The Provencal Market & Fontaine d' Vancluse

I was the last one to breakfast, and everyone else had already left Les Carmes to start their day exploring Provence once again. After Ann brought my breakfast over, she asked me if I was planning on going to the largest Provencal open market in L’Isle Sur la Sorgue this morning. I quickly realized that was the reason why I was the sole guest still at the breakfast table despite the fact that it was just nine in the morning. I hadn’t planned on going, but she convinced me that it was well worth the visit. I hurriedly scarfed down my croissant and finished it off with a few gulps of orange juice, and was off. Apparently, if I left any later than 10am, parking was guaranteed to be virtually unavailable. Ann was right, parking was horrendous but I lucked out after driving only a few circles around the town.
The L’Isle Sur la Sorgue Sunday market was packed, but I didn’t feel as squished as I did on the narrow streets of Uzes just days earlier. This market was just a larger version of the one in Uzes, and I think that I even saw some of the same vendors as well. There were so many interesting and uniquely Provencal products at the market. I wanted to take a lot of what I saw back with me, but don’t have any extra weight capacity. From a glass-is-half-full standpoint, I’ve found that to be an effective way to limit spending! I leisurely strolled the market for only a couple of hours and then headed back to Les Carmes to drop off my small purchases. Returning to the village of Gordes to have lunch, I found a quaint café called L’Estaminet and ate their poisson de jour (fish of the day) entrée. I walked around Gordes and took more pictures of the beautiful views of the hillside village and of the countryside down below.
I headed back towards Les Carmes, but stopped at the small village of Fontaine de Vaucluse. The town is known for one of the most powerful springs in the world, and the water is a beautiful emerald green color. Unfortunately, during the summertime the water level is drastically lower than during the winter, so it’s not as magnificent a sight right now. Essentially, there’s a big cave like hole at the bottom, and the measuring marks were the only indication of how high the water level will get in the coming months. The riverfront town was still quite picturesque and full of tourists from all over the world.
The only night of each week that the entire Les Carmes family takes off from preparing and serving dinner is on Sunday. So after my day of exploring the Luberon area, I went to Auberge de Lagnes for dinner, per Ann and Mike’s recommendation. The chef used to work with James in England years before. The shrimp tempura, gazpacho combo appetizer and dorad fish entrée were both very good. However, I still preferred James’ meals by far! Dinner didn’t take that long, but I did have to drive back to Les Carmes for the first time in the dark. It was an interesting experience because of course I couldn’t easily see all of the landmarks and street lights are hard to come by on the backroads of Provence. Overall, I had a very relaxing and mellow Sunday.

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