Recently I went to Fontaine de Vaucluse.
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| The town of Fontaine de Vaucluse. |
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| A view of the town from the river. |
Its only about half an hour
away by bus. The village is truly, disgustingly beautiful. It it set
against a backdrop of mountains with the Sorgue river running fast and clear
all through it. Fontaine de Vaucluse is the village that the
renaissance
poet Petrarch lived in, and you can see the church were he met his
famous muse, Laura. The church 11th century church is impressive less
for its architecture than for its age. Of the many churches I have been
in it is one of the oldest that still retains all of its original
construction. Fontaine de Vacluse is clearly a popular tourist
destination, especially for the locals, however it has a nice carnival
atmosphere to it, rather than being an expensive tourist trap.
The way
along the river to the main attraction of Fontain de Vacluse, the source
of the Sorgue river, is lined with stalls selling souvenirs: clothing, hats,
the famous scented soaps or the region, sweets, and postcards. All manner
of nick-knacks. Most things were pretty reasonably priced too. The
walk up to the source wasn't too look and it beautiful.
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| A pool in the Sorgue river |
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| A fine view of the river Sorgue. |
Because of all
the rain, the Sorgue was very full. It was rushing and cascading around
rocks in white rapids. The Sorgue is supposed to come out from a cave,
and when the water is lower I think you can go down and a bit into it.
The water was so high when I was there that it simply seemed the be
coming right from the bottom of the cliff. The pool was deep, clear,
and very cold! The path along the Sorgue up to the source is very easy
and pretty smooth, it should be accessible to just about anyone, even
small children or people in wheelchairs.
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| Old machines for making paper. |
There is also a Stanton museum and a Petrarch museum, which I didn't
go into, as well as a water powered paper mill that is still used to
make paper, and the remains of a very old castle. I went in the paper
mill and climbed up to the castle. The paper mill is attached to a larger
artisans village, there are a number of artisans sell glass works,
jewelry, candies and other things. The paper mill is still working and
you can watch the paper being made, which you can then buy if you so
please in the calligraphy shop that is attached to the mill.
My final stop was the old castle. It is up on the cliffs overlooking
the Sorgue, and the way up is steep and a bit rocky. The climb is
beautiful and offers a wonderful view. The castle is mostly destroyed,
just a few walls are left, but still interesting to see. It looked like
there were more trails around the cliffs than just the one that lead up
to the castle, but I didn't have time to explore them all.
I would definitely recommend Fontaine de Vaucluse to anyone traveling
in Provence. It is a great place for the whole family to visit.
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| A view of the castle ruins. |
Next I planned to go to Stes. Maries de la Mer again, but when I got to
Arles I found out that the bus I was going to take doesn't start
running until the end of May. So I had to wait for the later bus a bit
after noon. I went into Arles to pass the time as I has about two hours
to kill.
I started wandering around a bit, saw the Arena again, St.
Triomphe, then I found that an enormous market had popped up in Arles. It
seemed like every huckster in Provence was there!
I wandered through
the market in a combination of curiosity and became lost!
I couldn't find my
way out in time and missed the noon bus, but by that time I realized I
was really very tired anyway, so I wandered around Arles a bit more and
then just came back to Avignon and took a nap. I'll go to Stes. Maries
some other time.
