Category: General (Page 15 of 37)

Planes, Trains & Automobiles – Pt 3 St Louis & Bardstown, Kentucky

6 January 2020 / Juliet Stratton

We left the endless flat prairie land – clapperboard houses with long driveways through the fields and white log fencing that reminded us of Little House on the Prairie and headed into Kentucky and Bardstown, rolling hills of greenery and forests, dotted with roadkill every few miles – deer, squirrels and badgers. It was so green and gently hilly that it is likened to Oxfordshire and we can see that.

When planning this part of the trip, several web sites recommended three days in the area with a visit to 4 or 5 distilleries each day with a designated non-drinking driver of course. Each visit offers a tasting, and each distillery is several miles apart even though on the maps they look close together so we managed 3 in one day and 2 in another. This was hampered (in a lovely way) by the fact that we had met a lovely couple, he was from Coventry (of all places!) and she was American, and they helped us feel like locals, plying us with alcohol and food at night! Their hospitality went beyond anything we had experienced before, we were introduced to dignitaries in the town and to a chief plant engineer at another distillery that we were then invited to for a private tour, but we really did run out of time….and never got to see him and his brewery.

We stopped a few days in an old town called Bardstown, and on the Sunday night, stopped at The Old Talbott Tavern, built in 1779 and recognised as the oldest western stagecoach stop in America, the hotel part is said to be haunted! European Americans settled here in 1780, Bardstown is the second oldest city in Kentucky, the town was formally established in 1788.

9 Bourbon Distilleries in 1 Town!

In 1789, Baptist minister Elijah Craig pretty much saved the American soul when he developed America’s signature spirit – bourbon. Since the first barrel was produced over 200 years ago, it’s helped build the lives of Bardstown residents who’ve earned their living by distilling America’s native spirit. Established by European Americans in 1780, Bardstown is the second oldest city in Kentucky county.

Today, visitors can tour Bardstown’s nine distilleries as well as enjoying bourbon entertainment, bourbon-inspired dining, bourbon history, and bourbon shopping.

The distillery tours were all different.

We started at Heaven Hill, America’s largest family owned and operated distilling company, home to Larceny, Elijah Craig and Rittenhouse (our 3 tasters) as well as Evan Williams, Fighting Cock, Georgia Moon, Henry McKenna, Mellow Corn, Old Fitzgerald and Pikesville Bourbons ; a small batch brewery where they still regularly roll the barrels in storage and hold a competition to practice the art of barrel rolling and loading in a purpose built area outside.

At the Jim Beam factory, we watched traditional barrels being loaded into the “rickhouses” where the barrels are stored. We were able to dip our fingers into the “mash” and taste the sweet malty liquid before it is distilled; we watched the distilling control room monitoring the flow of liquid before it emerges as a clear flow of “wine”, it’s then poured into barrels, stored for several years before emerging a deep red colour. We tasted Knob Creek straight from the barrel, before David enjoyed dipping a bottle of bourbon into the red wax to seal it. He picked his own bottle, washed it in watered down bourbon, put it into the bottling plant and collected it the other end, full and stoppered.

Jim Beam is also home to Basil Haydens, Bookers, Bakers as well as Knob Creek.

On to Maker’s Mark distillery, this was a small scale operation, set in lovely landscaped gardens and buildings that were established by the owner’s wife (Mrs Burks) back in 1815 after Mr Burks built a water powered grain mill on the site in 1805. All the processes were visible, all operational and all original, including printing their own labels! We could taste the mash in a wooden open barrel, and saw the large brewing vats. The tasting was interesting, here we learned all about adding a drop of water to the bourbon, how it changed the molecules and therefore the taste.

Again, David was able to dip his own bottle, this time the process was heavily “health and safety” aware!

Next we visited Barton 1792, established in 1879 and the oldest running distillery in Kentucky, and distilled with water from its own spring a few miles away. It is called 1792 after the year Kentucky became an official state of the USA, based on the original distillery, Ridegwood Reserve, which was also established in 1792. It’s now owned by a large conglomerate which also produce Glenmore and Buffalo Trace.

However, the most varied tasting was in the “whole county of Kentucky” where David tried every different one he could, whilst he could!

St Louis

We stopped for two days in St Louis, pronounced, St Lewis to us Brits! It’s in the county of Missouri along the Mississippi River. Its 630-ft. Gateway Arch, built in the 1960s, honors the early 19th-century explorations of Lewis and Clark and America’s westward expansion, a fascinating bone shaking tram ride to the top and then a video show and tour of the museum below round off the trip.

