North Sacristy depicted important figures from the time period.

The Great Chapel. As you can see, the rooms were bare for the most part, stripped of all of its valuables which were removed during the French Revolution.

A view of the gardens from a terrace, after ascending some steep stairs.

A statue of the Virgin Mary adorns this tower.

Apparently even the Virgin requires protection from lightning.

The clock tower which still has a figure striking the bell to mark the time. The figure can barely be seen in the left opening.

Having ascended and descended probably 1000 stairs, our appetites were honed for lunch. We stumbled out of the palace, somewhat disoriented as to where we were and looked across the street to see a lovely hotel offering a delightful menu. We went in sat down in their charming garden, and had one of the best meals we enjoyed on the trip.

The La Mirande Hotel where we dined for lunch...

and the beautiful terrace where we dined.

After lunch we wandered a bit, first coming across this busker playing the accordion.

This building with the trompe l'oeil caught our eye as we were walking...

and it was reputed to be an advertisement of sorts for the Avignon Theater nearby.

In our travels through Europe it is great to see the carrousels that are still in use.

On to the Pont

No, not the Pont du Avignon, which is a bit of a disappointment but to the Pont du Gard, which never disappoints. Those Romans really knew how to build. This massive aqueduct was built in 100 A.D. and to this day remains intact and functional. We had visited the Pont du Gard (it spans the Gardon River) but we wanted to see it again and share it with you. Our time in Uzes was over and we were ready to move on to the Riviera.

A view from afar walking toward the Pont du Gard, 

After this it was on to Antibes and the Riviera for a continuation of our journey through France.

A FINAL STOP IN BELGIUM, ALMOST LITERALLY

We are scheduled for a night in Dinant, Belgium, and arrived in late afternoon. It’s a beautiful little town on the river. This area, including parts of Belgium and France were the scene of some of the most bloody fighting in World War I. As we drove toward the town, we passed through many place names we recognized from our history courses long ago

We stayed in an old Abbey perched high above the river. Well, it sounded idyllic when we booked it. I rapidly found reasons to be less than charmed. Our “suite“ reached only by a tiny, creaky, elevator (phobia number two and number three). Luckily, we were only booked for a night and the next morning we approached our car with anticipation of reaching France and the Château Beauchamp.

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Deirdre looking out at the Meuse River from the bridge, with the Church and buildings in the background.

A picture of the hotel where we stayed, which was formerly the Abbaye Notre-Dame de Leffe. Beer was first brewed here in 1240, as a means of protecting the citizens from tainted water. Dinant is divided by the Meuse River and the town is on both sides of the river connected by a bridge.

Adolphe Sax, who was born in Dinant, invented the saxophone. In tribute to Adolphe different, large, colored saxophones representing different countries were arranged on the bridge. This saxophone was representing Croatia.

This saxophone was representing the USA. These saxophones have lined the bridge since 2010.

You can see the various saxophones extending along the bridge, and they were on both sides.

We always find the different architecture in each place interesting and notable.

This also holds true for the different architectural styles of the churches. The Collegiate Church, with its distinctive onion dome dates from the 16th century.

In the background behind these buildings was the Citadel of Dinant constructed in 1815, which was involved in the Battle of Dinant in World War I. The bridge across the Meuse is named in honor of Charles de Gaulle, who was a young lieutenant and was wounded in the leg during the battle.

These, letters strung between the two buildings, translate to "At the end of the street", encouraging the Belgians to go to the end of the street.

