30 September – 9 October 2019
Big Day! Big Day! It was the day we’d all been waiting for, the day Sena turned 5! Despite her expectations of decadent decorations and entertainment to celebrate this important milestone, the house looked depressingly normal but for the echoes of ‘happy birthday’ and ‘joyeaux anniversaire’ being sung by both the family and in messages from friends. Luckily she seemed satiated by this and made her way to school with a big smile on her face. We had a smile too, as in France, families are not allowed to bring in 24 little cupcakes, jellies or similar to school to celebrate. (Side note – possibly the best thing about school in France is that its catered. Its nice not having to work this year, but it’s really really nice to not have to make school lunches x 3 – a pet hate of both of us).
On Tuesday, following the success of our trip to the museum last week, we decided to go for a day trip to the typically french and highly authentic grape stomping trip, at a ‘farm’ about 40 kms north of Aix near the beautiful village of Lourmarin in the Luberon. (Side note: there is actually nothing french or highly authentic about grape stomping. In fact, and somewhat reassuringly, once a grape has been ‘stomped on’ it can’t be made into wine, no doubt because very few people would like to drink another’s toe jam in their rosé. Grapes are picked – typically by immigrant labour or machines, and crushed, also using machines).
Regardless of the authenticity, we thought it sounded like fun, so we firmly affixed our tourist hats, took off our shoes, put on our swimmers and – both metaphorically and physically – jumped in.
We arrived at the ‘farm’ (Les Pastras) around 10.30, fresh from a ‘meet the parents’ coffee at the school. Historically the place had been a vineyard, but it was too small to be profitable. The current owner inherited the land from his grandparents and had the foresight to realise this and converted part of the land to olives and part to oak trees – in order to spore truffles. 15 years later, he makes his money running tours to tourists looking for an ‘authentic’ experience of stomping grapes, picking olives or hunting truffles… and also harvesting a commercial quantity of truffles. Clever guy.
It’s so authentic that, when we asked if he (the French guy) could do the tour in French, he admitted that he probably couldn’t because he had never tried.
It was the end of the season and there were only a few vines left for us to harvest. Luckily for us, what was left were some extremely sweet and tasty Shiraz grapes, grown solely for the purpose of tourist stomping (he does make some wine that you can sample and purchase at the end of the tour). We took to this with gusto, carefully selecting and lovingly plucking bunches of red grapes bursting from the vine. Bonnie, initially exuberant at the pleasure of having grass under his paws, rapidly fell asleep in the shade of the vines. Soon we had enough to stomp. We placed our grapes on the largely unnecessary but somewhat picturesque tractor, woke Bonnie and made our way up to 2 large wooden vats overlooking the property.
From there, shirts were removed faster than you can say Dave Sanchez in a 2000s London nightclub and the stomping commenced. There is a undoubted joy at the feeling of squishing grapes between your toes whilst looking across the beautiful landscape of the Luberon. Even the knowledge that the activity is utterly futile and wasteful (the squashed grapes are used to ‘fertilize’ the plants in the field – ie they are thrown out) does not detract from the sensation of grapes popping underfoot.
Soon our lovingly picked shiraz grapes had been transformed into a gratifying slippery, slightly rose coloured mush. We bravely had a small taste of the fruits of our toils (incredibly sweet) before we left it for the flies and hornets that were suddenly buzzing about and shifted our focus to taking authentic farming shots of ourselves and our totally unnecessary, vintage John Deere tractor.
From there, we were shepherded back to the farmhouse to sample the wine from the property that (happily) they don’t let tourists stomp on (it turns out on an all-you-can-drink basis), force-fed truffly goodness (not the good stuff, but still pretty good) and regaled with extremely well rehearsed but still amusing stories from our host.
Bonnie, exhausted from all that grass and fresh air, slept through it all.
We eventually pulled ourselves away, lamenting the fact that we had to pick up the kids and did not have a designated driver for the afternoon.
We did, however, leave ourselves enough time to tour through the pretty Luberon village of Lourmarin on the way back to school pick ups – apparently one of the ‘Plus Belles Villages de France’… certainly pretty but probably not the top of what is a very esteemed list!
The following day was a Wednesday and Ellie woke up in tears. This is not like her at all. Since we’ve been travelling she has been an absolute superstar, throwing herself into anything and everything, and it turns out that she now needed a break.
Bring on the mental health day.
Jessie and Seni were dropped at the bus without compliant, Ellie and Ant went to the nearby Carrieres de Bibemus to give Bonnie a second taste of the week of grass under his paws (we really were spoiling him) and go for a bushwalk in the beautiful forests around the Sainte-Victoire. Second stop for the day was for milkshakes.