Replica paddle steamers are found on the river, and the Soulard district is home to barbecue restaurants and bars playing blues music. The Cardinals (baseball at Busch Gardens) and NFL (hockey) are based here, as well as the America’s Centre, a huge arena full of sporting memorabilia and a Walk of Fame on the pavements outside.

Views from the top of the Arch

Planes, Trains & Automobiles – Pt 2, Chicago, Route 66 & Santa Claus

17 December 2019 / Juliet Stratton

Chicago Town

We took the Amtrak train from Detroit to Central Station in Chicago, a lovely relaxing journey of about 5 hours in a spaciously comfortable, clean and quiet train that sped through city suburbs, fields, forests and endless rolling plains, alongside rivers and ending up circling the bottom part of Lake Michigan before heading up to Chicago.

We had booked an apartment right in the centre of Chicago, modern and comfortable, right beside a huge shopping centre and residential skyscraper called Water Tower Place, which was home to a Ritz Hotel, 2 schools, 8 levels of shops, a theatre, restaurants and the first vertical “mall” in the world.

The original Water Tower used to pump water all over the City, it’s now a museum.

Being our first night in the City, I went up onto the roof terrace of our apartment block and admired the view, an enjoyable voyeuristic look into night time activities in other apartment blocks! I didn’t stay there long, it was very cold, by this time about minus 2c!

That evening we headed into the City and immediately came across an iconic restaurant called The Pancake House, a bizzarely built subterranean structure, made famous by the Big Bang Theory, we just had to stop and go in. We had almost got used to large American plates of food, until we ordered 4 shared starters off the menu – they were sooo big we could only manage a shared dessert afterwards, no mains!!

As we only really had 48 hours here, Chicago was explored again on a tourist trambus, a bus made to look like an old tram with the driver giving running commentary. The Old Navy Pier is a pier jutting out into the Lake, full of restaurants and entertainment facilities, I’m sure it would be heaving in the summer but very empty in the cold winter.

It had started to snow just after we arrived, it was soooo cold!! We saw the Trump building, one of many, right on the edge of the financial part of the city. We rode down Wacker Drive and Clinton Street, and around the Magnificent Mile, where you have to make an appointment to gain entry into the exclusive boutique shops and luxury fashion outlets. We drove past the first McDonalds and RainForest Cafe, both started in Chicago.

We were also amazed at the number of large parks in the city, Millenium, Wicker, Grant, Hyde and Lincoln Park which has its own zoo.

We collected our hire car the next morning, a vehicle the Americans call a “caravan” – 6 seater people carrier to you and me and trudged through the sludgy snow to the start of Route 66 for the obligatory photo – ready for the next part of the journey.

Our Amtrak Journey

The Pancake House & other Chicago views

Route 66 – Chicago to Springfield

Route 66 was the old original road from Chicago in the east to Santa Monica on the Pacific coast in the west, build by a series of Federal Highways Acts completed in 1926 and was the largest public works project ever undertaken in the USA. It helped distribute the population from areas affected most by the Great Depression to new areas in the west. During 1945 to 1965 many businesses sprung up along the road to support the travelers – restaurants, motels, hotels, service stations, novelty shops as well as small towns to support the workers.

Its total length is 2488 miles but we only travelled 220 miles of it. The Mother Road as it’s called is one continuous road but signs send you off, through towns along the route, to stop at iconic restaurants, hot dog stalls, donut shops, novelty sellers and “diners” galore! 220 miles should theoretically take you 3.5 hours but we took all day, stopping off at an Armish village store to buy apple and toffee flavoured popcorn and homemade peanut butter (with marshmallows!!), another stop to look at hundreds of classic American cars in a dealers (we had hoped to hire one but insurance charges kill that option) and several stops at silly road side signs.

One evening we had booked into “Route 66 Hotel and Conference Centre” expecting a modern hotel maybe with a spa or pool, tastefully decorated, with a museum dedicated to Route 66. The first sign of this not meeting our expectations was the old car and motorbike in front of the reception doors. Decaying, broken windows, paint peeling….that was just the car. The rooms were off a V shaped corridor, internal rooms with glass windows, covered in curtains, looking into the corridor. The corridors were flowing with vintage posters, photos, newspaper cutting, cigarette and vending machines from the 60’s.

