Day 142 Walls, Graves and Canals!

Friday 10/08/2018 (Day 55 SZ) Appart'City Nîmes 364, allée de l’Amérique Latine, Nîmes, 30900, France

Today’s adventure took us to a few different locations and it actually turned out to be a huge day.

We started at Aigues Mortes which unbeknown to us is a Medieval fortified Citadel, just blew us away as we drove into the normal township with the streets lined with beautiful flower gardens. Seeing the canals beside us and huge trees lining the streets right to the door of this massive fortified walls with Ramparts standing tall and solid holding all the walls around the city as it’s called no but really a village! Inside it is very touristy with heaps of bars, restaurants and tourist shops... outside when we pulled up into yep a paid vacation park nothing free anywhere it’s in the Salt marshes amongst the grass lands but next to it was the most amazing soft punk salt Lake so, so pretty but you couldn’t get close enough to it as it as fenced off and high grass lands around it...this is where a drone would be fantastic to use.... they actually mine this lake and if we had the time could have checked out the mine as well but we don’t have time..

Next to the walled city is the canals and on canals are the all the canal boats and cruisers sitting waited by to be hired and taken up and down the canals just read they can go 140 ks takes 15 locks and takes 1 week to cruise it... you could see people on the boats relaxing, they must have hired them, just looked funny with them underneath the bridge area relaxing with traffic non stop going up and over the bridge and along the walled city to the salt marsh area... very busy spot so I still wonder how they got to relax... I loved the pink Lake and as we entered the city the unreal smell of the food coming from inside the Medieval village had my hunger bug going one to the dozen, all we got was a little cake to share and a cuppa and on our way.... I could have spent days exploring here just love, love, loved it..they even had flower pots on the bridge, massive tall layer flower pots around the walled city and outside it as well and a massive huge beautiful carousel that I would have lived to had a ride on...

Aigues Mortes, was founded in the thirteenth century and famous since the first crusades in the time of King Louis IX. The waterways in this region, set between the sea and the Camargue countryside has the salt marshes of the Midi that have surrounded the city of Aigues Mortes since the Middle Ages. There are excellent beaches and swimming in the Mediterranean at Grau du Roi, Palavas-les-Flots at the Grande Motte or in Carnon. They offer horse riding in Franquevaux which we pulled up near after leaving checking out a massive birds nest on top of a tower.
There are supposed to be fields of wild bulls and horses and Flamingo spotting on the famous Etang de Thau lagoon. But we never got to see any sadly...

From here we headed towards St Gilles where we had lunch then went exploring and looking for the old Cathedral L’Abbatiale De Saint Gilles.
(Info thanks to Wiki) According to the legend, it was founded in the 7th century by Saint Gilles, over lands which had been given him by the Visigoth King Wamba after he had involuntarily wounded the saint during a hunt. The monastery was initially dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul: however, in the 9th century, the dedication was changed to St. Giles himself, who had become one of the most venerated figures in the area. His relics were housed in the abbey church and attracted numerous pilgrims. In the 11th century, the monastery was attached to that of Cluny. Thanks to its prosperity, it was enlarged and decorated from the 12th to the 15th century, when the cloister was finished. In the 16th century the church, in the course of the Wars of Religion, was devastated when the Huguenots took shelter in it. Restorations were held in the 17th century and again, after further damage during the French Revolution, in the 19th century. The tomb of St. Giles was rediscovered in 1865, becoming again a pilgrim destination from 1965. The village itself as interesting with its narrow alleys and unreal doors... another great sight we had to do a quick look and head on...

Next stop was The L’Abbaye Trogodytique De Saint Roman at Beaucaire, this amazing sight was very similar to the monk cemeteries we saw in Croatia a huge rock formation coming out of the ground and nearly every square inch of it has been carved with dug our graves in the rock... all over the top and inside its caves.....we actually soent a fair amount of time here it was so interesting.

Info thanks to Wiki
The Abbey of Saint-Roman (Abbaye de Saint-Roman), is a cave monastery located in the communes of Beaucaire and Comps, in the Gard département of France.
The site, which includes the ruins of a castle, the château de Saint-Roman-d'Aiguille, has been protected by the French Ministry of Culture as a monument historique since 1990 and includes a chapel, cloisters, terrace, tombs and walls. It was constructed in the 9th, 10th, 12th and 15th centuries. The abbey is reached by a signposted path from Beaucaire which leads past a vast chamber and the monks’ cells to the chapel carved out of the rock which contains the tomb of St Roman. From the terrace, there is a fine view over the Rhône, Avignon and the Mont Ventoux area with Tarascon in the foreground. The Michelin Guide describes it "a site of captivating simplicity".

The surrounding scenery was just unreal valley below was worth the climb by itself with out the cave Monastery. Then as we drove away we could see a huge dam with quite a large amount of water being let go from its gates from here you could see more of the the canal and locks. The whole area was so interesting... but off we speed to the next location.

