France - Provence

Marseilles Airport

This years holiday was our second cycling holiday after Italy last year. It was similar to last year, some parts better, some parts worse. Overall it was great though and our 10 day holiday felt about 2.5 weeks which is always a good thing.

Here's the trip we did:
https://www.skedaddle.co.uk/cycling/holiday/Leisure_Cycling/France_-_Provence_-_Self-Guided_Cycling_Holiday/75/view.rails

Saturday

Flew into Marseilles and got the train straight away to Orange. Checked into our 3 star hotel and went wandering. We went to the main attraction which is the amphitheatre. It's impressive but maybe not quite as nice as the one in Verona we saw last year.

Théâtre antique d'Orange

Tunnels of Théâtre antique d'Orange

Théâtre antique d'Orange

We were pretty tired after that as we'd been up since 3:30am to catch our flight so we went back to the hotel to have a few drinks as we waited for our cycle tour instructor to arrive. 

First drinks of the holiday

Jazz band playing outside our hotel in Orange

Once the instructor arrived she gave us the maps, bikes and everything we needed. We were happy that our bikes, while not great, were still a vast improvement over last year. We had an early enough night on the first night all set for our first cycle the following day.

Nice hipster bar in Orange

Sunday
Each morning we could leave at our own pace but needed to have our bags at reception for 09:30 to be collected and brought to the next hotel. We have breakfast in each hotel before heading off which usually involved some bread, meat and cheese.

Our first cycle was from Orange to Uzes.

It should have been 50k but took us 66k due to horrendous instructions. Got lost several times due to incorrect directions or just plain missing instructions. At one point we could not find the right way even after trying the 3 different possibilities. We even stopped a German couple on a similar cycle trip but unfortunately they were going in the opposite direction so were unable to help. In the end we had to give up on the directions and find our own way to the next town. Once we got there we stopped for what was possibly the most rewarding lunch of my life. Fortunately it was super tasty too and one of the highlights food-wise of the trip.

Some of the roads were very picturesque

The trip itself was one of the most beautiful days with plenty of vineyards and scenery to see.

Fields and fields of sunflowers

Once we finally did make it to Uzes our bags were there waiting for us so we had a quick shower and went for a walk around the town as this would be our only opportunity to see it and glad we did as it is one of the most beautiful towns I've ever seen. It was quite small and mainly consisted of restaurants but almost every building there was so picturesque. One night may have been enough there as it's very small and didn't appear to be much to do but well worth a visit for one night anyway.

We HAD to treat ourselves after our first cycle

Part of beautiful Uzes

Monday

Today's cycle was Uzes to Avignon.

It took us 60k instead of 50 again due to horrible instructions. Today was overcast with a treat of rain that never came.

One of the points of interest today was Point du Gard. It was nice but we didn't have much time to do anything beyond walk over it and take pics. It was overcast too which didn't help for the pictures.

Point du Gard

View from Point du Gard

Avignon is a cool city inside castle walls with lots of cool restaurants and bars. We got to stay in a nice 4 star hotel.

Entrance into Avignon

 Went to view the palace the following morning before our cycle.

Palais des Papes, Avignon

View from Palais des Papes

The French sure do keep their bikes in good condition

Tuesday

Avignon to Remy. 55k. Had the option for a 25k cycle but we decided to go for the full one. 

Didn't get lost today even though directions were still useless. Was overcast for most of the day which was nice for keeping cool. Threatened to rain but didn't thankfully. Passed lots of fruit farms with olive trees, pears, apples and plenty of others. Lots of expensive houses along the route also.

One of many small towns we went through on our cycles

2 star hotel in Remy was lovely and had our first pool. They slightly overdid it with the religious statues/pictures/everything.

Overly religious hotel in St Remy

Wednesday
Remy to Les Baux-de-Provence to Remy

Stayed in Remy for 2 nights so today's cycle was a loop around the mountains, up to see an ancient village up in the mountains caused Les Baux. It's an enclosed town behind castle walls. The cycle up to this was prob the most difficult cycle of the week, especially with the wind in our faces. We only had a quick look around the town as we wanted to get a move on. The journey back down was a very enjoyable descent but was so windy we needed to be careful of the traffic on the windy roads. 

Les Baux-de-Provence

Les Baux-de-Provence

Les Baux-de-Provence

Panoramic view from Les Baux-de-Provence

Nice shop front in St Remy

Thursday

Remy to Arles

Easiest cycle of the week. 32k. Mainly through farms. Tracking stopped working again. Found out we had the wrong bikes and lucky for it as the 2 we should have had broke down twice. A Norwegian father, son group were doing the same route as us and had our bikes. We meet up with them a lot on our cycles everyday and had lunch and drinks with them on occasions.

Arles is another very nice town. We did some museums and attractions there on the first day as we got in early. One museum had a lot of Picasso paintings which he gave to them. 

Friday
Arles to St-Marie-de-la-Mer

Our last days cycle was to the coastal town, St-Marie-de-la-Mer. Because we were cycling towards the coast the wind picked up and made this one of the more difficult cycles of the week. We didn't stop often on this cycle as we wanted to motor through it and get to the beach.

Our two stops were a little tower setup to view the local birds, of which we saw none and Château d'Avignon. There was nothing to do here either but it looked impressive and had a lot of history behind it. Mainly been the first house in France to have electricity and working toilets on each floor.

Château d'Avignon

Once we made it to St-Marie-de-la-Mer we celebrated the end of our cycle with a giant desert and also a couple of beers. We popped into the sea for a bit too. First time in the ocean for a while so it was nice to just float there for a while and relax at the end of our cycle trip. A taxi came to collect us at 5:30 with our bikes and bring us back to Arles for our last night in the hotel. He kept Louise busy for the journey with chat, I'm not sure he even inhaled for the whole journey.




Saturday - Tuesday.
On Saturday we got up and got the train from Arles to Nice with a short stopover in Marseilles. Once we got to Nice we went straight to our hostel which we choose as we thought it would be good to meet some people after the week on the bike. Unfortunately the private room in the hostel was a bit of a dump but the location was excellent which made up for it.

Nice beach

We didn't get up to much at all in Nice as neither of us were in the mood for anymore site seeing or travelling. Louise spent a lot of her time on the beach while I wandered around aimlessly taking pictures and stuffing myself with ice cream.

One of the nights we did do some socializing with 2 girls in the hostel from New Zealand and the US who were nice and we joined them in an English bar later with 2 Aussie blokes for a bit of a session. This was brought back to the hostel later for a stupid drinking, card game resulted in us drinking every minute or so.

Fountains in Nice

By Tuesday I was happy to leave Nice and head home. It felt like we had been on holidays much longer to 10 days and Nice is nice for a weekend getaway but not much for me there.