Equilibrium restored and all was right with the world.
Thursday – meant to be homework day, nestled in among gymnastics and dance on both Wednesday and Friday – turned out to be rollerblading and playdates. Oops. So much for the discipline there.
On Friday we were looking forward to two things – the arrival of Adam and Zoe (pending satisfaction of the ever-fickle standby gods) and hosting our first party, where we would try to squash 40 full grown humans into our lounge room and terrace.
We had our normal, chaotic, Friday afternoon run around – tennis and school pick ups at school, drop Ellie off at gym, Jessie at dance (15 kms north of the city), come back and pick up Ellie post gym. Thankfully, after that Adam and Zoe arrived, having successfully navigated their course from Serbia via Germany into Marseille (unfortunately their bags did not).
It was then time for our party. 40 odd people. A half dozen children stashed downstairs like illicit cargo. Lots of wine, beer and champagne and even some food. It turns out our place does actually hold that many people, the roof didn’t collapse and the neighbours were kind enough not to complain. Apart from the inevitable fact of not really being able to talk to anyone when you’re hosting the party it was a fun evening.
We had been looking forward to spending a couple of days starting to explore the region and had two willing co-conspirators in Adam and Zoe. First stop on Saturday was the beautiful hilltop village of Gordes, which sits somewhat imposingly on the top of a cliff overlooking the fields of the Luberon. The town dates back to Roman times, with many of its buildings (including its church and castle) dating back to the 12th century. It is around 75 minutes from Aix, and the drive through the vineyards, fields and hills of the area did not disappoint. Like so many villages, the uniformity of the white/grey stone used is remarkable and stunning, as are the views of the surrounding area. It has, and in our esteemed opinion deserves, it’s title of ‘One of the most beautiful villages in France’ (Side note here – it appears that the (doubtless Paris based) authorities which preside over the ‘Most Beautiful Villages in France’ register are relatively free in their doling out of this title. We do not doubt there is a reassuringly large amount of paperwork and administration required to apply for and maintain such a title (no doubt at the local, regional, national and European level) but we have not been convinced about the quality of all such annointed villages we have seen. Some, for example, are merely quaint, some appear to have very few redeeming qualities at all. Gordes, however, was true to its label, and was remarkably beautiful).
We spent a lovely few hours wandering the narrow alleyways around the church and hilltop castle, exploring the views, patting random dogs (Ellie and Zoe) and barking aggressively at visiting Weimerareners (Bonnie) (Side note: somewhat controversially, it turns out that Bonnie is racist, and does not like certain breeds of dog. Weimerareners are the top of this list, Huskies are a close second. In his old age he has stopped being subtle about this distaste).
Following the mandatory Ice cream consumption we made our way back south to deposit Jessie at the much anticipated playdate of the century – the sleepover birthday party of one of her best buddies, Lola. 4 7 year old girls (Canadian, Swedish, Italian/Swedish and Australian), one pool, one cup cake chef and one night. We dropped her off, had a drink, wished Lola’s parents the best of luck and then ran away as fast as we could, expecting to come back the following morning to find parents gagged and tied and the house in smoldering ruins.
Meanwhile, Anthony headed back into town for a couple of beers and dinner with Adam. As always it was great to catch up, and nice to be able to do so without the full contingent of kids running around (the cousins – less Jessie – were self amusing in the apartment we got some kid free time). From there it was back to the apartment for wine and dinner overlooking the rooftops of Aix down to the forests and peaks around Bouc Bel Air – something that we have not yet started to take for granted and which was certainly not lost on Adam.
The following morning we made our way with some trepidation back to Cabriès to pick up Jessie. Fortunately, the house was still intact, although parents looked about a decade older and children looked shattered and somewhat sheepish. Still, there were smiles, farewell hugs and tales of 2am bedtimes. By all accounts, the sleepover of the century had been a big success.
For our second day of ‘PACA’ (Provence, Alpes, Cote d’Azur region) exploration, we switched from history and architecture to natural scenery and made our way down to Cassis on the Mediterranean Coast. The Calanques – (literally ‘creeks’) are a series of stunning fjord like cliffs, rock formations and inlets carved into the coastline between Cassis and Marseille. We took a tour by boat across the coastline to more closely inspect the towering cliffs, clear emerald blue water and forested inlets. The views were amazing, but, from the looks on their faces at least, both Sienna and Bonnie were unconvinced about the idea of maritime travel in the slightly bumpy conditions.