So, we entered the room, pulled back the curtains and found…….brown nylon carpet, brown blankets and bedcovers (no sign of a plush cotton covered duvet here), dark brown hotel furniture and a white dial up glow in the dark phone!!! It hadn’t been touched since the 70’s although I’m sure it was clean, it was just too dark to see!!!!!!!!

Sadly, the restaurant on site was a hang out for youngsters playing fruit machines so we ate out that night, at a popular chain called “Steak and Shake”, turned out to be a limited burger menu but a huge milkshake menu, shame none of tried one! We needed alcohol to help us sleep in the brown rooms 🙂

Santa Claus – A true story of Christmas!

We stopped for lunch at Santa Claus, a perpetual Christmas town, just before Bardstown! It has a large store that sells Christmas paraphernalia all year, except when it’s closed January to March for re-stocking!! Lunch was a pleasant buffet of pizza and salad, relatively cheap at $7 per head, before we bought a few items in the Christmas shop. The town was oddly dotted with larger than life sized images of Santa….made us all smile.

The high street is called Christmas Boulevard. The main development – where most of the town’s 2,500 people live – is called Christmas Lake Village. In the gated community, which began in the 1960s, the main streets are named after the three wise men – Melchior, Balthazar, and Kaspar.

Others roads are named after Rudolph’s reindeer – take a left down Prancer Drive and you hit Vixen Lane – while one street is simply called Chestnut by the Fire. In Santa Claus, Indiana, it’s Christmas 365 days a year.

In the 19th Century, the town was called Santa Fee, but, when residents applied for a post office, they were asked to pick another name – it sounded too similar to Santa Fe, 200 miles north.

On Christmas Eve, the residents of Santa Fee got together to try to pick a new name. They sat round a potbelly stove when, suddenly, the doors blew open. A little girl, after seeing the doors open, heard bells. “It’s Santa Claus!” she gasped, and that was that.

Around 1914, they started receiving children’s letters to Santa Claus – and the town, led by postmaster James Martin, started replying. The post office now receives 20,000 letters every year, from all over America and the world. Most are addressed to the PO Box, but some envelopes simply say: Santa Claus, North Pole.

The person in charge of replying is the Chief Elf, Pat Koch. She is 86, has degrees in nursing and theology (the latter earned aged 70), and brims with human spirit, not just Christmas spirit. Mrs Koch (pronounced Cook) leads a team of around 200 volunteers. They read the letters, take a printed reply, fill in the child’s name, and add a personal message, sending them off just before Christmas!

Planes, Trains & Automobiles – Pt 1 New York & Detroit

17 December 2019 / Juliet Stratton

In October, Samson was put into storage in Spain, together with our friends Mike and Brenda’s motorhome. Anything attractive to ants (the bane of our life along with mozzies) has been double wrapped and packed away or dumped! Samson was to be cared for by a Dutch family, surrounded by several large Alsations and Doberman(s) in a 10 foot walled and fenced enclosure, wedged between caravans and boats, safe as houses!

For those who didn’t know how this trip evolved, we made friends with Mike and Brenda in Portugal, about 18 months ago. They mentioned a trip to Detroit to a 5 day Motown musical event, in about a year’s time and asked if we wanted to join them, we said that sounds great! Last autumn, they added in a wedding event after Mike proposed! It was booked for Friday during the Motown A Go Go, so we became part of the wedding party!

David and I decided to continue our stay in America after Detroit and do a short trip on Route 66 and down to Kentucky for David to experience the genuine Bourbon trail, being a bourbon fan! Mike and Brenda asked to join us on this part, we said sounds great! Cheapest flights were with Norwegian Air from Barcelona to New York so a 5 day stay in the Big Apple came first. **We can highly recommend Norwegian Air, Dreamliner planes, and option to bid to upgrade from economy to Premium class and superb service.

Our flight left Barcelona airport on time on the 16th October 2019 and flew through the afternoon, arriving in New York at 9pm, to a blustery and wet evening! We finally returned on the 12th November, heavier, wiser, happier, more knowledgeable and much much lighter in pocket!!

This blog is mainly pictures with a short write up about each stop during our trip, we experienced so much that it would take months to write about! We hope you enjoy the pictures, as much as we enjoyed taking them!!

Our route over October and November 2019.

New York, New York – so good they named it twice!!

We arrived in New York’s Newark airport on a wet windy evening and got into a taxi to our Hotel in Newark just a few miles away. Newark is opposite the island of New York so we negotiated the numerous transport options each day and made it to Times Square on one day, and “Downtown” another day. To us Europeans or Brits, Downtown is an area outside the City, in America Downtown is the City! We left Penn Station Newark and arrived at Penn Station NY! Confused? Yes, we were too!

