France 2022 – Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, Roman ruins, van Gogh, and an Alpilles hike

April 12 and 13, 2022

I travelled from Roussillon to Saint Rémy by bus and arrived in the late morning. Luckily, I was able to check into my accommodation early so I quickly dropped off my back pack and set off to visit the first of three sites here that I wanted to see. After a brief stop in the centre of town to visit the tourist information office, I carried on down a rather busy road towards the Monastere St. Paul de Mausole asylum where Vincent van Gogh spent a year of his life after he cut off part of his ear. The kilometre-long walk beside traffic was made more enjoyable by the presence of nineteen panels along the route that displayed reproductions of works painted by van Gogh while he was in Saint Rémy. Like in Arles, it added an extra dimension to view the paintings in the area where they were painted (yes, I see the olive trees, the cypresses, the Alpilles hills). The accompanying quotes on the panels, extracted from letters written by Van Gogh, really caught my attention – such beautiful words on each, expressing his emotions about the nature surrounding him and his efforts as an artist to capture the colour, form, and essence of his subjects. When I get home, I plan to find a book of letters written by van Gogh.

Here is the approach into St. Paul de Mausole which still operates as a psychiatric hospital today.

The lovely cloisters and a peaceful chapel are open to visitors.

There are several rooms which provide information and displays about the life of van Gogh and the time he spent here, and there is a re-creation of his room which I found to be quite moving.

Vincent’s room overlooked a large walled garden area, and beyond that were fields and olive groves. Here is a view of the asylum from the gardens.

While at St. Paul de Mausole, van Gogh was able to leave his room daily to visit the countryside and paint. In his 53 weeks in residence here, he completed 143 paintings and more than 100 drawings! I find it quite sad that van Gogh created so much of his beautiful art in the south of France (over 350 paintings and drawings over 27 months), and yet there is only one van Gogh painting on permanent exhibit in Provence, at Avignon.

Here are several more photos from the quiet and peaceful St. Paul de Mausole. The sculpture of van Gogh, by Gabriel Sterk, is entitled, ”Le voleur de tournesol” (the thief of the sunflowers).

From the monastery of St. Paul, it is just a bit further of a walk to reach two Roman monuments, known as Les Antiques, that marked the entrance to the Roman city of Glanum.

The Arc de Triomphe, built in 20 AD, is missing its upper level but is impressive nonetheless.

The taller structure, the Mausoleum of the Julii (30 BC), was built by three brothers to honour their father and it contains reliefs on all four sides depicting scenes from the battles of Julius Caesar.

Next, across the road and a little further down, I visited the Site Archéologique de Glanum. Once buried beneath an olive grove that van Gogh painted, this ancient site was discovered in 1920 and has been excavated over the subsequent decades to reveal multiple centuries of settlement. Most obvious are the remains of a Roman town that existed here between around 40 BC and 260 AD. There is also archaeological evidence of a Hellenic settlement here from the 2nd and 1st centuries BC, and of Gaulish occupation (of the Salluvians, a Gaulish people of Celto-Ligurian origin), from the 6th and 7th centuries BC.

It was so beautiful here! I loved the the geometry of the ruins contrasted with the natural forms of the Judas trees, all in pink/purple bloom, and the dark green cypresses and other trees surrounding the site.

And then, at the far end, the dramatic, rocky Alpilles hovered over the site and echoed the colour and solidity of the stones but not their symmetry.

This is the main street which runs through the site, with the remains of shops and homes found on the right. On the left, beyond the wall, is the rounded apse of the curia which was used as an assembly hall and as a tribunal, and beyond that was the forum.

Here are the foundations of the thermal baths, an important part of Roman social life.

Farther up the central road one nears an area where two temples stood, one to the goddess Valetudo, the Roman goddess of health, and one to Hercules. A sacred spring here was thought to have curative properties by both the Gauls and later the Romans.

This upper area of the site, near the sacred spring, is also where the remains of the Gaulish village were found as well as stone ramparts that worked with the topography of the hills for defensive purposes.

At the far end of the site, beyond the tall columns, a path rose up onto the hill on the right enabling views down onto the site. As yet, only about ten percent of the total area of the Roman town has been excavated.