And thus begins the saga of the demonically possessed car. We have leased cars in the past and always received a brand new, reliable and economically, sound vehicle. That was all over. We got into the car and Michael tried to start it. Nothing. No whirring. No clunking. Nothing. We made our first call (many to follow) to the 800 number 24 hour assistance line. We explained our problem to someone who, sort of, spoke English. They said they would dispatch someone to help us, and after two more calls in an hour, a man arrived in a tow truck. He jumped the car and pronounced our problem solved. We pointed out that the car was brand new, we had driven it hundreds of miles over several days, and it shouldn’t do this. He gave a gallic shrug and said he’d follow us down the incredibly steep hill into town. This was considerate since our dashboard warning system was saying that our brakes didn’t work. We decided his diagnosis was not sufficient. So, we went to a Renault dealer to get the car checked out. At the first dealer, we were politely turned away since one mechanic had called in sick and the second was on a smoking break. Yes, a smoking break. They directed us to a second Renault dealer and after I asked in my pathetic French that we needed help, they agreed to look at the car. They hooked up the computer diagnostic machine (the only way anything seems to get attention) and pronounced “Zee auto is fine“. We didn’t think so, but pushed on.

We arrived at our Château in one piece, but fearing each time we turned the car off that it would never start again. By now we were deep in the countryside with no Renault dealer in sight.

We loved our new dwelling. where we would spend six nights. My brother, Stephen and my sister-in-law Lee would be arriving by train in Dijon the next day around noon to join us. We zoomed into Dijon and fetched them with no problem. However, upon returning to the car once again, our dashboard warning lights were lit up urging us to attend to a low battery level. Damn! We have to get to another Renault dealer where I was forced to plead even more pitifully for immediate attention. They were very solicitous and spent 2 1/2 hours scouring the car to find the problem only to announce “there is no problem with Zee ka”. OK, fine.

The time with our kin folks passed quickly. We went to several small towns in Champagne on our first day and tucked into one of our better meals in Chaumont. Michael woke up in the middle of the night unable to sleep and sought out some other fun place to explore. And he hit pay dirt.The place he found was named TROYES but is pronounced TROIS.” Go figure. This dissimilarity between how a town is written and how it is pronounced is quite common in France. We had been to a town called UZES three times before we discovered how to say it correctly. Troyes was magnificent. Almost all the houses were timber framed, and it was a delight to stroll the narrow (sometimes very narrow) alleys and streets. Some of the houses were being restored, and we were pleased to see that they were adhering to the same architectural style of the original town.

Lee and Steve making their way through the Allée des Chats (Alley of Cats) in Troyes, which is called this because it is so narrow the cats can jump from one building to the other.

Steve and Deirdre in Troyes.

One of the many half-timbered houses in Troyes, which date back to the 16th century and evokes its rich Medieval and Renaissance past when the large Champagne Fairs were held here.

Some more examples of the half-timbered houses.

This half-timbered house was the local synagogue and displayed the menorah and the Star of David on the grills covering the windows.

This was the entrance to the synagogue Rachi.

A woman peering from the window of her half-timbered house.

There were many amazing sculptures throughout Troyes, this being an example of two of them.

This very cute little girl decided to pose in front of one of them.

The flowering trees showed that Spring had definitely arrived in Troyes.

"The saying goes that France is home to 80% of the world's stained glass, that 80% of French stained glass windows north of the Loire are in the Champagne region, and that 80% of the stained glass windows in the Champagne region are in the Aube départment." (Troyes La Champagne Tourisme). The Aube contains approximately 9,000 square meters of stained glass windows.

The ceiling of the stained glass museum was as impressive as the stained glass. The museum is housed in the former Hôtel-Dieu-le-Comte, built in the 18th century.

The museum contained stained glass from many different eras,...

such as this one from 1621.

It also contained more contemporary stained glass...

as seen in these two photos.

It even had this Art Deco themed stained glass. There were so many more beautiful examples included in the museum collection.

These stairway lights were definitely on the more contemporary side.

Troyes also contained some quirky things like these bears arranged in various poses in the windows of the building...

and a cat coffee house, where the cats roamed free and would greet the customers. This one posed for its photo.

The facade of the Hôtel de Ville (City Hall) was initially started in 1624. It is one of the rare monuments in France to have preserved on its facade the initial motto of the French Revolution.

The rather ornate gate to the Hôtel de Ville.

Troyes contains many whimsical sculptures, such as this one...

or this one...

or even this one.

However, the most famous one is the stainless steel "Heart of Troyes", which lights up at night and emulates a beating heart.

