Provence

Would you believe it, but when we returned to Brussels we caught up with snow again!! This is what our garden looked like when we got up the next morning.

Week of 08.04 when we set off for Provence we hoped we had left all the cold weather behind but alas this was not to be the case. We had rain for most of the week and it was very cold. However, this did produce some fantastic skies.

We finally got the sort of weather normally associated with Provence on our last day. We were lucky enough to see the last of the cherry trees in flower as well as the beautiful dark purple irises on old stone walls – the quintessence of Provence.

One afternoon our walk took us over the top of the hill passing an old cottage, now sadly fallen into a very bad state of disrepair. The mushroom shaped construction is an old bread oven.

In the woods close by we found this old stone building – known as a borie in this part of the world – with wild orchids growing close by.

Wild green euphorbia and these beautiful white star flowers grew in abundance here too.

We were staying just outside Apt

which has its own cathedral, dedicated to St Anne, and this confers upon it the status of city.

It is situated within the national park of the Luberon and is some 50km from Avignon, home for many years to successions of popes and now famous for its cultural activities. We managed a visit to the local Saturday market – a riot of colour and smells.

These bedspreads are typical of the area. They are known as “boutis” or double stitched quilts and are typical of this area. There was also a corner for those interested in junk/antiques.

It has some pretty colourful characters too. This guy was selling some sort of “animal” - I assume it was static that made the creatures climb all over your hand ….

The market takes over the whole pedestrianised area of the old city.. Stalls crowd the narrow road in front of the main entrance to the cathedral and you can’t possibly hurry through the streets here. If you take the time to look upwards you can see that the buildings have been painted in bright provencal colours echoing the colours of the earth and the sky.

There are remnants of a dim and distant past in the names of the streets – prison street, street of the jews and indeed there was a jewish ghetto here at one time. Needless to say any visit to the market will result in the imbibing of refreshment at some stage …

At the end of the week we cleared up the place. I did sterling work wielding this (for me) outsize bucket and broom.

But who could blame me if I wanted to go flying?

Of course the sun was shining when we left on Sunday morning but the weather got increasingly greyer as we headed north. C says that this time last year they got their summer with temperatures of 27°C – the only warm weather they saw all year!