La Tour Philippe Le Bel seeing the Tower, then Fort and Abbey Saint Andrè both in Villeneuve les Avignon, we didn’t get to go into this as it was closing time, but just looking at it was interesting enough....

(Info from Wiki) Tour Philippe-le-Bel (English: Tower of Philip the Fair) is a medieval tower in Villeneuve-lès-Avignon which marked the French terminus of the Saint-Bénézet Bridge across the Rhone between the Kingdom of France and Papal territory of Avignon. It is named after the French king Philippe-le-Bel (Philip IV "the Fair") who was responsible for its construction.

A tower with only two storeys was completed in 1302. In spite of protests from the Count of Provence and the population of Avignon, Philippe-le-Bel pressed ahead and built a gatehouse at the end of the bridge. The tower and gatehouse formed part of a fortress with a curtain wall that enclosed several buildings including a chapel and a residence for the châtelain. A third storey was added to the tower in the middle of the 14th century. The Saint-Bénézet Bridge was abandoned in 1669 and the fortress then ceased to serve any useful function. The French crown continued to pay for repairs, but after the French Revolution the buildings were abandoned and allowed to fall into ruins. In 1822 the town of Villeneuve-lès-Avignon decided to demolish all of the fortress except the present tower. It was listed as a Monument historique in 1862 and is now open to the public.

From the La Tour w had to drive up further to find a parking space, again somehow we ended up in the another Medieval township I am sure we will hav heaps of fines once him for being in forbidden areas..there are signs but being in French or Italian we don’t understand them.... Hence why we end up in the wrong spot

We eventually found a spot then se off on foot to find the Fort and Abbey Saint Andrè another wow place it’s massive and yet another fortified medieval city walled community. As we wound our Amy Brough yet again another unreal village with amazing alleys and sights abounding, at a higher level we could actually see the Papal Palace it was as if not bigger than this fortified city... but a lot more glamous... it as across the Rhone River and yet again sadly no Tim to look at it closely just had to see it in the distance....

(Info thanks to Wiki)The Fort Saint-André is a medieval fortress in the commune of Villeneuve-lès-Avignon in the Gard département of France, dating from the first half of the 14th century. The treaty of Paris, signed in 1229 at the end of the Albigensian Crusade, handed the French crown land to the west of the Rhone from Pont-Saint-Esprit to the Mediterranean and a joint interest in the city of Avignon. In 1290 the French king, Philip IV (Philippe-le-Bel or Philip the Fair), ceded his claim to Avignon to his father's cousin, Charles II of Naples who was the Count of Provence through his marriage to Beatrice of Provence. The Benedictine Abbey of Saint-André occupied a strategic position on Mount Andaon within sight of the town of Avignon which lay on the other side of the Rhone. Mount Andaon is a rocky outcrop with steep sides to the north and the east that rises 50 m above the floodplain of the Rhone. Prior to the 1770s the river flowed next to the base of the eastern side of the mount. The plateau at the top covers an area of around 3.5 hectare and extends for 220 m in an east-west direction and 160 m north-south. The top is not flat but rises from south to north by 24 m. The abbey was built at the eastern end of the plateau; the western end was occupied by a small village. The abbey had been founded at the end of the 10th century and possessed extensive property with over 200 churches spread over a wide area of southern France. In 1290 Philip IV instructed Adam de Montcéliard, the sénéchal of Beaucaire, to negotiate an agreement with the abbey to cooperate in the defense of the right bank of the Rhone. The paréage treaty signed in 1292 specified that Philippe le Bel could build a fortress with a permanent garrison next to the abbey and a castle by the river. The abbey surrendered temporal power but obtained protection from the unwanted pressure from the city of Avignon which wished to control both banks of the Rhone. By 1302 fortifications, including an initial Tour Philippe-le-Bel, had been built at the western end of the Pont Saint-Bénézet which lay less than kilometer from the abbey. In 1309, Pope Clement V moved the papacy from Rome to Avignon. The fortress of Saint-André, with the curtain wall that surrounded the abbey, was built in several stages during the first half of the 14th century. The surviving manuscripts do not allow the construction to be precisely dated. A châtelain is mentioned in documents dating from 1314 and 1344, a guard is mentioned in 1318. The carved crest placed by the abbey above the entrance is dated 20 July 1367. This was probably when modifications were made to the entrance arch. The fortress was continually occupied by officers of the crown up to the time of French revolution. The fortress was clearly visible from Papal State across the Rhone in the town of Avignon and was intended to demonstrate the power of the Kingdom of France.

What a huge day but boy did we see some amazing breathtaking sights... worth feeling very tired.
Our little unit was very basic, but No kettle no toaster, did have a microwave, sink Weeny dishwasher, not sure why as you really didn’t need it, and thank goodness a 2 ring stove top plus a little fridge..did cope with it and getting some cooking done was a bonus...Read more