After a stroll through the timber framed section of town, we moved on to the section in which the most affluent of the populace live. Here the architecture was notably different but still very charming. We went to a museum that explored the art of stained class. An exhibit highlighted the evolution of stained glass creation over the centuries. In Troyes, and in all of Champagne really, we never encountered any tourist. By comparison in Bruges and Ghent, we were pretty regularly surrounded by tourists trailing dully behind their flag waving guides.

We had eaten a late lunch of sushi (it is a bit strange in France, I know) but we wanted to hold back because that night our hosts were going to prepare a meal for us.

Our host and hostess were Dutch but spend many months of the year in France at the Château. They prepared a marvelous meal featuring local produce and meat. Of course there was wine. Lots of wine. And lots of conversation. We spoke of our life in Mexico, my brother and sister-in-law‘s life in Maine, and their lives in Europe. Of course, we ended up discussing the political situation in the United States and its impact on Europe. Except for the one instance in

Ghent, we’ve not encountered any anti-American feeling in our travels. In fact, in our discussions, we have found that the Europeans we know, tend to express sympathy and concern for us rather than outrage or a sense of betrayal. It was a long and fascinating dinner and it is conversation and these kinds of interactions that make traveling so valuable to us.

The next morning we spent helping Lee and Steve organize for their next segment of travel, which would take them to Annecy and Grenoble. After that, we decided to go for a hike. Champagne has several extensive parks and we picked a hike which featured a most interesting waterfall as its high point. I’ll let Michael’s photos and captions explain why it’s unique. 

Take a spring and some moss, pour rainwater onto a limestone substrate, allow it to wander along a bed of marl and wait patiently until it resurfaces, skirting a landform.

There the limestone in the water will precipitate and gather around moss, eventually turning it white.

Leave it to simmer for a few hundred years...

and the final result will be tufa.

This waterfall at Rolampont feeds the water that drips down the terraces of moss, helping to create the tufa over time.

On our last day at the Château, we decided that it would be a travesty to not go and sample some of the region’s most famous product. We had not, however, done our homework. We drove past domain after domain, all of which were closed since Monday seems to be the universal date of rest for the industry. However, as we were about to abandon our search, we came upon an open sign and immediately turned into the drive..

We were greeted by the howling and yipping of at least a dozen beagles kenneled behind the tasting room. We were the only car in the parking lot, which should’ve served as a sign. The door was open, but no one was around, and we were about to get back in the car when a very elderly gentleman appeared. He must’ve come out to see why his pets were going mad.

He warmly welcomed us and invited us in (via sign language) to the tasting room. I realized at this point that any interaction was going to have to be entirely in French. And so it was. Never being wholly confident of my ability to either comprehend or speak French accurately I began to realize that this conversation seemed more challenged than most. After all, I’d managed to charm service people into letting us jump the line and get our car looked at, right? After tasting a couple of flutes of champagne and conversing with the old gent for far too long, I came to the conclusion that the problem was not entirely mine linguistically. He clearly was suffering from dementia. It turns out his son runs the place, but wasn’t there because it was his day off and he was out drinking champagne with his buddies. It was quite difficult to extricate ourselves graciously, but we bought two bottles and eased our way out. We were going to bring one bottle home to give to our friends who always host a New Year’s in Paris party, but it was really heavy so we drank it. Sorry Sally and Mike.

One of the more interesting sights as we drove around Champagne was the number of trees with mistletoe...

and the fields of rape stretching to the horizon. Rape seed is the source for canola oil.

The decoration of the interior of the house was very interesting. It came with a knight in armor to keep us safe and, if he failed, we could grab a halberd from the wall to fend off any intruders.

This is the wood stove that kept our accommodations warm during our stay. The weather was much cooler than we had experienced previously. We went through a cord and a half of wood during our stay.

The side of the house we occupied, along with a photo of our first car (to be explained in a future blog).

A view of the whole house. Our hosts occupied the left side of the house and we occupied the right side of the house.

Finally in our wanderings we came across this cart, which was quite old judging from the wooden, iron clad wheels.

Now it was time for the drive to our next stop on our journey.