Month: September 2014

Sat 30th – Sun 31st Aug. – Fontaine de Vaucluse

We’ve taken a branch off our main road to head for an aire that seemed off the beaten track, therefore less busy, therefore get a decent night’s sleep after last night in Sisteron.

This is a tiny little town called Fontaine de Vaucluse, and it has an aire for about 30 motorhomes. It also has the most complex entry/pay/security system we’ve ever come across. We joined the small queue of vans waiting to get in; the hold up being people unable to get the entry machine to do their bidding and make the barrier go up. We did eventually manage to get in, though we never got the “gratuit” Internet access that was allegedly available.

Another fabulous and interesting town. There’s a river through the town that’s absolutely crystal clear. It’s probably the clearest river I’ve ever seen. It’s not a small river – probably 20 m across, yet it rises from the foot of the cliffs 300m upstream of the town. It’s apparently the largest spring in the whole of Europe. And it doesn’t end there. There’s a footpath that runs alongside the river/cascade, past the main spring(s), and leads you to a cave at the foot of the cliffs. You can’t really get into the cave as it’s more like a vertical hole. And it’s full of water. Just a still water surface. A couple of times a year, the water level in the cave rises. And rises, and rises. By some 20 m or so. It then overflows from the cave and cascades down to join the rest of the river. This is – it is said – an awe-inspiring sight.

The Vaucluse
The Vaucluse rises from a cave at the bottom of this cliff

The cave itself has been explored many times; the first dive taking place in 1853, from which it was established that the floor of the cave was 24m down. The next dive established a floor at 32m down. Subsequent dives over the years have explored further and further down, the most recent in depth being determined in 1985 as being 308m by remote control diving vehicle. Further explorations  2003 and 2004 revealed hundreds of Roman coins and other artefacts that were retrieved. The full extent of the cave system is still unknown, as is the cause of the twice yearly flooding of the cave. Fascinating.

Getting out of the aire in the morning was no easier than getting in. Especially as there were motorhomes trying to get in & thus blocking the only way out. In fact, the people trying to get in  called out the Gendarmerie as they’d paid twice and STILL the barrier wouldn’t let them in!

Needless to say, we eventually made good our exit and continued to head South – the temperature rising all the time, reaching a very pleasant 29 degrees by the time we reached our chosen destination of Saintes Maries de la Mer.

Fri 29th Aug. – Gap and Sisteron

We left Chamrousse somewhat late in the day. We’d identified a couple of Aires around Gap & Sisteron that might be useful stopovers on our way South. There is an unfortunate lack of Aires in this area so we were keeping our fingers crossed, especially as the ones we could find on ProMobile didn’t have great reviews.

The Route Napoleon runs from Vizille – South of Grenoble – down to Cannes in Provence, following an often perilously twisty course through several lumpy bits of France. We drove the entire length of it back in 1982: after a lengthy training course in Grenoble, I’d booked a holiday cottage in a miniscule village called Gigaro, about 10km to the South of St Tropez. That was in a Ford Cortina 2l Estate with loads of spare power. This time, we were only going to a point to the South of Sisteron before branching off towards the Camargue. And in a huge van with very little spare power. Slightly worrying, as the map showed the bit through Vizille as being unsuitable for large vehicles. It all worked out in the end as “large vehicles” turned out to mean over 26 tonnes. Even we don’t stretch anywhere close to that.

We reached Gap. Gap has two aires: The first one turned out to be a supermarket car park, inhabited by a large number of darkly dubious types. A quick about-turn and search for the second one. Yet again, her up the windscreen messed us around, taking us down a tiny road on exactly the wrong side of the railway line, before the road ended in a no-entry sign. I may have mentioned it before, but doing a 3-point turn in narrow roads is not our vehicle’s best selling point. Despite having a reversing camera, I managed to snap the end off our waste tank drain-pipe, clipped so conveniently to the underside when I hit the bank. Bugger.

We found the other Aire: It had 4 motorhomes in it and was full. There were two other vans seemingly queuing for a space. So we headed further South.

We reached Sisteron at about 7:30pm and found the Aire at the side of the main road. There were 4 places available, one of which was taken up by a Spanish truck. We grabbed the best space of the rest.

It wasn’t a peaceful night. We were right next to (i.e. 2 metres away) from the main road, and it was very busy. We walked into Sisteron to take a quick look and found it to be yet another of those wonderful places you could easily spend a couple of days in. The aire / car park was perched on top of the old city walls. About 30 metres vertically below us was the ancient road crossing the river, and 200 m down the road was the ancient portal (now removed) through which the old road used to pass under the cliff to reach the town.

Across the river

Wonderful old part to the town, with slightly Moorish appearance, very narrow streets, and a citadel perched high up above the town. The next morning, we went on a hunt for a boulangerie and spent some time in the market buying fruit. The market was causing havoc for the traffic through the town, and we had still to drive through the town!

The Citadel, Sisteron

Tired, with lack of sleep we headed further South, branching off the Route Napolean at Chateau-Arnoux St-Auban.

Thur/Fri 28th/29th Aug. – Chamrousse/Sisteron

Thur 28th Aug

Thursday dawned well. We (eventually) decided we were going to walk to Lacs Roberts – over the hills and far, far away. Actually, it’s only about 5.5km away – at least, according to the signs. But most of it was fairly vertical and by the time we reached the diminutive Lac des Pourettes (only 2.5km from our start position, allegedly) we were pretty worn out and it was time for lunch. Some of the walking was fairly intense, involving clambering up (and down) steep, rocky sections of path. Neither Joy’s bad knee nor my bad knee were very appreciative of this. It was also pretty hot. After we’d had our packed lunch, we headed back.

As it was still warm, we decided to sit outside – on the terrace of one of the bars. We ordered a (biere de) pression each (draft beer). It was horrible. I asked if they had any other beers: They had and so Joy & I each ordered a different (bottled, this time) beer. This time, they were very good whilst also being very alcoholic at 5.9% and 6.3% respectively. For that little lot, we paid the handsome sum of €20. The two “special” beers (as they turned out to be) were €6 each (for a mere 33cl. Never should you expect to buy French beer cheaply in a bar. Even when the bar is in a ski resort, out of season, and is otherwise deserted.

Fri 29th.

We’re leaving today, but not before I have another ride down one of the mountain bike downhill routes. Joy elected to do the cross-country trail, so I took the tele-cabine up to the top and followed the blue trail down from there. There were a couple of sections I felt I could have done – had I been wearing more body protection; had I been closer to home; etc – but didn’t. The rest of it was good fun but would have been far better on the other bike I left at home (my full-suspension bike).

After filling the van with water, we set off down the Route Napoleon, eventually arriving at Sisteron at about tea-time. But more about that when I next have time (and an Internet connection).