Arles

We spent another night in Vallabrègues due to flooding on the Rhône. Our bikes were taken on a trailer to Arles by Georgio, and Micky escorted both groups there on a bus. On arrival in Arles, we were reunited with our bikes and we headed off with Micky, who pointed out a couple of important sites on our way to meet our local guide at the tourist office, such as the site of Van Gogh’s house (no longer there) and the place on the Rhône that inspired one of his starry night paintings.

Our tour guide Julie was a great, full of enthusiasm, pride and love for her city. The tour of the city included the Roman ruins, the Arena, the Hôtel de Ville, the Place Forum, lovely architecture and gorgeous hidden little spots, Place Republic, Hotel Dieu and Le Jardin de la Masion de Santé a Arles (where Van Gogh spent some time after cutting off his ear). We then had free time to wander around and explore till 1pm.

At one we got on our bikes and started the ride out of Arles to our meeting point with the barge. We stopped in the village of Saint-Gilles, where some checked out the Abbatiale de Saint-Gilles. I waited outside as I was a little stressed from being led up a one way street the wrong way with little wiggle room when a car came down the street and, to top it off, my chain came off. Luckily Hilary and Deb were with me and helped get the chain back on. After the church visit Micky took us down another one way street the wrong way, no-one tooted and cars let us pass - in Australia we would have been abused for sure. We then continued out along busy roads and finally down a very bumpy riding track to the canal which runs from the Rhône river to Sete.

We rode a total of about 40 kms today. The barge had travelled through a number of locks over the day to make it to our meeting point. Katie reported that one of the locks had about a 30 metre drop. We boarded the barge and had a 90 minute cruise to Aigues-Mortes. We all sat out on the deck and along the way we spotted flamingoes, blue cranes, white Herons and wild horses. It was one of the highlights of the trip.

A number of us decided to take a quick walk into the city which was preparing for some big celebrations over the coming days that involved dressing up, bulls, horses and cowboys, music and running! I went down the slippery slide at a fun fair with Deb and then we had a drink before returning to the barge for another fantastic dinner. This was some traditional fare, including Socca, a flatbread from Marseille made with chickpea flour with a salad, followed by a bull stew (which I found way too rich) with mash and carrots. After dinner, we played cards for a while before heading to bed.

PS - a number of people on the barge had come down with COVID over the past few days, but most only seemed to have mild symptoms and were doing okay. We have avoided it so far.Read more