Wednesday 3 December 2008

Pont-du-Gard : suite






The day was lazy, warm and sunny and Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur - in the south of this wonderful country was announcing its welcome with clear skies and bright sunshine.

The aura of siestas could be sniffed in the breeze and the townsfolk at the roadside cafes in Remoulins were not concerned one way or the other.

Summer was only just over and no one could accept that this was really so !

But the excitement was building.
Soon we would be arriving in Avignon and Nathalie would be there to meet us.
At least we had brought her some good, old-fashioned Aussie weather !

Crikey, I thought, what language shall we speak ?
There was a choice of four, French, Australian (where one holds the nose while speaking), British (just come from there), or Globish.

Demain, vous pouvez découvrir le résultat et la réponse.
C'est le temps de sieste à l'heure actuelle.

À demain !

6 comments:

Nathalie H.D. said...

I'm amazed to see how deserted the place looks. On summer days the river is crammed with swimmers and kayaks competing for space and the river banks are packed with sun bathers.

The sign seems beautifully translated to me, something so rare it's worth mentioning. Most signs anywhere in France bring a good laugh.

Jumping from the cliffs on both sides into the deepest part of the river (your last photo) has been an all time favourite for young adventurous boys. The sign is supposed to prevent from this happening. It's become a bit of a cat and mouse game but the boys still love doing it.

(they rarely jump from the bridge itself because of the real risk of not seeing a kayak coming from under it)

M.Benaut said...

I suppose with the summer at its end, there were less people than previously.
It would be excellent to kayak from Pont-St-Nicolas and return as one of my photos shows. However I have not posted it.

Next trip, - in the heat of summer !

Nathalie H.D. said...

Yes m.benaut, kayaking down the Gardon from Pont Saint Nicolas to Pont du Gard is great fun, I've done it many times but the beauty of it is there's no need for hard paddling back up again! Canoe and kayak rental companies such as Kayak Vert offer one way options: it's an easy paddle downstream, they pick you up with a minibus at the other end and drive you back to where you started!

Anonymous said...

It looks like your bathing couple hadn't really planned to take a swim. They're wearing their underwear rather than proper bathing suits...

claude said...

Philippe and I visited this very beautiful bridge. I bought a small book about it. This bridge is one of treasures of our country.

Jules said...

The water in the bottom shot looks so cold and deep!!!

We were there on a freezing day in October and it certainly was frigid.