The first of our two full days in Avignon was a rainy one. We sought shelter at the Musée Calvet, a restored 18th-century mansion, where we saw some 16th century Spanish paintings on wood, some antique china and silver, and a representation of works in oil by the Vernet dynasty: Joseph (1714-89), Carle (1758-1836), Horace (1789 - 1863) and Charles LeComte (1821-1900). The next was sunny, if still a bit cold and windy, and we took a bus to nearby Orange (onetime seat of the counts of Orange, which later passed to the Netherlands—a small, pedestrian-accessible town with no resemblance to its sprawling namesake in Southern California). The main attraction there is the well preserved Théâtre Antique, the only such Roman theater in the modern world with its stage wall still standing. Constructed of massive reddish stone blocks, the wall looms 36 meters above the stage; from a niche near the top an oversized white marble statue of Augustus salutes the audience. A brief note on history, as condensed by Fodor's: During the 400 years following the conquest of Gaul by Julius Caesar in 51 B.C. “Roman civilization blossomed in Provence.” Emperor Augustus, in particular, “established colonies, ruled by veteran legionnaires,” —in Apt, Arles, Avignon, and Glanum, of the places we would visit. And “these settlements grew into prosperous cities with baths, theaters, arenas, aqueducts, temples, and bridges.” And some 2000 years later an image of Augustus still stands to remind us of his accomplishments.

After three nights in Avignon we bid good-bye to Virgil and to M. Julot and dragged our luggage down the wide Cours Jean Jaurès (one of those rare straight-line streets) to the Budget rental office, conveniently located between the train and bus stations. Claiming the car that I had reserved for four days was as easy as presenting a passport, a driver's license, and signing a credit card slip for a hefty 1158FF (about $200). This would have bought quite a few bus and train tickets. But, I reasoned, we would need the car to visit the many smaller sites we had in mind, scattered around St. Rémy to the south and Apt to the east. I knew it was to be a small car, but just how compact would have stunned me, if I had not already been prepared by several days of observing all the little vehicles motoring down narrow streets or crammed into tight parking spaces. Only the biggest 10% of the cars I saw resembled compacts we see in the U.S. The remaining majority, while sometimes of makes known to us, were miniscule models that would probably not pass as road worthy in California. The car we rented, in fact, was a Ford, but nothing so large as an Escort. It was designated, simply, a “KA.” Very modern and highly streamlined, the lines of its dark blue body made one continuous curve from the integrated front bumper over the top, then curving down steeply to the tail, somewhat like the new Volkswagen beetle. As a result of the curved trunk lid, there is almost no usable cargo space. We did manage to pack in Maryl's compact suitcase, but my full-sized one wound up occupying the rear seat.

Although small, the car was, as we had been informed, new: less than a hundred kilometers on the odometer. After orienting myself to the shift pattern and the feel of the clutch (very light compared to my Volvo), I waited a considerable time for a break in traffic, cautiously backed out, then accelerated down one of the boulevards radiating away from the center of Avignon, toward St. Rémy, a mere 25 kilometers (15 mi.) to the south. My displeasure with the high price of the car was soon assuaged by my discovery that it was quite spirited, unlike the somewhat larger, but anemic Nissan “Sunny” we had rented in Greece the year before (at a considerably lower price). The KA rapidly accelerated to 50 or 60 kph, which seemed a decent speed for a boulevard within the city limits. As we proceeded, and as Maryl tried to align our progress with the cluster of lines leading away from Avignon on our detailed Michelin map, I quickly learned two lessons that would prove to be general rules throughout our four days of driving. 

First of all, the roads are so thoroughly signed in the French countryside that you are often better off following the arrows to your destination than trying to correlate your position with the tangle of possible routes on the map. You may not always find the particular route you thought you wanted, or the most efficient one, but you will get there. Case in point: that very afternoon, on a 50-kilometer excursion from St. Rémy, we stopped for an exprès in Fontvielle. From our table at a broad place, shaded by plane trees, I could see that the adjoining, relatively quiet street was signed as a highway. An arrow pointing to the left read: D17 — St. Etienne du Grès, Beaucaire, Tarascon. An arrow pointing to the right read: D33 — St. Etienne du Grès, Beaucaire, Tarascon. In southern France you may find that any road takes you where you want to go.

One caveat, and that was the second lesson I learned quickly: no matter how fast you think is a legal or proper speed for a given road or highway, someone else will want to go faster. Much faster. They will come up behind you and follow at an unnervingly close distance until they can get by. The French drive as if speed and mastery of the road are the essence of life. As if their are no laws or rules of etiquette for sharing the road with other drivers. As if there is not the slightest risk of damage or injury or death from colliding with another vehicle on a conflicting course. While driving along a meandering country road at, say 100 kph (60 mph), it is not uncommon to round a bend or pass a crest and see three cars coming toward you in your lane, each passing a different vehicle moving at a slightly slower speed. Guidebooks warn about the dangers of driving in France. Accident rates are high. I am sorry to say that this fact has been confirmed by my own limited experience while traveling there. When my sister and I arrived in Paris by motorcoach at the end of our eight-country guided tour in 1985, we were delayed by a massive traffic jam on the peripheral freeway. When we got to the head of the congestion, we looked out to see an automobile that had been mangled by a truck so badly as to be unidentifiable. And on this recent visit, late on the first afternoon of our brief driving tour, Maryl and I drove past a car lying wheels-up on the opposite side of the road. As we passed I noticed, in my peripheral vision, one person cradling the head of another lying by the roadside. Alive, I presumed. I did not want to look too long for fear of seeing blood.

