Em's running away to become a mime...

We've just returned to Castellane after a road trip around Provence in Twingo (Olivier's little Renault).

The main reason we wanted to get away was to check out the Avignon Festival, which was amazing! Not only is Avignon one of the most beautiful cities we've seen, but the festival meant that the streets were full of performances, and the theatres and clubs had incredible shows on.

We could only stay in Avignon for 2 nights, but we got to check out Archaos on the first night, and Julien Cottereau, the mime from Cirque du Soleil, on the second. We thought a mime show would be easy to understand because of the lack of dialogue, and Julien was incredible... and he decided to bring Em into the show (between playing a catwalk model and a damsel in distress it was a little embarrassing!).

The other highlights of Avignon were the Popes Palace,

and the Pont d'Avignon ("sur le pont d'avignon, l'on y danse, l'on y danse..."). And yes, we dansed on 'le pont'!!


We drove through lots of small towns on the trip, but our favourites were:

Puimoisson - famous for it's lavender fields

(This was taken on the way to Puimoisson... the entire field of lavender was being harvested by hand!)

Allemagne-en-Provence - has a huge castle that is now used as a hotel


Greoux-les-Bains - in summer, Greoux uses it's old citadel (which is partly in ruins and has views over the whole town) for concerts. The old town here is huge and very intact


Manosque - the home of L'Occitane


Forcalquier - one of our very favourite stops. Amazing old town, great food, lovely people


Mane - we got snap happy in Mane. Fields of sunflowers sit infront of enormous chateaus.


Pont du Gard - a 2000 year old Roman Aqueduct that was built to carry water to Nimes. It is huge and incredible to think that they had the skills and power to build such an amazing structure


Nimes - The Ampitheater in Nimes was also built by the Romans when the area was under Roman rule. It used to house gladiator fights, but is still used today for bull fights, and also for huge concerts. We were one night too late for Goldfrapp and Depeche Mode!


Arles - the home of Van Gogh. We went to the cafe where Van Gogh painted his "Le Cafe, le Soir" in 1888.

We also saw the building which used to be the hospital that Van Gogh was a patient in after he cut off his ear. The garden in the centre of the building was painted by Van Gogh in 1889, and they've kept it looking the same today.

Aix-en-Provence - the home of Cezanne, and another big festival town. The Cezanne festival (2006 is the year of Cezanne), the Aix-en-Provence music festival, the Retro Car Rally and the Lyrical Music Festival were all on while we were in town. We went to see Cezanne's studio, the 'Secret Gardens' of Cezanne, the house where he died in Aix, and 'Jas de Bouffan' which was Cezanne's father's house. There was also a huge Cezanne exhibition on, but you needed to have a reservation to be able to buy tickets... and the reservations line was 200 people deep at 8.45am!

(Gwil re-enacting Cezanne's pose outside his studio)

St Raphael - we had planned to visit St Tropez... but had been warned that on weekends you can sit in traffic for 2 hours to get into St Tropez if it's a nice day. The sun was out, and we couldn't wait to get in the water, so headed straight to St Raphael. The water was amazingly clear, as it is along the entire Cote d'Azur, but the beach was packed! We drove from St Raphael towards Cannes, stopping at a few small bays along the way, where you can climb down steep steps to reach strips of sand and pebbles that aren't too crowded.


Mandelieu La Napoule - Right near Cannes. There is an enormous castle next to the sand, so while you swim you look back at turrets and stone walls.


Cannes - glitzy night clubs, long strips of sand, and one big tourist town!

Bastille Day

The fireworks last night in Castellane would put most NYE displays to shame. They were huge, and went for about 20 mins in front of 'Le Roc' that towers over the town... so that each time a firework lit the sky, the old church on top of the rock would be illuminated.



After the fireworks, a chanson style band hit the stage, complete with accordions. Meanwhile, in the square, young kids collected snails and raced them... I kid you not!



Today, we went on another 'explore' out of town, but took a wrong turn.