Standing opposite Macy’s store one day (the store takes up a whole block) Mike and David negotiated a 3 day pass on a tourist bus, a brilliant idea when we realised how BIG New York is!! We thought we would just wander up to Central Park, head down to the financial district, sail down the Hudson River or trot over Brooklyn Bridge to Brooklyn.

Yeah!! Right!! A block takes several minutes to walk and take into account stopping and turning to check out and watch every ambulance, fire engine and police car crawling past, getting neck ache from looking up at all the immensely tall buildings, and the sights, smells and sounds that invade and overload all the senses, walking just half a mile took well over an hour!!

The bus ride took us one route “Uptown”, through the theatre district, up the edge of Central Park, through the posh Washington Heights, through dodgy Harlem, and back down Museum Mile, passing the American Guggenheim, Central Park zoo , Carnegie Hall and Times Square!

Route 2 was “Downtown”, Times Square, Rockerfeller Centre, Macys, Empire State Building, Flatiron Building, Soho, Little Italy, China Town, Canal Street, City Hall, Garment District, Meat Packing District, Chelsea and the port of New York.

Route 3 was a mix of the above plus areas like Upper West Side, the Bronx, East Harlem and Midtown.

We crossed the Hudson River one evening just as sun was setting, to tour around the Statue of Liberty and saw New Jersey and Brooklyn in the background on the horizon.

We visited all the usual tourist buildings – we had to! We gawped at the size of Macy’s and Bloomingdales (didn’t actually have time to go into them), went up the viewing platform on floor 89 of the Empire State building, paid an emotional visit to the eerily quiet 9/11 monuments, went to Madison Square Gardens to see if anything was on (it wasn’t) and marveled at Broadway, attending a matinee showing of Phantom of the Opera at the Majestic Theatre.

We saw some very strange things – hot dog stalls on every street corner and steam vents in the roads (as you see in the films), a group of about 150 stake boarders snaking down a road on a Sunday morning, and every nationality you could ever imagine wearing all sorts of different types and styles of clothes.

So how would I describe New York? Its clean, friendly, noisy, unruffled, happy, busy, easy going, beautiful, eerie, fashionable, structured, and amazing!!!

Images from the top of the Empire State Building, approx. 4pm until sunset

Statue of Liberty trip & other pics

Mike placing his order with the NYPD, a night in the cells!

Images from the 7/11 Monument

Motor Town Detroit

What a different 2 hours makes in American weather! We flew to Detroit, a short 2 hour journey and arrived to sunshine and a bit of warmth. Our hotel was just outside town so we discovered the delights of UBER drivers over the next week.

Detroit is named “motor city” where car production and manufacture “made the city”. Ford, Chrysler, GMC, all started here but as production was killed off in the 1960s or 70s, the city took a huge downturn, became a bed of riots, rotting buildings, derelict factories, unemployment and dire living. The other thing Detroit was famous for, and this is what has helped the rebirth of Detroit, is Motown music, where Berry Gordy lived at the time, created a recording studio and where he created his empire of record labels that made people like Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye and the Temptations famous.

Berry had worked on a production line at Ford, realised the advantages and benefits of well skilled, smart, organised teams and applied this method of working to his artistes. If anyone fell below his standards they didn’t make it. His first house, bought by him and turned into a recording studio, is now the Motown Museum, along with the neighbouring 8 houses with displays of personal items, his original apartment, musical instruments and memorabilia given to him by his stars.

We had a tour of the museum, which was fascinating. One afternoon we visited a house that Berry Gordy once owned for a private party. The house is now owned by a local paint artist who is trying to keep the house as original as possible, however he had covered over the swimming pool and put away all the antiques!

The Motown event was amazing, although I have to confess that I was born after most of the artistes sprung onto the scene! Every evening we were entertained with old Motown musicians, I will attach a copy of the event’s line up, easier than trying to remember them all!

We took time out during the day to explore the city, we walked along the sea front and looked over the river at Canada. We visited an area in Downtown that is simply full of restaurants and casinos, we spent an afternoon at a museum where the original Ford Models A to T were made, before the production became too big for the building and they moved to a huge premises out of town. Our guide was an ex-Ford worker and very obviously took pride in still being involved. The collection of all working models from A to T is the only one in the world. Note : they ALL run!! The museum is sometimes used as a wedding venue, and was recently patronised by the current Ford family, who held a wedding on the top floor.

