Tour de France – Day 7 (Hermitage // Aix-en-Provence)

Day 7 happened to fall on the first Saturday in July. Despite leaving Beaune at 8:30 in the morning, we hit traffic. We quickly learned that the first Saturday in July is when the entire population of Northern Europe descends upon Southern Europe, fleeing their gray, sunless skies in favor of the warm beaches and clear water of the Mediterranean. I know they were all from the north because their license plates told me so. (Deciphering the country initials on plates is the European equivalent to the license plate game in the States.) Nothing but Germans, Belgians, and Dutch on the road, all of whom have unique driving abilities. I use the term ‘ability’ loosely. At least the Germans are decisively bad. Everyone else cruises along, straddling lanes, turning their blinkers on prior to seeing if anyone is around them. The Germans will make their lane changes and its up to you to dodge them. One must be very alert when driving in Europe.

Anyway, the traffic was so horrendous, a 3 hour drive took us closer to 5, despite taking back roads after being deadlocked through the main highways around Lyon. We had to cancel our first tasting appointment at Chapoutier due to the traffic and so it seemed our luck had run out. Did I mention Europe hasn’t adopted automatic transmissions yet? Stick shift in that nightmare was the opposite of awesome. We finally arrived in the early afternoon, in time to make our next appointment (we grabbed lunch at a rest stop along the way so as not to lose anymore time) and we also finally hit warmer, summer-like temperatures.

Tain l'Hermitage
fountain in the square of Tain l’Hermitage
Tain l'Hermitage
the hills of Tain l’Hermitage
Tain l'Hermitage
the famous Tain l’Hermitage

We cruised through our tasting appointment, overall unimpressed with the wines we tasted (and certainly not finding the prices commiserate with the quality) and we hopped back in the car to finish our trek to Aix-en-Provence, another couple hours away. I had mentioned to Dave that I had wanted to see the lavender fields of Provence, so as I drove through the nightmare that was traffic, he found a map of the lavender fields, with the small town of Grignan smack in the middle of a purple patch on a map. We navigated our way there, a good stopping point along our route and found Grignan to be a cute village, in the midst of hosting a festival seemingly to do with books and writing. We explored a bit, snapped some photos and stopped for ice cream; a nice (short) respite from the roads.

Grignan
lavender field in Grignan
Grignan
leading up to the village of Grignan
Grignan
lots of books for sale
Grignan
the village of Grignan
Grignan
the village of Grignan
Grignan
not a true village until you find the belltower
Grignan
Grignan

Finally, around 7pm, we arrived at our hotel in Aix— a hour after check-in stopped for the day. Of course. Tired, hungry and a bit cranky, Dave called the emergency number, while a kind older lady who spoke a bit of English showed me the lockbox where we could find our room key after getting the code from the emergency contact.

After a week of traveling, we had a few loads of dirty laundry we’d hoped to wash before meeting Dave’s parents the next day. Typical of the days’ events, we got to the laundromat in time for closing. Sigh. Foiled again. We returned the small suitcase full of dirty clothes to the car and proceeded to explore Aix, in search of dinner while we were at it.

Overall, we found Aix to be a smaller Montpellier (and we all know how much I enjoyed that city). It was filled with shops and stores, giving it the impression of a giant commerce area— and not the kind promoting small, mom-and-pop kind of stores. They were the larger, French chain stores, which I’m sure were full of life during the day, but the late evening hours seemed to find the streets full of people just meandering aimlessly, not really with a purpose or in the “taking a walk” sort of way, but more of the “now what do we do?” mentality.

We found a pizza place in a main square, which also happened to be overlooking the classic car show that served as entertainment for the evening. Classic car owners and their spouses were dressed for a Gatsby-esque party, ready to hop in their Model-Ts for the short lap around the plaza. While entertaining, we still weren’t overly-enthused with Aix (to be fair, we were at the end of a long week of travel, which was capped off by the worst traffic I’ve ever been in, so maybe our mindset wasn’t right). Apparently Aix-en-Provence is also known for its fountains, so following dinner, we did a bit of fountain-seeking, but soon after were ready to call it a night. We decided that, in an effort to get to Nice by 3pm to meet Dave’s parents, we would sleep in a bit (and by ‘sleep in’, I mean wake up at 8am instead of 6am), then track down a laundromat open on a Sunday (not an easy task). We hit a market in the morning, making sure to get there before 1pm closing time, bought some lunch and a small box of laundry soap, then Dave picked out laundromats along the route to Nice. We stopped at two, before getting lucky in Nice. Then began the quest for change since the part of the machine that accepted bills was broken. Of course. Two loads later, we were finally clean and we made the quick trip to the Nice airport to return our car and meet Dave’s folks and head for Italy.

Aix-en-Provence
fountains in the plaza in Aix-en-Provence
Aix-en-Provence
classic cars in Aix-en-Provence
Aix-en-Provence
making the loop around the fountain
Aix-en-Provence
fountain at the far end of the square
Aix-en-Provence
even more fountains, past the square

Phew! Before long, France was nothing more than the view in our rear view mirror. A quick trip around the country that was done as best we could in the time frame we had with which to work. I’m glad we did it, but by Day 8, I was definitely ready to put the “quick, let’s see everything we can” type of vacation on ice, in favor for the Italian beaches of the Mediterranean.

Now that we are in Cavo, on the island of Elba, the internet is a bit more limited, but know that I’m much too busy working on my tan to blog right now anyway- haha!

Ciao for now

(I’m practicing!)

4 comments on “Tour de France – Day 7 (Hermitage // Aix-en-Provence)

  1. Great photos! Looks like you saw a lot in the time you had. You will have great memories and also decide where you want to return someday to visit! (Bordeaux, of course!) Enjoy your time on Elba – some nice R&R – looking forward to hearing more about your summer.

  2. Isn’t driving southward in France during the summer magical? And by magical I mean pure insanity due to the influx of northern germans. In my corner of Provence, during July and Summer, cars with the 04 reg become the minority, it’s pretty surreal.
    At least you finally made it to Aix-en-Provence, it’s such a beautiful city, one of my favorites 🙂
    Enjoy Italy!

    • Haha, I’m glad I’m not the only one who thought the Great Migration was a surreal experience! I think, someday, we need to revisit Provence and see it properly. The tail-end of a long, busy trip was not the best way. Maybe in the Springtime, before everyone flocks there, but when the weather is still pleasant enough to enjoy (2013 weather excluded!)

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