And on to Provence...

People always extol the variety in New Zealand’s scenery but our trip today was pretty interesting. We left Paraza on the Canal du Midi and drove north-east to St Rémy-de-Provence, south of Avignon. Via the motorway, this trip would take about two hours, but we took back roads and most of the day.

Managing to almost miss the snarl-ups of holiday traffic heading south (it was, after all, July 13^th), we arrived in Sète just in time for lunch. France’s biggest fishing port on the Mediterranean sits at the meeting place of several canals including the Canal du Midi and the Canal du Rhone. It is a bustling, colourful town with cafés and restaurants lining its quays. Fish, once again, is the main fare, which is always appealing to our family of non-carnivores.

We tracked down a Lonely Planet recommendation and had lunch on the water on board a moored barge. Both the décor and the food were divine. When on holiday in France, it’s quite easy to slip into French habits and eat a big meal at lunchtime.  Everyone else is doing it after all. We had tomato and mozzarella millefeuilles with a basil sauce and fat, juicy scallops with risotto. Well, at least we didn’t have dessert as well like all the French diners at the nearby tables.

Sète is famous not only for its seafood but also for its sport of water-jousting which has been practised here since the 1700s. We happened upon the start of a match just as we were leaving the town. Two opposing teams of men in white suits and red or blue hats (apparently the red men are married and the blue are unmarried) sit in heavy wooden row-boats with high platforms at the back while musicians play from the bow. As the boats are rowed frantically towards each other the man standing at the back of each boat tries to push his opponent into the water with a long wooden pole. When one of them falls in, the crowd cheers loudly, a boat motors out, a replacement team member climbs on board, the others  all move one rung up the ladder and then off they go again. After six rounds we had to leave so we never did find out how it all ends although I suspect the nearby pub may be involved.

Further north, on the edge of the Camargue, the medieval town of Aigues-Mortes, baking in the afternoon sun, also warranted a visit. Built in the 13^th century by Louis IX to provide a Mediterranean port for France, its encircling ramparts rise suddenly out of the flat marshland as you drive towards it. Flamingos wade and dip in the swampy waters nearby, their legs and the tips of their wings tinged pink from the tiny crustaceans that they are searching for. The Camargue, formed over thousands of years by sediment swept down by the River Rhone, produces most of the country’s rice harvest in its shallow rice paddies. It is also and more famously home to many herds of wild white ponies, and horse-riding is a popular activity.

At the north-eastern corner of the Camargue, just inside Provence stands the old Roman town of Arles, a highlight for even the most jaded tourist with its well-preserved amphitheatre and other spectacular monuments. Originally a Celtic settlement, it later became the Roman capital of Gaul, Britain and Spain. It was also the home of Vincent van Gogh for a time and the place where he famously cut off his ear.

You could happily spend a couple of days here but we had to move through fast as we had an appointment at the Carrière de Lumières near the village of Les Baux in the Alpilles range south of St Rémy. This sound and light show must rate up there with the best such spectacles in the world. It can’t be described but must be experienced, and all who see it are moved in some way not just by the beauty of the art but also for the sad and desperate lives of many of the artists whose works are depicted.