Where did we go that afternoon on that treacherous highway? Alas, of all our stops on this trip, the single night in St. Rémy was far too short. If I had it to plan over again, I would have taken a day away from Apt and given it to St. Rémy. But how was one to know? The Lonely Planet guide to France does not even mention the town. What caught my eye was the Rough Guide's description: “The scenery of La Petite Crau changes abruptly with the eruption of the Chaine des Alpilles, whose peaks look like the surf of a wave about to engulf the plain. At the northern base of the Alpilles nestles St-Rémy-de-Provence, a dreamy place where Van Gogh sought psychiatric help and painted some of his most lyrical works. . . . A short way south of St-Rémy are the remains of the ancient city of Glanum, and along the ridge of the Alpilles is the medieval stronghold of Les Baux. . . . St-Rémy is a beautiful place, as unspoilt as the villages around, and its old town is contained within a circle of boulevards no more than half a kilometer in diameter.”

And it was better than I imagined. A mere six days before our arrival (the day before I left home) I phoned to reserve a room. Because there had been no answer at the Grand Hôtel de Provence (which turned out to be shuttered up), I contacted the second choice, the Hôtel Les Arts-La Palette, billed in the Rough Guide as a “very friendly” place above the Café des Arts. Locating it without any sort of map of the town posed a bit of a challenge, but by driving in random circles on the streets with ever-changing names, we eventually stumbled upon the Boulevard Victor-Hugo. Curb space was, as usual, unavailable, so I dropped Maryl off with the luggage and drove off in search of a place to park. After going far too many blocks and getting lost a second time, I feared this had been a dreadful mistake. Fortunately, the layout of St-Rémy was not too difficult to master, and I found a decent parking place a block short of the hotel. The Café des Arts was crowded with people enjoying a midday drink. A friendly young hotelier greeted us and led us to our top-floor suite, cheerfully hoisting my heavy bags up three flights of stairs (and leaving Maryl to contend with her own). I recalled asking for une chambre pour deux personnes avec douche et toilette, and, hearing a quote of one price in the 200s and another in the 300s, selecting the higher one. Our room, at 360FF (about $60) turned out to be the nicest of anywhere we stayed. It had twice the space of our room in Avignon, two single beds (which turned out to be fortunate, because that night I sweated out a short-term fever of 37.8 Celsius—about 100 degrees), a sizeable closet, a chest of drawers, a writing table and a spacious bathroom with toilet, bidet, shower and tub. And the view out the windows—of rustic stone buildings with weathered tile roofs, beneath towering leafy trees—was idyllic. I was ready to abandon plans and stay for a week.

But to take advantage of the car, we decided to leave the town behind and take in part of a loop through the Alpilles outlined in Fodor's, past several historic sites. There would be no time to linger at any of them, but, remarkably, we did manage to sit or walk in four spots long enough to feel a sense of place. First of all—carrying the bread, goat cheese, and wine that we struggled to buy just as the shops were closing for the midday break—we stopped for a picnic at a pair of Roman monuments known as Les Antiques: “a triumphal arch celebrating the Roman conquest of Marseille and a mausoleum thought to commemorate two grandsons of Augustus” (Rough Guide). While walking around the towering well-preserved mausoleum, we knew were following in the footsteps of Vincent van Gogh—toward the end of his life, alas. After living in Arles from 1888-89, after threatening Paul Gaugin with a razor, then mutilating his own ear in remorse, he was voluntarily institution­alized at the sanatorium of St-Paul-de-Mausole, within a hundred yards of Les Antiques.

It would have taken us a day to explore the ancient ruins of Glanum just across the road. Here the Gallo-Greeks built a city between the 2nd and 1st centuries avant JC (as the French refer to the period before Christ) and the Gallo-Romans lived for the following 3 - 4 centuries. We put it off to a future visit, leaving it to our imaginations to picture the spring and baths, the altars and temples—not to mention the bottles that would have been scattered by those centuries of Gallo drinkers.

During a café stop in Fontvielle we watched several older men playing petanque, the very popular French lawn bowling sport that is similar to the Italian bocci ball. Then we drove to a nearby site to walk along the remains of a Roman aqueduct—more evidence of the great works of infrastructure developed by the Romans in the prime parts of their empire. This aqueduct was nowhere near as impressive as the three-tiered arched span usually pictured in textbooks (which also happens to be in southern France, just outside the city of Nîmes —although we would miss the chance to see it). But the aqueduct de Barbegal that we did see is noteworthy for another reason. We followed it to a sudden drop-off of land, where a massive set of founda­tions trailing down the hill indicate the presence, according to archaeologists, of a 16-wheel, water-powered Roman flour mill.

For our last stop of the afternoon we joined throngs of Friday afternoon French tourists walking in the footsteps of an apparently beloved novelist, Alphonse Daudet (19th century, I believe—ever hear of him?). The landmark on this pine-forested rocky hilltop on the edge of Fontvielle is an intact windmill. One of the vanes of the mill was anchored to the ground, probably a necessary precaution, because the wind came in forceful gusts over the exposed rock.