In my last post, I forgot to include the link to the tourist site that had my photos of the Roman road remains, so here it is in English on the Hérault department site. Montpellier is in the department of Hérault, in the region of occitanie.
http://www.destination-languedoc.co.uk/cultural-heritage/castelnau-le-lez/via-domitia-castelnau-le-lez/tourisme-PCULAR034V50WR3X-2.html
Friday May 20th
Today was a day of meeting random friendly Montpelliérains.
We were visiting the museum but had a side trip to the Tram ticket office to get a refund on an attempted purchase. We had fed 9.20e into a platform machine to buy a 10 euro pass, when it stopped being cooperative. So you get a receipt instead to take to the customer service office by the train station.
We've been here before, take a number and wait 30 minutes to plead your case. I started the conversation with the agent with my usual line, "sorry but I don't speak French very well". The agent jumped up and brought her supervisor who treated us as if we were visiting dignitaires. Then In the museum a guard was happy to talk to relieve his boredom, he told us he was Italian and wanted to talk all about Canada. And then we had lunch in a cafe by the museum and the server was very welcoming which helped make the whole day enjoyable.
The main museum exhibit was about one French artist who painted in Italy . Unlike many exhibitions where you see a school or style of painters, this one focused on just the artist, who happened to be in Italy when the French revolution started so you can fit his life and work into the political landscape. No photos from the special exhibition, these below are all ftom the permanent collection
Also, I found this photo on Twitter, it's Paris, and some street art...
Montpellier is pedestrianized around the ticket office, so no drive through, there's a walk up macdonalds, and it's wheelchair accessible.
And for anyone complaining of parking prices, here is a map of municipal parking.
Around our apartment it appears you can park for 9 hours for 17e, but close to the centre, only for a max of 5 hours and it will cost 33e. The map is a bit fuzzy, but look at the centre, it's all a blank zone, because cars are not allowed on most of the streets. So you'd pay 33e $44 Cdn) and still have to walk.
Distinctive interior design, the louvre set the standard for all galleries in France
Not easy to see, but this canvas was huge, I'd guess about 20-30feet high
Voltaire
Tte exterior of the gallery
Saturday May 21
Didn't need anything, but a trip to the market is still important to see what's happening. Gigantic garlic!
Local lamb
We wanted to see if we could go into the church, we've never been in, but, unusual for a church in France, it was locked.
Walls are always built around the existing outcrops.
For dinner we returned to the Sicilian restaurant in the square that we'd visited with Antoine. Went with a rose for a change.
The tables when we started, they were completely full when we left. They were spaced nicely apart. At the far end, our Airbnb host was having drinks with friends at the next door restaurant so we socialized for a few minutes. It's a small village after all.
Sunday May 22
Went downtown to check out a photography exhibition, and for our Sunday afternoon wine opportunity.
There has been an outdoor book fair this week in the gardens around PDLC.
This photograph of a boy with a cigarette and lollypop was impressive.
I also enjoyed this photographers views of edited landscapes
Outside the flowers were vibrant
The photography exhibit was in this classical building
And surprise, we learned that our cafe has cooling misters that sprayed every minute or so!
Waiting for the tram to return home
Monday May 23
A surprise. No sun today! So we went to an outdoor mall we've never visited before, it's at the end of one of the tram lines. Not too crowded because it was a bit damp when we first arrived. Sun came out late.
Out door escalators and moving walkways.
Went to the église St Francois, a church with a huge steeple that we see all the time on the tram ride into the centre. We knew it was not open, but we hoped to maybe get some good photos of the outside of the church and grounds. No such luck. But we did get to see a neighbourhood that was very different to most of Montpellier. It was like walking in a very old village within the city.
Stones buildings with balconies
Small houses in a row.
Aging
This would have been the carriage entrance to a courtyard
First glimpse of the Church but only because someone opened a gate as we walked by
A different view from afar
Interesting design for a house.
Lots of aging door photo opportunities.
Another carriage gate
Glimpse of the spire behind a villa
Another odd house.
Old through the new.
The tram stop, is called "jeu de mail des abbés" or, the game of mail played by the monks. I have no idea.
Wednesday May 26
Today we visited Aiguë-Mortes, with Francoise and Roland. It's a perfectly preserved medieval village port rich in history. And maybe the only medieval village we've visited that is not on top of a hill or mountain. And, it's built around a square with the roads straight, and at right angles, not a jumble of roads following the topography of the hill.
The centre of the town is commercial.
This brief easy to read intro will give you an idea of the age and importance to the first crusades.
In 1240, King Louis IX set his hugely ambitious plan in motion, namely to furnish his kingdom with a port town that would liberate him, with regard to future crusades, from the goodwill of foreign princes, chiefly the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II, who reigned over Provence at the time, and King James I of Aragon, whose possessions stretched from Montpellier to Catalonia.
The Constance Tower and a Château were erected in a matter of years. A population began to assemble in the shadow of their walls, drawn by the impressive privileges granted by the King as an incentive for the founding of the city Aigues-Mortes.
