Rousillon, Pont Julien, Lacoste, Menerbes, Oppede-le-Vieux

On Wednesday, July 29^th, we decided that we would picnic, so, after breakfast, we went into town and stopped at the boulangerie (bakery) for a small loaf of bread and at the charcuterie-epicerie (a sort of delicatessen) for sliced cold meat and olives.  We made a reservation for dinner for 7:30 at L’Estrade.  Then we headed off southwest.

Since Roussillon was on our way, we decided to try visiting it again, in spite of our negative experience the evening before.  This time, things turned out much better.  It wasn’t quite as crowded, and we found a parking place in a lot up a hill, by the Ochre Trail.  As we went in and picked up a ticket from the machine, we saw a sign saying that the first fifteen minutes were “gratis.”  This, of course, implied that longer stays would require payment.  We assumed that how that would be done would become apparent when we left the lot.  The lot was informal—dirt and grass, with no lines separating the cars.

We walked down into town.  Roussillon is famous for sitting on ochre-colored cliffs, the color of which is caused by (guess what) ochre, which has been mined on and off since Roman times. 

The town itself is ochre-colored, an explosion of reddish-brownish-orangeish-pink.  It is very artsy-craftsy, most of the art and pottery and textiles looking pretty high in quality—not too much kitsch.  We wandered around the pretty town, stopping in the church of St.-Michel, then passing under the Belfry to the Castrum, the old citadel and the highest part of the village.

We spent a substantial amount of time in Roussillon—certainly much more than fifteen minutes,

so we were expecting to have to pay something, and when we stuck the ticket into the exit machine, we were told so, but not how or where the caisse (cashier) was, and the machine arm blocking our way stayed resolutely down.  We managed to extricate Francois from the line of cars waiting to leave, then, while Mary Joy went to repark, I tried to find the caisse.  It was a ticket-vending machine at the far end of the lot, near the Ochre Trail (probably also for buying tickets to the Trail).  The man in front of me--also, I think, a foreigner, though not American—was having trouble with the machine and eventually gave up.  It took me a while to figure out where to put the ticket and where to put my credit card, but I succeeded in get my ticket back, stamped. 

Meanwhile, Mary Joy had had some trouble parking, due to the fact that someone had parked on one of the drive lanes, so she ended up having to ask an Italian family to back their car up, which they did, very genially.  When Mary Joy asked the mother how she had learned to speak English so well, she smiled and said: “We’re Italian.  We speak every language.”

My stamped ticket succeeded in causing the exit arm to go up, letting us out of the lot, so we continued on our way, heading south on the D106.
 

Next stop, just the other side of the D900, was the Pont Julien, an ancient Roman bridge that until recently had carried car traffic over the Calavon River, which this particular day was completely dried up.  The worn old bridge, now carrying only pedestrians and bikes, while the highway detours around it over a new bridge, looked a little forlorn, like an aged workman, retired against his will, who no longer knows what to do with himself.

From there we went to nearby Lacoste, parking in a free lot below the town and walking up.  While Roussillon was red-brown, Lacoste, like the towns we would visit later in the day, was a gray-white limestone (?). 

Most of the town appears to be occupied by artists related to the Savannah College of Art and Design, so you would hear, passing in the main street up the hill to the Chateau, young people having art-related conversations, in English.  The Chateau at the top of Lacoste, is being somewhat restored, with the help of Pierre Cardin, who also sponsors a classical music festival there (this year’s had finished the previous week).  This chateau was partly dismantled for building materials at the time of the French Revolution, but before that it had been the home and hideaway of the infamous Marquis de Sade.  You can cross a bridge over a dry moat to the Chateau’s ticket office.  When we asked what was inside, we were told that there were some restored rooms from the time of the Marquis and some art exhibits.  Looking over our shoulders from the courtyard, as were hearing this, was a pink metal elephant. 

We were about to decline this opportunity, when the guy in the ticket booth quickly offered to cut the price in half, from twelve euros to six.  Why not?  Especially since we needed to use the restrooms.  We eventually found them, though they probably weren’t intended for public use and didn’t have toilet paper.  We looked through the two or three rooms furnished with period stuff, then looked for the art exhibits.  Apparently, the pink elephant, along with three or four other metal animals, was it.  So we’d basically paid six euros apiece for a pit stop.

Rick Steves had recommended a particular restaurant there for lunch, but Mary Joy wanted to go on to Menerbes and eat there.  The problem with that was that once we arrived in Menerbes, it was just at two o’clock, and none of Lonely Planet’s recommended restaurants was still serving lunch.  We were stuck with a pizza place.  They had some other special—a salad or pasta?—that we tried, but Mary Joy didn’t finish hers.  I think this colored her view of Menerbes (home to Peter Mayle, author of A Year in Provence and a few hundred other books about his Luberon expat-ship). 

At this point I should explain that this whole area is called, loosely the Luberon, though the Luberon proper is the long mountain that looms behind and to the south of Bonnieux, Lacoste, Menerbes, Oppede, etc.

In any case, we wandered up the length of Menerbes, which appears to run along a ridge, and back again, not seeing anything of particular interest.

We went on to Oppede-le-Vieux.  This town, like Jerome, Arizona, is a former ghost town, abandoned by its inhabitants around the turn of the twentieth century, but reinhabited by artists and writers, starting in the 1940s. 

You park down below and walk up, first to the village square, and then up and up to the old church and castle.  We didn’t get that far, only reaching a ruined chapel at the first hairpin above the square.  I thought that it was too far up—too ambitious a hike this late in the day.  Mary Joy thought the village was charming, in contrast to Lacoste and Menerbes.  I’ll have to say that I didn’t see what she saw in the place.

We went down and drove off.  There was a circus set up in tents near the town--we had seen it as we came in.  A day or two earlier, we had seen another circus somewhere along the way, and we had seen posters for various circuses everywhere we went in Provence.  Apparently, small circuses are still an important form of entertainment there.

We went through Maubec and Coustellet, picking up the D2.  Once we’d crossed the D900, we followed the route we’d taken coming in on Sunday, passing below Gordes. 

We had time for a swim in the infinity pool at Au Pointe de Lumiere—very, very pleasant.  Then we got dressed and headed for St.-Saturnin.  Since our normal lot, by the Salle de Fetes, was closed that night, in preparation for something going on the next day, we ended up, after searching for some time, parking below and farther back from our restaurant, so we arrived about ten minutes late.  However, they still had a small table reserved for us, which was good, because L’Estrade, in a relatively small room, with a small deck in front, filled up pretty quickly.

We had a bottle of cold tap water and a 50-centiliter bottle of white wine from the region.  The amuse-bouche was a slice of toasted baguette spread with a tomato sauce, topped by a little filet from a very small fish (a sardine or fresh anchovie?).

We didn't order an appetizer (everything was a la carte).  Mary Joy had a tuna steak, thick and just a little seared, with a tomato-vegetable sauce and some potatoes.  I had a duck breast in a wonderful honey-balsamic vinegar sauce, with some vegetables and potatoes.  For dessert, Mary Joy had a peach clafoutis, while I had a wonderful chocolate Charlotte with raspberry sorbet.  This was one of the best meals we had on the whole trip.  We hadn’t gotten our picnic, but that could wait for another day.