Detroit is an interesting city, being modernised and updated, with a large financial section in the heart of the city, and everyone we met was pleasant, polite, friendly, helpful and very interested in talking to us.

Because of the wedding itself, we felt like one big family, people came up to us to congratulate the bride and groom, people who turned out to be old Motown singers, or band players or someone who knew someone in a Motown band – the connections were there even down to an Uber driver we had one day who used to play in a supporting band!! We felt humbled by their pride in the improvements in their life and city, it was a relaxing, happy stay during our week in Detroit.

Autumn Roses

13 October 2019 / Juliet Stratton / 0 Comments

We have spent the past 6 weeks in a lovely seaside town called Roses, in Spain, just over the French/Spanish border and have very much been acting like tourists, cycling along the prom, eating in the local tapas bars, chatting to other British caravanners about the occasional thunderstorm or windy day we were having, or swimming in the Med or the pool. But. … same as in the UK, autumn has arrived! Just not on such a grand scale!!

The nights are drawing in, getting dark by 7.30pm, mornings are darker until sunrise at 7.30am and evenings are a little chilly, resulting in the reappearance of my faithful fleece! Another downside to this weather, is the abundance of flies during the day and bloomin mosquitos in the evening! They drive David mad!! Me, the flies just annoy, and the mozzies feed a family of 20 on me, so frequent applications of anthisan are a regular occurrence after dark! I hope our neighbours have not heard the frequent cries of “oh, you b**tard, David, quick, rub here!”

This will be our last post for a few weeks, as we are jetting off to the USA with friends Mike and Brenda. We are flying from Barcelona to New York, spending 5 days there, then flying to Detroit, arriving on my birthday!

In Detroit we will be joining a few hundred others at “Motown A GoGo”, a celebration of Motown bands and singers, organised by a British man and held in the area famous for the Motown museum and Berry Gordi’s recording studios. On Friday 25th we will attend Mike and Brenda’s wedding, along with a few others, being performed in one of the actual studios.

After the wedding, we are taking an Amtrak train to Chicago, spending a few days there, before collecting a hire car and driving down part of Route 66, to St Louis, and Louisville, where we will pick up the Bourbon trail. Here we will no doubt visit a few distilleries, sampling their wares, maybe even purchasing some!!! From Louisville we head across to Indianapolis before heading north back up to Chicago. We fly back to New York and Barclona mid November, where we head south, so news updates will continue….

Sunset on Roses beach
A sundowner??? Don’t mind if I do!
Beautiful pink sky over the campsite bar
Empuriabrava beach one Sunday afternoon
Roses Bay from the mountains behind
Off roading to achieve the best views.

One day we took our snorkelling gear to Montjoi Bay, a secluded bay a little further around the coast, and spent the day at this deserted beach. At one point in the afternoon, there were a dozen people there, most had arrived on yachts or canoes! The water was cool, but not particularly clear, not many fish there, despite us taking tasty bread rolls along.

Montjoi beach
David contemplating going in
Next bay along.

One day, we took a ride out with Mike and Brenda to the local Hyper shopping mall, and found this amazing Cadillac, reminding us that we are just weeks away from our visit to the USA.

Brenda and I also visited Salvador Dali’s museum in Figueres, housed in an old theatre that burned down, so Dali purchased it, renovated it and used the interior to display his artwork, paintings, drawings, ceramics and jewels.

David, Mike, Brenda, Me and a Cadillac!
A beautiful house in Figueres
Dali’s Museum
Brenda on her way up!
One of Dali’s famous jewels
And another….
And another….
His most famous…..
The centre piece in the interior of the museum.

One of Dali’s most unknown works is called “Explosion of Mystical Faith in the midst of the Cathedral” and is worth studying, the photos probably don’t do it justice. Its a stunning piece of artwork, which Dali worked on for 15 years (1959 – 1974) and is still claimed to be “unfinished”, showing the virgin saint surrounded by a nebula. The second painting shows his first attempt that was used as his “study” attempt, without the layers or colour and depth of bodies.

Superman enjoying some beach time!!! OK, you can breathe out now!!!
One of the beautiful bays in this area.
And another, we have done plenty of off roading to achieve these views!

France – Mid to South, and To The Sun

21 September 2019 / Juliet Stratton / 0 Comments

Lyon

It transpires that Lyon was a Roman town called Lugdunum, capital of the area called Gaul.