The road led us to a dead end in a tiny town. The town seemed empty, except for a sign that read "Ce ville n'est pas abandonée. " (This village is not abandoned). There wasn't much to do there... we turned around to drive back only to discover the "Holy City" of a cult! We went in to explore, and found two people inside wearing red headbands with the 'ohm' symbol on them. They invited us to come back next week for a guided tour!

Finally, in our attempt to get to the lake, we drove down an unsealed road and straight into a nudist colony! The sign at the top of the road was marked 'Centre Naturisme', and we thought it sounded like where we wanted to be. It wasn't until we saw lots of old dangly bits that we realised we were in the wrong place... Sorry, we didn't take any photos here!

Haute-Provence

After an amazing headbutt by Zidane, France's World Cup dreams were shattered by Italy... and the whole of Castellane still feels a little bit depressed, even a few days later!

(Watching the final on the big screen in the town square)

But not only did France lose at soccer, Australia lost at boules. We played in an 'official' tourament on the weekend. While we managed to beat a pair of 10 year olds (hooray!),

we lost our other 2 games - one to a very serious team of Frenchmen. It was good fun though, and we learnt that while combining Pastis and boules sounds like a great idea, it CAN hinder your game!

We've also been exploring the Haute-Provence area quite a bit. After our trip to Moustiers, we did another drive to check out the "Barrage du Castillon" (hydro-dam),


as well as some small nearby towns such as:
St-André-les-Alpes - we waited out a storm here, while we ate the best baguette we've found yet
Ubraye - right off the beaten track. encountered some hostile locals who gave us very wrong directions to get out of town!
Senez - only one very narrow bridge into town, and a cathedral with an interesting entrance policy


Moriez - tiny town with no visible inhabitants!


St-Julien-du-Verdon - town right on the dam


Entreveaux - very intact medieval town with drawbridges and a mountain top citadel


Colmars-les-Alpes - in the ski region of Provence. Entire town is inside a wall, and you drive over the alps to get there (over 2000m high!). Only 385 people live here


Annot - this town has our favourtie 'Grand Rue' of any town


Guillaumes - Gwil's very own French town, and the town even had lots of beautiful gardens!

Allez les bleus!!

We are a little bit tired today...

France beat Portugal last night in the World Cup, and the celebrations kicked on until really early this morning! Cars drove in circles beeping their horns, kids ran down the main street with flares and flags, fireworks were let off from the town's one round-a-bout, and everyone sang and cheered.



And once you thought the noise had stopped, some lone drunk Frenchman would wander the street outside our bedroom window, singing "Allez les bleus, allez les bleus..." loudly and off key!

During the match, the entire town of Castellane could be found in front of a TV. Even bartenders got cranky when you asked them to pour you a beer, as they'd have to take their eyes off the game! It was great to be here to help celebrate - we are now honorary French supporters! (Allez les bleus!)

The highlight of this week in Castellane, is a boules tournament that's happening on Friday night. We've bought a boules set, and have been practicing in the town square! But I don't know how we'll go competing against some of the older men here in town... they're all REALLY good! Marie-Therese's father has offered us coaching, so we'll let you know how we go.


(this is who we're up against! hahaha!)

Nous aimons les vacances

We checked out Castellane's only nightclub (la discothèque) on the weekend. It's called 'Moulin' and is a short drive out of town.... meaning that either someone has to stay sober... or that you take the backroads coming home!



The music in the club was lots of Bob Sinclair and cheesy French house. But while the music may have been average, the atmosphere made up for it. But when drinking in Castellane, you have to remember that everyone knows everyone else - so you can never do something embarrassing anonymously! (not that we would, of course!)

Marie-Therese is still wonderful. She has lent us her car so that we can explore Provence. Yesterday we drove to see the lake at Verdon (Ste-Croix), and a small town called Moustiers.



We are fitting right into to the pace of small town Provence. Shops close every day for lunch, usually from midday until 3pm. Everyone says bonjour as they pass in the street. And once the shops re-open at 3pm, it's time for a pain au chocolat from the boulangerie across the road!



In the hotel, we've been trying to help out as much as possible. Gwil's done some gardening, and Em's done some translating, but there isn't a huge amount of work right now. Not that we're complaining...

Provence

This is the area that we live in at the moment...