In 1266, King Louis IX decided to go one better and commissioned the construction of ramparts around the town, which were not completed until some 30 years later, during the reign of his grandson, Philip the Fair.
Except for the Château, destroyed during a skirmish in the Hundred Years' War and not rebuilt until the 17th century, the town has preserved the entire perimeter wall (1,643 metres), featuring three corner towers, two flanking towers and the entrances provided by five main gates and five posterns. The only elements that did not survive the monument’s reorganisation after the development of armaments are the ditches and hoarding, which were maintained until the 18th century.
A port used during the last two crusades, both led by King Louis IX, Aigues-Mortes was also a commercial port from its founding – the town even obtained a monopoly for goods coming in and out of the kingdom in 1278. Although the port inevitably silted up starting in the late 13th century, it kept its monopoly until Provence was annexed to the kingdom, in 1481.
Ramparts and gate at end of a residential street
If you couldn't defeat invaders with armour and swords, you could always scare them away with pastel plastic windmills
The main square with king/saint Louis
Colourful tables
Beautiful jasmin
Aiguës Mortes is in the Camargue and Bulls are big in the Camargue.
Way back in the 13th century, they thoughtfully built the main gate where the car parking would bc situated centuries later.
This may seem an odd combo, bulk flavoured salt sold by weight, and wine.. but the connection is that the vines are grown in sand. Years ago, the Vines in France were decimated by an infestation and they discovered it was eliminated if the plants were rooted in sand. We sampled a bottle of sand wine, vin du sable at lunch, very pleasant.
Lots of bull (toro) delicacies . Wok de taureau though, hmm. Chinese bill dish?
Beautiful array of flowers
The village is completely surrounded by these ramparts.
We drove on to a tower that was the main toll gate for anyone entering aiguë mortes, about 5 kms from the village over typical Camargue landscape,
Not totally pink, but certainly wild flamingos
Archers view of the road to aiguë mortes
Wild Camargue white horses
We drove back to La Grande Motte, they have a friend who owns a cabin restaurant on the beach. He works 4 months and lives off the profits for the rest of the time.
Thursday May 26
Temperatures back up to 30c. A stay home day after all the travelling yesterday. And, today is another holiday in France. Thats three in May, the 1st, then victory in Europe day and today is the feast of the Ascension. . Just like Canada, people tag on extra days to a long weekend and they call it "faire le pont" or, to make a bridge. We Bought our train tickets for Narbonne on Monday, couldn't find any for Saturday likely because of the long weekend. Magically the places in Narbonne we want to visit are all open on Monday. That's not always the case in France, many museums and restaurants are closed after the weekend.
Friday May 27
We went downtown to photograph an area by PDLC, called Antigone. It was conceived and built mostly between 1980 to 2000. À very large block of land, 36 hectares, that was apparently a former military barracks. As a departure from the concrete, block and glass architecture, the buildings are designed in Classical Greek style, and forms it's own community of apartments, (predominantly low income! offices, restaurants, libraries, sports centre, swimming pool and even a church. There are bold towering arches, very large squares, fountains. It's bold, and quite stunning to walk through. It connects to the central Montpellier historical section through the indoor downtown shopping centre.
The Antigone complex is large enough to be served by three separate tram stops on the Line 1. These photographs show the walk from one end, Place de Europe to the other end, which is the polygon shopping mall off Place de La Comédie.
Place de Europe
An odd looking apartment building that was built a couple if years ago. Not part of Antigone.
At this point we are walking down the central axis boulevard towards the Polygon Mall (a long way to go still!)
The swimming pool
The public library with an outdoor theatre (Greek style!)
Looking backwards to the place Europe
More bikes in the wall...and Montpellier région offices
Tree lined border alleys just like Paris and all the other French towns.
The church, this us the only road that intersects the complex. Pedestrians have the right of way and most cars respect that. Actually, we've found that to be the case all over Montpellier, cars routinely stop for pedestrians standing by the side of a road.
Here's a crosswalk with a light, but even though cars have a green light, they tend to stop if there are people waiting. I know, strange, but You'll just have to believe me 🙂
The main stretch with most of the restaurants.
Classical columns, either real or implied, prédominate.
The downtown mall ahead
Stunning entrance to the mall
View towards PDLC and the old section of Montpellier from the top of the mall
Looking down to the start of the Antigone section and the trams
Another very, very hot day. So we stayed close to home and decided to take a slow walk a trail along the river Lez that runs next to our apartment. New adventure for us. The trail paralleled the river, then rose up to a grass land and park. Lots of interesting stone walls, and door ways to no where. I got the impression that it may have been a very large estate with out buildings at one point.
Roofing job about to start
Very large trunk!
This may have been a mill at one time
This might have been the main gate to the estate. The right column collapsed and they left the stones where they fell
You're used to seeing medieval towers by no3, but this is actually a newer water tower
And if you've read all the way to the bottom, this will be the last blog from France. The next blog will be about Narbonne, our trip to Paris and our flight home on Friday 3rd June. Looking forward to 30c weather in Parksville .
Comments
Post a Comment