It was quite busy at the site when I first arrived, but I lingered for a long time, reading the information boards and listening to the excellent audio guide, and by the late afternoon there were far fewer people about so I was able to freely take photos of this very beautiful and multi-layered, historic place.

After visiting Glanum, I returned to Saint Rémy. The town centre, as I passed through, was very busy with people strolling about or enjoying an afternoon aperitif at a café, but lingering here held no appeal for me. My apartment, in a quiet residential neighbourhood, and featuring a garden, was my refuge for the evening in order to think about and savour all that I had seen today.

Up into the Alpilles

The next morning my plan was to do a small hike of only about 3 km, but it necessitated a road walk of almost 6 km in order to get to and from the trail. I was feeling a bit lazy and briefly thought about not going, but the lure of seeing a small lake and of climbing up, over, and through (via a rock tunnel) the Alpilles hills was enough to have me putting on my hiking boots and heading out the door.

The road walk went surprisingly quickly, but I was still very thankful when I was able to veer away from the traffic and off onto this dirt track. Ah, green all around!

A couple were just ahead of me which I resented a bit, but it soon proved useful as without them I might have missed the start of the small trail that would take me up and over the promontory on the right in the photo. I walked to the end of this road, expecting to see Lac Peirou spread out before me, but upon turning the last corner all that was in front of me was a tall narrow dam rising up at least 15 metres! No lake in sight! (I was a bit miffed at the dam and didn’t take its picture!)

I had known of course that there was a dam there but had thought that I would still be able see the lake. No matter, I retraced my steps and found the small trail, almost hidden in the scrubby vegetation, that the couple had taken. I started to climb and this is the first view of the lake I had.

I climbed higher up on the steep rocky trail,

and stopped to take a photo back towards Saint Rémy where I had started.

Stopping to look at plants gave me an excuse to catch my breath! I have seen so much lovely rosemary in bloom all throughout Provence, but here I began to see wild thyme. It is so pretty that it deserves its own large photo!

Wildflowers grew from tiny crevices in the limestone, or they found areas on the hillside to grow in larger patches like the pink cistes (cistus albidus) and mounds of pretty purple flowers that looked a bit like bachelor’s buttons.

The path took me over the top of the promontory through a thin gap,

and I began the steep climb down to the lake.

I finished the descent and walked along the peaceful lake shore to the far end to take this photo looking towards where the dam is placed. I had climbed over the hill on the left, and now it was time to walk around to the right side of the lake and climb up to a tunnel that would take me through the hill on the right!

After walking around to the far side of the lake and towards the dam, I took this photo looking back. Cars are able to access a parking area beyond the trees and the lake is popular for fishing and family outings, but swimming is not allowed as the lake serves as a water reservoir.

I found the trail to take me up. The dark oval in the wall of rock is where the tunnel is!

There were chains attached to the rock, and then metal ladder rungs attached in the tunnel to help hikers as the limestone underfoot has been worn quite smooth over the years.

I climbed around the corner, and there was the tunnel going up in two steep sections, with a natural landing in the middle. The photo on the left is looking up from the base, and on the right is looking down from near the top.

Fun! I had left for my outing fairly early in the morning, hoping to arrive at the tunnel before it got too busy but I was the only one there which was wonderful. After emerging from the tunnel, there was a quick descent down the steep hill to arrive, far too soon, at the main road about a kilometre from Glanum. The traffic immediately made me want to retrace my steps and return the same way I had come (the trail portion was too short!), but I was mindful of the distance back to my apartment, so I headed on down the road towards Saint Rémy and tried to hang on to my ”zen”. I succeeded fairly well, and my sense of peace was replenished by a brief stop in an olive grove by the roadside where the tiniest wildflowers were growing in the grass, like a mini meadow. The flowers of the little poppies were less than three centimetres across, and I found a few of these beautiful tiny white star flowers.

Zen replenished, I walked through town, again declining to ”do city things” and returned to my apartment and its garden, very happy with my time in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence.

Addendum: Now, I’ve been meaning to mention the skies. Since my arrival in Provence, most of the days have been very hazy and the bright white light has not been the best for taking pictures. That’s why you have not seen many photos with deep blue skies in my posts. It’s been a little frustrating, yes, but it is what it is!