We woke up to the quieter winds, showered in the
“French-style tub” (no shower so that was fun!) in our huge bathroom, got
dressed, and went to breakfast. Danielle
and Jean-Claude were already at the table.
They are very friendly and conversational so we continued our
broken-language conversations. Tim
thought this was stressful, but it was a challenge for all of us. The usual French breakfast.
One of the two stairways leading from the bottom to the upper courtyard
Looking down from the upper courtyard - knight in shining armor at the bottom! (Not Tim!)
We then got our things and headed out for Cassis on the Mediterranean Sea coast. Just over an hours drive via local roads and two “peages” – the toll roads. We found a place to park on the street WAY UP a steep hill (here we go again) and walked down to find that the market was in progress in Cassis. I think Tim is OVER the markets now but I enjoy them a lot.
View of a huge (expensive) hotel overlooking Cassis Harbor
The market in Cassis - beautiful flowers and fruits and foods
We wound our way down to the waterfront and found the boats that take you to the Calanques – beautiful coves and cliffs right on the sea. I bought us tickets for an 11:30 boat and off we went – beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. Richard and Genevieve had urged us to see this as it is unique and it was worth it. Glad we did this. We visited 5 calanques: Port Miou, Port Pin, En Vau, L’Oule and Devenson. The boat was full but we saw what we needed to see and enjoyed the time.
The Cassis Waterfront
Lots of restaurants on the waterfront in Cassis
The beginning of the Calanques - interesting and beautiful but the best was yet to come
Calanques south of Cassis - note the hole in the arch just to the left of the middle!
Calanques south of Cassis
Calanques south of Cassis - they kept getting larger and larger
Calanques south of Cassis
Calanques south of Cassis
Calanques south of Cassis
Calanques south of Cassis
This rock formation almost looked like it had a painting on it!
Calanques south of Cassis
This was a large beach in the Calanques where many people were swimming
Beautiful coves with rock formations all around
When we got back to Cassis, we walked along the waterfront and stopped for lunch at Poissonnerie Laurent (Larry the Fisherman). We each had a fixed menu meal with fish – Tim with the fish with bones and mine with the fish filet in a sauce. Delicious. It started with the wonderful soupe de poisson too. A great bottle of rose wine and some sorbet for dessert – cassis and citron (lemon). Yum, yum, yum. The waiter was “easy on the eyes” too! He had that “French swagger” that a lot of the men have. Ha!
Larry with his soupe de poisson - yummy fish soup! Love it!
A "pensive Tim" taking in the sights during lunch along the waterfront in Cassis
Our view of the Cassis Harbor from our table at lunch
Poissonnerie Laurent for lunch in Cassis
A view of the rocks overlooking Cassis from up the hill where we parked the car - spectacular
We walked along the waterfront, window shopped in the small town and then headed back to the car. It was late afternoon so we decided to head to Aix-en-Provence and walk around. It took us about 40 minutes to get to Aix from Cassis and we found a large parking lot with open spaces. Funny story – I drove into the parking facility and went down 3 levels, but then took a wrong turn and we ended up coming back out. We hadn’t paid for the parking and Tim was “Oh No, Oh No, Oh No” but I put the unpaid ticket in and it let us out since it was so short. We drove around the block and back in and went down further where there were lots of parking spaces. There was a pissoir out in the open in the parking garage – how thoughtful!!!! We used it.
The open air carpark pissoir - Don't Look!
We came up from the car park at Place General DeGaulle and walked along Cours Mirabeau. There were lots of young people roaming around and most very well dressed. This is a much larger city that most of the places we’ve been. We turned and walked through the small streets to some of the small squares – Place Richelme and Place des Cardeurs. We stopped for a coffee and people watching and to enjoy the beautiful weather.
Place General DeGaulle
Statue of King Rene in Aix en Provence
Beautiful church with wrought iron belfry in Aix en Provence
Stopped for coffee at a small square in Aix en Provence
We decided then to head on back to the Chateau La Barben and enjoy one of our bottles of wine.
It was only about a 35 minute drive from Aix back to La Barben. We parked the car and went to see the garden for the chateau that we planned by Le Notre – who also designed the gardens at Vaux le Vicomte and Versailles. Beautiful. There is an old sequoia tree that someone from the US gave to the former owner of the chateau – it must be hundreds of years old. HUGE.
The private gardens at Chateau La Barben
The gardens designed by Le Notre at Chateau La Barben
The drive up to the main entrance at the chateau - you have to drive through 2 porticocheres!
The gardens are over the wall to the right
The large sequoia tree in the garden at Chateau La Barben given to the former owner by someone from the U.S.!
The first entry stairs inside the front door.
I counted 113 stairs from the front to the level where the Auguste Suite was!
Many knights in armor standing at attention at Chateau La Barben
Another of the stairways leading up to our room at Chateau La Barben
One of the towers at Chateau La Barben - 2 of the towers were destroyed in an earthquake in 1909
The upper courtyard at Chateau La Barben - the chapel to the left. This is where we had our afternoon wine!
The room outside our Auguste Suite - it had lots of tapestries and antiques
One of the living rooms - beautiful painted ceilings
There was only one key to each room - this was our key to the Auguste Suite
This was above the door to the small chapel. The story was the daughter of the owner was taking bread out of the chateau to feed the poor. Her father caught her but when she opened up the container with the bread - it had rose pedals in the container. The carving describes this event.
We went up to our room – the Auguste Room - only to realize that we had left all of our wine in the car. So Tim volunteered to go get a bottle of Gigondas red for our afternoon treat. I took the other things down to the outside patio that had chairs and cushions and a gorgeous view. He came back about 15 minutes later and said – “Want to see UNDER the castle? The gate is open.” So we headed back down 3 flights and through an old iron gate that was open to the belly of the castle. We talked through a ways but there was no light – Tim ventured further using the light on his iPhone! I honestly was concerned that someone would come along and lock us IN and there would be no way to get out. It was fun though.
Part of the passage ways under the castle - the gate was open so we took that as an invitation to go in
From the upper porticochere looking down the entry drive to Chateau de La Barben
Entry to the gardens at Chateau La Barben
We went back to the patio and enjoyed our wine. Bertrand came along and talked to us for a while. They have a full house in the chateau tonight. He invited us to aperitifs again in the drawing but warned us that all of the other guests were only French speaking, so we politely declined his invitation but thanked him profusely. He told us that they had forgotten to tell us to leave the key to our room in a drawer outside our room as there is only one key to the room. That’s why they didn’t clean and refresh our room today. Interesting that all of the guests put their keys in the same drawer! Oh well.
The evening sunset from the upper courtyard at Chateau La Barben
We finished our wine and headed to Restaurant 7e just down the small road leading out of the castle. We had a very nice waiter and a good dinner. Interesting rock walls inside but a beautiful restaurant. The waiter spoke good English – much better than our French.
We were stuffed after a big lunch in Cassis, and another
large 3 course dinner. We headed back to
the chateau and went straight to bed.
The mistral winds have come up again but they are supposed to be calm
tomorrow. A good night’s rest was well
deserved. Fabulous trip.
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