It is also the second largest city on France, after Paris, and we can now agree with that having only explored one area of it. It’s a sprawling city, split up by the River Soane and the Rhone, creating a huge island in the middle, but with very old historic parts of Fouviere which overlooks the whole city. It has 9 different “areas” – called arondissements, as in Paris.

Its also probably one of few cities that we have visited that have a Cathedral, and a Basilica, as well as about a dozen churches!

We firstly visited the Saint Jean Cathedral on the banks of the River Soane, a huge stone building in a square, which was first built in 1180 on the remains of a 7th century church and completed in 1476. It is a familiar sight in France, a Gothic exterior, all internal stone columns, stone roof and stone towers and quite plain internally with very little decoration.

Sant Jean Square looking up to the Basilica
The Ancient clock.

The cathedral homes the Lyon Astronomical Clock from the 14th century and an organ installed in 1841 with 15 stops but it was rebuilt in 1875 and given 30 stops, three keyboards of 54 notes and pedals for 27.

Along the River is also a Saint George Church and Saint Paul church!

Sant Jean Cathedral, Basilica at the top of the hill, Palais of Justice to the right of the Church.

We then took a funicular to the top of Mount Just to visit the Basilica, which was a different building altogether. Originally built by the Romans in 1192, rebuilt during the 16th century and extended during 1872 and 1896, and maintained to this day by a monetary pledge from the Aldermen of the City as well as public donations. In 1852 the gilded statue of the Virgin Mary was erected on a bell tower, it was dedicated to Mary in 1896 and in 1897, recognised as a Basilica Minor by Pope Pie IX after recognising the Church’s importance in Lyon.

Huge columns of marble, mosaic floors, stained glass windows and massive wall paintings touched with gold and mosaics. It certainly was an impressive building, and can be seen from most aspects of the city below, it dominates the sky line.

Ornate ceiling
Ceiling in detail
One of the wall paintings
Floor mosaics

We also walked down the hill of Fouviere, to the Roman ruins of the original Forum, the name comes from “forum vetus/old town”, a large preserved area of buildings, two arenas, and several old thermal baths and the water storage tanks. One of the Arenas has been sympathetically restored and is used for concerts and plays. The ruins themselves are not some of the best we have seen, but are certainly the biggest we have seen so far.

Down in the old town, the medieval narrow streets are cobbled and wind around the foot of the hill. Because buildings were tall and narrow (built between the 1500s and 1800s), an architect was requested to construct a way to connect two buildings to make access easier and “Traboules” were created. They are often stone spiral staircases leading to covered or open walkways and corridors, all at a high level. The houses are maybe 4 to 6 storeys high, so the traboules were sometimes covered in.

The other side of the city is modern, sprawling and a grey concrete jungle, neat, clean and organised.

We took a drive to the top of Mount Thau, which at 593M above sea level overlooks the City with amazing views!

Avignon

An overnight stay in a campsite on a private island on the Rhone on the banks of Avignon, what could sound more romantic???

The reality was sadly diferent, a large untidy open site, Reception closed between noon and 4.00pm, pitches the furthest point from the entrance, overhanging trees, no water or drainage on the pitches and thousands of mosquitos and stink bugs! We used the late afternoon and evening to head into Avignon for the rest of the day and made the most of our time there.

We couldn’t go into Avignon and NOT visit the famous bridge! Access is through part of the gatehouse and the history is told through a handset, allowing you to walk to the end of the bridge.

Its only 4 arches long now but when it was built between 1177 and 1185 it was 22 arches long and wooden, but wars, time and the River Rhone have washed them away and all that remains now are the small parts jutting into the River. It was rebuilt in the 12th century, in stone with a chapel on one of the piers, but fighting the river was a major issue, hence it’s shortness.

Looking back at the City
An image of how the original bridge looked in 1100s

The walled City has several large impressive buildings surrounding a public square which came alive at night, the Palais des Papes was a beautiful stone building, with the Basilica Notre Dame des Doms next to it, the views as the sun was setting were amazingly colourful.

The Cathedral and Palais
The Palais
Square at night
Sunset from the Cathedral

Narbonne

Finally we reached Narbonne on the South coast, a town and camp site we have visited several times, beside the Etangs (marsh lakes) and in prime wine country! We stopped here a few nights to catch our breath and catch up on regular chores.

David dipped into the pool on site, not for long, as it was freezing!

We finally left France for the pretty town of Roses, just over the border in Spain.