Discovering Nîmes

Today we had a lazy start to the day, leaving the apartment around 10am. We first checked out La Maison Carrée, a Roman temple dedicated to the imperial cult and located virtually across the road from our place. Built around 2 AD (2,022 years ago!), it is the best-preserved temple of its type in the world. Its symbolic and religious function was connected to the birth of the Principate Augustus, the first emperor of Rome. This cult of the “genius augusti” allowed the provinces to show their support for the Emperor, his family and the Empire. As with all Roman temples, only priests could enter the cella, the room where the cult statues were located, and public ceremonies were conducted outside.

We next visited the Carre D’Art, a modern art museum designed by Norman Foster located opposite Maison Carrée. Unfortunately, the museum houses only a few fairly small temporary collections. Some of it was okay but most of it was not the type of art I like or admire. There was an exhibition by Lena Vandrey, who was born in Germany, and moved to Paris in 1958 and then to Provence in 1967. This was the one I liked the best. Lena and her partner are feminist cultural producers whose work consists of texts, drawings, paintings, assemblages in boxes and cut-outs and sculptures, always with a direct connection to female culture.

We then went up to the rooftop restaurant to have a coffee. Unfortunately, the staff were on a break as the restaurant was opening for lunch at noon. We decided to take a walk through the old town and go and see the Roman arena, and then head back up to the restaurant a little later. The old town was getting, busy with restaurants starting to fill, as at 3pm there was some final celebration to do with the bulls and horses being held in the arena.

We tried a couple of restaurants, but everything we liked the look of was full, so we went back to the museum to their restaurant, le Ciel de Nîmes, which it was also pretty full. When we asked for a table the waiter asked if we had a booking and we didn’t, but it was the same waiter who had sent us away earlier, so he took pity on us and found us a lovely spot on the terrace.

We had a delicious and relaxed lunch and, as we finished the sun began to break through, which was very pleasing as it had been a grey and overcast morning. We left the restaurant and walked up to the Jardins de la Fontaine a large park at one end of the old city. We walked up a couple of levels of the terraced gardens, but I was feeling the humidity and did not want to climb up to the Tour Magne, so I sat on a bench people watching, while Ian went up to the tower. After climbing a hill to get to the tower, and then climbing to the top of it, a sweaty Ian reported back that the views across Nîmes were lovely.

We then headed back into the old town wandering down the narrow streets, and retraced our steps to some degree, as I wanted to retake some of the photos I had taken earlier in the day while the sun was shining. We saw some more Roman ruins, the Cathedral of Notre Dame and Saint-Castor, the clock tower with no clock, and a couple of other churches. It was a lovely way to walk off lunch and see more of the city. What we did notice during our walk was the number of barber shops that were open and how busy they were on a Sunday.

We again stayed in this evening and ate charcuterie, cheese, fruit and a lovely baguette.Read more