Renting a House in Provence
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| Remy |
Provence has five major areas: Bouche de Rhone (Arles,
Nimes),Vaucluse (Avignon area), Haut Provence, the Yar, and the Riviera and
Maritime Alps (Cannes, Cap d’Antibes). Provence is surprisingly large so it is
advisable to find a center of operations and take day trips. June
was a perfect time to travel before the summer tourist season and summer heat.
We rented a townhouse near the town of St. Remy,
France, for ten days in June of 2012 through Villa Journeys (www.villajourneys.com). This agency is owned by an acquaintance,
Linda Freedman of Marblehead. This was the third time we’ve rented through Villa
Journeys. The website shows pictures of homes in Europe and the
Caribbean, and we’ve always found the agency to be extremely reliable, the homes
even nicer than expected. Linda is quite accommodating, supplying
us with information, maps, and answers. The on-site rental agency was an English
agency, “Cottages 4 You.”The house was much more reasonable than a hotel would
have been, plus we could accommodate two adult children, and it allowed us the
comfort of a home.
Our townhouse, named Charlemont, was in a vacation
home development called Les Bastides des Olivers (olive trees).
Arelie, the young woman who greeted us, had stocked the house with a nights’
food and wine at our request, since we knew we would have traveled a long night
and day before arrival. The two-story, air-conditioned townhouse had a lovely
patio and pool where we ate most dinners. It was a 10-minute walk to the center
of town via a trail along a canal. Residents are mostly from
France, UK and Ireland (our owners). A large grocery store outside
the town walls, Intermarche, had gorgeous produce and meat so we often
had lunch out and stayed “home” for dinner on the patio. St Remy’s Wednesday
open market is gorgeous and bountiful, and supplied us with fabulous local
produce, and even paella, for much of the week.
St. Remy is a small town of 10,000 about ½ hour south of
Avignon, where we had taken the TGV train directly from the Paris
airport. We rented a car from Avignon and found driving pretty
easy. St. Remy is entered by rows of “plane trees” which provide an enticing
entrance. St. Remy is where Vincent Van Gogh spent some time in
the hospital known as St.
Paul de Mausolee, today housing a stunning Van Gogh museum.
There is a walk from the clinic to town with reproductions of some of his
paintings of the Ravine (at the MFA), olive trees and farmers that he
loved in St. Remy. Across the street are Roman ruins known as Les Antiques or Glanum.
In each town in Provence, there is a Tourist Bureau where
you should stop first and get maps and information. English is
spoken widely, but people appreciate attempts at French. Shopping focuses on
soaps, olive oil, lavender, fabrics, and wine. Provence boasts
many good wineries. The scenery is full of olive trees, grape
vines and lavender, which turns entire valleys purple by late June. We were a
bit early for that spectacle.
Luckily, an annual feast known as the “Transhumance,”
took place in early June. On that
day, thousands of sheep and goats are paraded through the town on their way to
the adjacent mountains, Les
Alpilles, for the summer. There were few tourists and many
townspeople with children waiting for the sheep that followed each other in
their mindless manner, almost on top of each other, through the old center city.
Our day trips were guided by Karen Brown’s book, France;
Charming Inns and Itineraries. She took us through back roads to
hill towns of Roussillon, Gordes, and Les Baux de Provence, each more
breathtaking than the last. Les Baux is a must: The citadel there
was built out of the rocks in the 10th Century. Walk to the top
and see the battering rams and catapults used to protect the city in the Middle
Ages. There are restaurants galore, views, and on the way back,
stop by one of the wineries in the valley for a tasting.
Our favorite restaurant was Les Mas du
Capoun, in the small town of Molleges, about 15 minutes east of St.
Remy. It was hard to get a reservation so we went for lunch and had a prix
fixe lunch that will remain in my memory for presentation, food and
friendliness. We ate three kinds of asparagus, fish from the
Camargue (a delta area of the Rhone known for waterbirds and salt),
lettuces, tomatoes, strawberry dessert, and wine.
Fortunately, our son from England did the
driving through these towns; although French do drive on the right hand side,
the rotaries are challenging. Park outside old city
walls.
We found the larger cities, Avignon, Aix en Provence,
Cassis (on the coast, like many other Riviera towns, crowded and full of
shoppers), less interesting than the small hill towns, called villages
perche, or “perched towns.” Arles was an exception.
With a population of 55,000, Arles is larger, but retains its ancient
feel with its city walls, Roman ruins, and setting on the Rhone River.
Hotel D’Arlatan
(***) looked wonderful, an old hotel from ancient times of Gaul. Van Gogh spent
18 months here with Paul Gauguin in the “yellow
house,” and sure enough, it is now a restaurant with yellow awnings and
looks just like Van Gogh’s painting of it. Arles is also where the
Postman, Joseph Roulin and his wife lived (MFA - Postman and La
Berceuse). Vincent painted about 300 paintings around Arles.
We wanted to get to the recommended Roman Aqueduct called Pont du Gard, west of Avignon,
but it will have to wait until next trip.
Anita Poss 2012