We are Avignon a good time!

Country south of Paris


Gates of the wall of Avignon

Place de L'Horloge. Lots of bars and cafes

Palace of the Popes

Dougal and the Magic Roundabout!!!!


The street leading to our restaurant

Time to leave Paris. We're feeling a little claustrophobic. After much tooing and froing we decide to get the very fast train to Avignon. This is in Provence and of course we should go there! I'll be glad to be out in the country.

We met a couple of Aussies at the train station, Gare Lyon, who were back from a tour of Italy and Turkey. He was obviously passionate about their travels and gave us as many tips as he could think of, all unsolicited, well, not all. They were not uninteresting though, we were appreciative. Even when people sat at the tables between us he couldn't help himself to ask us our travel intentions across their gazes.

It was REALLY cold in the station, so it was comforting to board the TFG to Avignon. It took around 2.5 hours which was too easy. I felt like we were travelling at speed through a railway model diorama, as the landscape was perpetually green fields, bordered by foliage which was all very similar in colour and texture, so it looked like the bits of foam or moss that they use on those models. The green was consistent, punctured by masses of the acid yellow of the canola fields, bordered by hedges similar to rural England . As we approached Avignon, the mountains emerged, along with the ubiquitous wind mills (??) of energy production. Every small village in France seems to have a church spire.

Avignon is gorgeous, just what you expect of Provence. It is "without doubt" the oldest town in France, with evidence of habitation 4000 yr BC. We wondered around the streets for a while and plonked ourselves in the Place de L'Horloge, a long mall with tens of cafes and bars. A performance by some local young musicians made the atmosphere perfect. They played a type of reggae/jazz/gypsy fusion which garnered lots of coins in their sax case! When they finished, a lone guy with an African drum started up.........I felt like we were in Bellingen!

On the recommendation of Cathy, here at the Bristol Hotel, we had dinner in a little restaurant in a back street. I'm not really a fan of European food, too rich, but this was the best meal yet. Obviously to get great European food you need to pay well. The day to day food we've had isn't anywhere near as good as our cafe food in Aus.

We are going to hire a car today with the intention of driving Provence and the coast to Italy. Sounds good!