After the boat ride we dared a dip into the remarkably chilly Mediterranean (Side note: it’s amazing how quickly the Med cools down. Beautifully warm in July, August and beginning of September, its like someone turns off the heating when school goes back. By October the water is cold again – unlike Sydney were everything stays warm and toasty most of the way through autumn but is freezing until summer starts). Zoe and Ellie braved the cold water, albeit briefly. Bonnie – allowed in restaurants but not on the beach in Cassis (side note: the French do not like rules very much, and there were multiple (well behaved) dogs on the beach anyway) – skulked his way down across the sand and enjoyed an illicit swim in the frigid waters more than his human playmates). From there, it was beachside tree climbing, Cassis exploration (unfortunately it was the annual ‘stocktake’ weekend of all the shops in town, which made it crowded and relatively unpleasant) and ice cream before it was time to head back home for more aperos and dinner.
Day 3 of regional exploration took a depleted tour group (Ellie, Jessie and Sienna back at school, Liz at French) back into the north of the region to visit the incredible Roman aqueduct at Pont du Gard and the equally impressive Roman Amphitheatre at Orange. The city of Arles (which we have yet to visit but Adam was already familiar with) was the largest Roman city outside of Rome.
The 275m long Pont du Gard was built in the first century AD by the Romans to supply the nearby city of Nimes with fresh water. It functioned as such until the 4th Century before being used as a bridge across the Gordon River through the middle ages. It is still in remarkable condition, allowing visitors to walk across the beautiful structure and take advantage of great views of the river and hills surrounding it. The site itself is stunning and is a lovely place to go for a wander and a picnic, as well as of course admiring the incredible Roman engineering of two millennia ago.
From one Roman site to another, from Pont du Gard we made our way to nearby Orange to check out the incredible amphitheatre, unique because it is one of the few remaining to have maintained its exterior facade at the back of the stage. Originally built in the 1st century, it has been more or less continually in use since then. It underwent a major reconstruction project in the 19th century and today hosts an annual summer opera festival. The place sits more than 6000 people today – incredible considering it serviced a smallish Roman Colony (Arausio), outside a major regional centre (Arles), a really long way from Rome. Those Romans sure did love a good day out at the amphitheatre. Unlike many Roman ruins, enough remains of this amphitheatre to make it easy to envisage what it would have been like ‘back in the day’. You can almost here the sounds of lions eating various minority groups and street hawkers selling albatross flavoured snackies. The day of our visit, however, the wind was roaring through the structure and we were two of only a dozen or so people braving the elements to appreciate the sheer size and majesty of the structure. If there was an albatross in sight it would have been blown away, and there were a few moments there where we thought we were going to lose Zoe to a similar fate.
To finish off the Romain trifecta, stop three for the day was Orange’s very own Arc de Triomphe, proudly perched on a roundabout on the outskirts of town. It was built around 0 AD by the Emperor Augustus and, like the majority of triumphal arches, seems to lack any other real purpose other than to dominate suburban roundabouts for millennia to come. Impressive? Yes. Useful? Unconvinced. But it does make a pretty good decoration for a roundabout.
Roman trifecta completed, we made our way back to Aix in time to meet the girls at the bus stop, rollerblades and hula hoops in hand. The trip home was even less subtle than usual with Bonnie pulling Zoe pulling a hula hoop with Sena, Jessie and Ellie all screaming (generally frowned upon in France) and hanging on for dear life. Much fun was had by all.
On Tuesday we left our guests to their own touristy devices as we pursued a normal day of French classes, leaving them to appreciate the joys of the Aix en Provence walking tour (only a person in the group got pick pocketed that day) before a repeat of the previous day’s pick up shenanigans. The lure of a final apero on the Cours Mirabeau was too strong to resist, so Adam and Anthony stopped for a quick drink before heading back for a final meal, sunset and multiple bottles of wine. An appropriate end to a pretty awesome couple of days.
The following morning a similar transport recipe was followed to get everyone to the school bus (unfortunately this time without the kir) and final uncle/cousin goodbyes before Anthony deposited Adam and Zoe at the TGV for their final trip to Paris.
As we found out when we were on the road and visiting friends, there is something really special about taking the time to visit friends in their chosen environment. It turns out that having family or friends as guests is a bit the same and we loved having Adam and Zoe stay. The house felt a bit empty when they left.
That said, we may or may not have sworn off booze for two whole nights once they departed… which is somewhat of a record since we have left Australia!
Joseph Family Adventure 