Paris to Avignon and Nimes - Day 19

Our journey to the south of France began with a fast train, the TGV, from Paris to Avignon in the Provence region, hurtling along at up to 300kmh.

On arrival in Avignon we hopped on our bus and headed to the pretty village of Chateauneuf de Pape (literally meaning "new castle of the Pope", from the papal residence located there in medieval times), where we visited a winery to hear about and taste their famous wine.

Afterwards we went to Pont du Gard, a three level arch spanning a river that was built by the Romans as part of a 49km aqueduct system built around 19 BC providing water to the Roman town that is called Nimes (pronounced Neem) today. 35 arches straddling the aqueducts 275m long upper tier supporting a watercourse designed to carry 20,000 cubic metres of water per day.

We then travelled to Nimes and checked into our Hotel, the Hotel Imperator. Nimes is quite a lovely little city, and our hotel was historic but was quite old and in need of a revamp.Read more