Provence

Vincent van Gough put the tiny French commune of St. Remy de Provence on the map, since this is where he stayed in a hospital.  Just a stone’s throw from that hospital (literally, across the street!) is a pretty impressive site of ancient ruins, called Site Archéologique de Glanum. There are many more ruins than shown here – these are just the most impressive ones next to the parking lot:

It’s a good life in the south of France.

Whereas Swiss pidgeons in the middle of winter are worrying about food and avoiding freezing to death, these Provential pidgeons are using the medieval water fountain in Arles to take a bath and keep their feathers clean:

This snap really appeals to me.

It’s a juxtaposition of protection in the southern French village of Arles. In the foreground, modern protection against Covid; in the background, medieval protection against lawless threats. And on the side, that column you see is the sensor for a bollard, a modern traffic barricade that helps keep the inner city streets free from the threat of terrorists using their vehicles as weapons.

All three things serving a very similar purpose, keeping out something that is unwanted.

The Camargue region in southern France (essentially the swampy delta where the Rhone River empties into the Mediterranean Sea) is famous for its white horses, which many scientists actually think are one of the oldest breeds of horses in the world.

I took this snap down a deserted road in the Camargue, just outside of Sainte-Marie-de-Mer in the south of France

As artistic a snap as I thought I could take of what I think (but am not entirely sure) is a cement factory just outside of the southern French village of Beaucaire,

There are many good things about France that trace their origin back to Napolean – and the zillions of kilometers of streets in the south of France, lined by plane trees carefully planted to give shade to army troops, is one of them.

Here is as artistic a snap as I thought I could take of a street in the southern French village of Beaucaire, lined with plane trees:

If you think they are all leaning to the right, you’d be right. This part of France lives under the so-called Mistral wind, a wind of up to nearly 75  km/hr that forces trees to grow tilted. I visited in the winter, and there were numerous times I had to stop the Euro Cruiser, my minivan, because the wind gusts were too strong to safely drive.

Continuing the series, here is a snap from the Southern French village of Agde,

Continuing the series, what makes Agde so interesting for me is that many buildings have been built with a dark stone – and you just don’t see that in other French villages.

Here’s a pretty impressive snap of a downtown square in the southern French city of Arles, taken at around noon time – and as you can see, what should be a bustling, hectic square filled with people stands essentially empty:

I really like the way this snap turned out, I did not post-processing on it whatever. It captures the L’Église Saint-Baudile de Nîmes in the southern French city of Nimes. I especially like the way that the yellows of the building contrast with the grays of the sky.

It’s quite a new cathedral, as far as cathedrals go, having been built in the latter part of the nineteenth century.

I call them Mistral trees – but I don’t know if anyone else does. That’s because the south of France is famous for a hurricane strength wind known as the Mistral, which at certain times of year (particularly winter) can actually force traffic on highways to stop.

It’s what they call a northwesterly wind – and that can be a bit confusing. It does not mean that the wind flows to the northwest, but rather emanates from the northwest.

Here’s a nice picture of how the wind flows:

From time to time you spot a tree that has grown up directly in the path of this strong wind, such as this tree here that I spotted in the southern French commune of Sainte-Marie-del-la-Mer,

I took this snap of a pyramid in the southern French city of Nimes

France is replete with public pyramids, perhaps the best well-known of them being the glass pyramid at the Louvre in Paris. $

Far from coincidence, it shows the influence that a secret society has had on the French government, dating back to the times when many historians now believe that Jesus escaped from persecution in the Middle East and eventually took up residence in the southern French village of Narbonne, together with his wife Mary Magdelene.

OK, I don’t know if he was or he wasn’t. Probably “good” for any Roman means they kept their slaves well-fed. Anway, most scholars claim that Antoninus Pius was one of the so-called “Gang of Five Good Emperors.” I captured this snap in the southern French city of Nimes,

Interestingly, there is quite some historical evidence that I am the direct descendant of a famous Roman emperor, you can read more about it here.

As artistic a snap as I thought I could take, with the sun just hidden behind the magnificent Château de Beaucaire, a medieval fortress in the southern French village of the same name,

Continuing the series, here are some underground garbage receptacles, just in front of the ramparts of a medieval fort, in the southern French village of Beaucaire, France

How can you not love a country where people get out an enjoy a very relaxing sport?

As artistic a snap as I thought I could take of a narrow alley in the southern French villag of Agde, the dark stone used for construction having caught my eye, since you don’t see that in other French villages,

Is it a bus? Is it a tram?  It runs on tires – but are rails a requirement for a tram? What exactly defines a tram?

Well, the inhabitants of the southern French city of Nimes refer to it as a tram. I am not sure if it is of the same make and construction, but there is a similar bus/tram/thing that plies the streets of the northeastern French city of Metz.

One of the wonderful things about this tram is that by and large it runs on dedicated streets that are forbidden to vehicular traffic, but are open to bicycle traffic. So I spent quite some time on the Rhine Rider exploring Nimes by using the tram lines as bicycling shortcuts.

Some big rocks to stop the waves of the Mediterranean Sea from eroding the beaches of Fariente Plage, near the southern France village of Saint-Marie-de-la-Mer,