Advertisement
Published: February 26th 2005
Edit Blog Post
Pont du Guard
This was the last thing we saw, but it was the nicest picture so we decided to use it for the cover. In late January I bought Vanessa an early birthday present - rollerblades. I bought some for myself too so we can go out and skate around Paris. They are pretty good ones so we should be able to use them when we get home (down at Mission Bay and at Lake Murray). Anyway, we bought them now since every Friday night they have a group skate through the streets of Paris with thousands of people. Vanessa has been using them as much as she can - except for when it is too cold / wet outside. Speaking of which, we were hit with a major cold streak for about a month. It was in the 20’s and 30’s (with wind-chill making it feel like 10). It actually snowed several times and even stuck to the ground - the most that stayed was 3 or 4 inches.
I was busy working and studying for an insurance test, but we decided to go away for the weekend anyway. We went to southern France to get away from the cold (as it turns out it didn’t really turn out that way). First stop was Toulouse, where it snowed. We went around the city and
Toulouse
Fountain in a Toulouse square. took in the sights - several churches / cathedrals. The one I was actually impressed with the most was the smallest. They began it as a memorial but half way through, they decided to make a bigger one somewhere else in the city, so they just finished this one up and left it as is. The really cool thing about it was the ceiling. It was primarily a purple/blue/silver color that was slightly reflective. Then it had stars all over it, which were an iridescent white.
The next day we headed to Montpellier and started by checking out some fountains and gardens, then we headed to a high point in the city and took some panoramic shots with the camera. We walked around town and got to see a mini Arc d’Triumph, a cathedral, and the Chateau d’Eau, which was the end point of a long aqueduct and the point where the city used to come to to get its fresh water. We still had time before our train left to Nimes and it was a fairly nice day out so we decided to take a bus out to the Mediterranean. The bus dropped off a couple of miles away
from the ocean, so we had to walk down a road and then through some housing and docks to get to the beach. The water was pretty clear, but a bit to cold to take a swim in. We ate some snacks out on a jetty, and stayed out there enjoying the ocean air for awhile, then headed back to the bus. When we got back, the town was swamped with tourists so it took us a little while to find somewhere to eat. We ended up eating at an American restaurant - which was nice since we haven’t been able to have food like that for some time. We got a two person dinner that came with BBQ ribs, and two hamburgers. Yes, I know, I’m a pig, but I was very excited to actually be able to have BBQ once again. After stuffing ourselves, we headed to the train station and off to Nimes we went.
Once we arrived in Nimes we discovered that the hotel we had a reservation at was actually 10 km outside of Nimes, not the 1 mile from city center that it said it was on the internet. After a fairly pricey taxi
ride we arrived at the hotel and got some much needed sleep. The next day we walked about 5 km toward town then were able to catch a bus the rest of the way in. We went around town and saw a mini Coliseum that is actually still used for concerts and sporting events. We happened upon a Roman ruin that was still in incredible shape considering that is was about 2000 years old. Inside they had a bunch of mosaics and statues that they had dug up around town while making new buildings. A couple of the statues actually came from what they think was a 2000 year old garbage dump - I guess the guy who owned them way back when decided he didn’t like them anymore so he threw them out. After that we finally found a way to get out to Pont du Guard, the huge and most well known bridge / aqueduct in France. Once you see the pictures you will likely recognize it. Once we got out there it was absolutely amazing. I can’t believe that they were able to build something that huge, that long ago, especially with the tools they had. We
Unknown Dog
We miss our puppies so much that we have to take pictures of other people's dogs whenever we can. :( -Poor little Dharma... walked over the bridge then went down below it. The river that ran under it was very clear - I think you could see down about 20ft. Next we went up a trail to the very top where the aqueduct actually ran. The channel for the water that ran through it was actually not very big, so its kind of funny that they had to build that big of a bridge for that small of a channel. In all, we spent a couple of hours there then headed back to Nimes to catch our train to Paris.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.098s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 10; qc: 55; dbt: 0.0462s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.3mb