FrankingWorldTraveller

Twist right, then left, then cat stretch

A breeze caught Amante while in the sling and all hands had to run grab her. No one likes a 44 ton boat swinging out of control!

With less ease than you might think. But Amante is in the water

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Guess all this land touring is over!

We drove to St. Remy de Provence along the non-toll roads. this is an option on our GPS, and we were in no hurry so we chose it. It was almost as fast and so much prettier. Curvy roads that went through small towns, and as we neared Les Alpilles, thought the park. Beautiful. Les Alpilles are a narrow and jagged mountain range that slice France North from South just south of St. Remy De Provence. Olives dominate the south side and grapes (and olives, too) dominate the north in all directions around St Remy. This is the landscape that Van Gogh used to influence his last 100+ paintings, in his last year alive, while he lived at the infirmary in St. Remy.

We stayed at Hostellerie Vllon de Valrugge, which has- guess what? A Gastonomic restaurant with a Michelin star! We learned at check in that they just lost their chef, thus their star, and they hope to get back their star soon. Again- falsy advertising with the damn Michelin star thing. What it means is that you will pay 88 euros per person for a 5 course dinner, that in this case was pretty good, but not over the top. The one last week at Avignon was better, and didn’t even lie about no damn Michelin star. We were having dinner, discussing the MS lunch we almost had and had to remember that it was just the day before. Yes, we are living too high on the hog, yes, we both had to buy new pants, and yes, we or at least I am going to get a hold on this SOON! The cheese course was the finest I’ve ever seen, 5 or 6 or however many you want from this tray.

Has one of the lady liberties in the town square! And a nice view! And a Rosé festival this weekend every year. We cannot put one more bottle of wine on the boat, and in fact, some of the space allocated for water is used up by wine. Just when I was about to start a diet!

We visited here on our on and in our Bandol wine tour. Pretty little city! Looking back on La Ciotat from here and the famous Eagle’s Beak rocks, especially when the setting sun lights the rocks up, one has to think these rocks were an inspiration, at least, on the design of the Syndey Opera House.

We stayed at Hotel Vallon de Valruges and Spa, nice but needs management help in the spa, and ate too much the first night at their former Michelin starred gastonomic restaurant (I swear we’re going to stop this soon).
Resolved to do better the next day we went into town to find a salad, only to find the restaurants stop serving at 2:30. We came in at 2:32. We found a Tea house and patisserie, Michel Marshall, who served us a salad and savory tart that far surpassed the dinner the night before.

Dessert pushed that way past the- I’m certain this is better- level.

After we drove in the nearby countryside to visit two wineries and bought some provisions for Amante. This area is covered with cyclists, and I wish we had bikes and the legs to pedal them! The landscape here is amazing, vineyards, iris gardens and narrow roads lines with Plane trees nestled up against Les Alpilles.

A 15 minute drive from La Ciotat is Cassis.
We visited here last year just to walk around and take a few photos of the waterfront. This year we hiked a bit into les Calanques. WE would like to sail here, but they are small and by the time the boat is ready, they will be crowded. So hiking them is a pleasant alternative.
Also, Cassis is an appellation, known for their whites and as rosés as well. Some of their reds are also pretty good, but nothing like the big boy reds of Burgandy and Bordeaux.
Anyway- the gelato is just fine!

And yes. Those are footprints.

Are making it hard to sit down and write. I think I’ll go for a walk!

Vanessa