Provence, Toulouse, and the Dordogne

Hmmm.  Can I really fit all three of these regions into a single blog post?  I think I will need to be concise, as I have obviously fallen behind in the last two weeks.  The schedule is so packed, it's hard to keep up!

For those of you following our weather woes, I am sorry to say that they continued relentlessly until about two days ago.  Rain, hail, thunder, lightning, wind, and cold weather.  Many, many dark threatening clouds on a daily basis.  NOT what we were expecting from the first 17 days of May.  However, I am happy to say that things seem to be improving!  Today, it is actually warm and sunny, as it was yesterday.  Monday wasn't so bad either.  Not particularly warm, but it didn't rain.  Perhaps there is hope for May yet.  Of course, once the warm spring weather is here to stay, we'll be on our way to the rain and cold of Ireland.  Sigh.

In the last 11 days, we have visited all of the following places:  Mougins, St. Paul de Vence, Gourdon, Grand Canyon du Verdon, Augines, Rustrel, Rousillon, Buoux, St. Remy, Arles, Les Baux, Nimes, Escalquens (small suburb of Toulouse where we spent a wonderful weekend with our friends the Alberts), La Roque Gageac, and Les Eyzies, plus the town where we are currently staying, the name of which escapes me at the moment.  Would you like to hear a little bit about each of those places?  I didn't think so.  Suffice it to say that we have seen:  tons of fabulous scenery, many castles (both free standing and built into hillsides), old forts, quaint old walled cities, ocre cliffs, the monastery where Van Gogh painted many of his finest works, many ancient Roman ruins, good friends who we don't get to see nearly often enough, a park with life-sized scenes from prehistoric life, and prehistoric caves (both real and extremely well reproduced). 

We have hiked a lot, gone canoeing twice, shopped, played petanque and volleyball, taken many pictures, run through several rain storms, seen a falconry show, launched a trebuchet (Jonah), had lunch in a creperie populated entirely by Rick readers, visited museums, and, well, you get the idea . . ..

That "super short" slide show I've been trying to create of our whole trip just gets longer and longer.  Maybe I shouldn't mention that.  I don't want to deter anyone from wanting to spend time with us when we return home.  Here are a very few of the hundreds of photos of the last 11 days.

Just a couple of the many beautiful sights in the Grand Canyon du Verdon.

Paddling our way from the crystal clear lake to the Verdun River

The remains of the chapel at Fort de BouxJonah prepares to launch the trebuchet

Roman ruins in NimesOur wonderful friends, the Alberts

The Pont de Gard

On Saturday, we head to Paris, where we will spend one week.  Then, we have one more week in France before we leave for two weeks in Ireland and five days in London.  Our adventure is going to be over before we know it!