Day 101. Arles. Nov 15. 2001

For a day in which we woke, still tired, for a day in we passed by the Roman amphitheater with a dismissive wave because our minds were too numb to care, we have seen more than I ever thought possible.

Arles woke us with a grey coldness and the typical hostel breakfast. After days of inadequate sleep we were eager to return to beds. But despite purchasing another nights rest we were evicted during the 10-5 closing period. We set out to explore Arles, the Roman city of Arelate, with drooping eyelids.

We climbed the main streets back to the centre of town, to the town hall and the church of La Cathedrale Saint Trophime with its adjoining cloister. The cathedral's great gates are an ornate masterwork, smooth stone statues in a gentle curvature, with mythical beasts over the lintels. the inside of the church does not equal the exterior but it is a nice place to sit and rest. There is a large collection of relics, a grisly display of spiritual wealth. The bones of St. Roch, St. Etienne and many others all in gilded casks. Many have small holes in which the faithful can insert a finger and touch a bit of holiness.

The cloister next door looked intriguing, but we weren’t really interested in paying. We climbed the streets towards the arena, past the amphitheater where again we are not too interested in paying. Our minds are too numb to appreciate beauty or history. We circled the arena but did not go in. We wander aimlessly and wait for the hostel to open again so that we can go back to our beds. And then we stumble on the Cryptoportiques.

Unsure of what they are we enter the building with the sign, an ancient abandoned church with only the altar remaining. The sanctuary is deserted, only a staircase leading down and a small booth to pay. We buy the pass to the city and embark on an adventure. We descend the staircase, down, down below the level of the streets, beneath homes and sewers and layers of rock. We emerge from the staircase in a dark, damp and musty tunnel, twenty feet below ground. Rows of arches split the tunnel in two and at the junction of the stairs it turns a sharp right angle to disappear into the darkness.

Arles is on a hill. When the Romans made it a colony after it aided Julius Caesar against Pompey, it required a forum. The Romans leveled out the land around the hill by building a massive basement, where we now stood. The cave was eerily silent and the light, only provided by slits to the forum above, was a pale yellow light that illuminated nothing. We followed the tunnels beneath houses and hotels, an enormous artificial cavern of darkness.

The far side had once opened on to the side of the hill, to the backs of roman shops that catered to Roman material needs and the great basement had served as a subterranean highway for goods and horses that weren’t wanted in the city streets. The caverns were bare and damp smelled of age. They spoke of ancient confidence and ability to build whatever was required. The Romans never fail to impress.

But beneath the deepest basement of the Hotel De Ville our imaginations began to run away with our minds. Heather remembered the Balrog the Dwarves unearthed when they delved too deep beneath the earth, while lovecraftian horrors from the Mountains of Madness nagged at the back of my mind. We left quickly.

But, whether by the excitement of exploring or the desire to get our money’s worth from our tickets, we had a renewed vigor. We returned to the cloister of St. Trophime. From deep beneath Arles we climbed to a garden secluded above the city. The cloister was beautiful, and secreted away from the wind, very warm. The carvings were smooth and full of energy and the stone seats were inviting but if we had not bought the tick for the whole package it would have been an entrance we regretted.

From the cloister we returned to the arena. The arena belonged to the cats of Arles and they basked against ancient stone seats as the wind raged outside of the ancient arched walls. Gently curving corridors circled the building and we followed them around in wide circles. Two dogs roamed the upper stories and we passed them many times in our rounds. They seemed lost and unable to find their way back to the ground but they seemed to enjoy their explorations even as they lost themselves deeper into the arena.

We climbed to the rooftops where three strange, very non-roman towers loomed. The exposed tops of the Roman arches rolled away from us in an endless series of stone waves. We entered the towers and looked down on the city below us. Hotels and apartments, crammed together, made red islands of roof tiles beneath us.

When the Empire collapsed those living in the ruins were faced by with the loss of technologies and the waves of invasions. They had a unique solution. Not trusting their ability to fortifications and not having enough money or manpower to build them anyway. They retreated to the structures the Romans left behind. The arena became the new city. Protective towers were erected. The arches were divided into apartments and a city was erected on the arena floor. Even now the windows and the doors of the middle ages could still be seen. How far the world fell. The arena city speaks of a terror and a loss so complete it is hard to imagine.

We left the arena and followed the streets back to the medieval gate at the entrance to the city. We passed the intersection where Vincent Van GoghMaison Jaune.” Paved over now by a new roundabout.

The quay over the Rhones edge, where the Romans has once raised a bridge of boats and Van Gogh’s fevered vision has wandered, was a filthy mess with bricks crumbling and moss covering all. The baths of Constantine were not much better, obviously not a priority for the town. We picked our way among the rubble with hesitant footsteps. The walls seemed to decay around us.

From the baths we returned to the Amphitheater in the shadow of the arena. Little was left of an amphitheater that could at one time hold 10 000. The walls were gone, the upper levels, the stages settings that had risen 3 stores above the town in a series of columns and statutes that must have been amazing. All that was left were two pillars and a piles of intricately carved and absolutely beautiful rubble. Here school children scrambled over the ruins and hid in secret niches for a forbidden cigarette far from the prying eyes of the teachers.

I wondered what plays had unfolded on the long vanished stage. Oedipus? Antigone? The Medea? Amateur performances of poetry and local auteurs that had failed and were lost to history? Flocks of pigeons blocked the sun and wind howled where once a chorus had sung. No deus ex machine had saved this theater from the ravages of time. We left feeling the weight of years.

We walked out of the city in a long walk to the ugly buildings of the Museum of Antiquity. Blue panels on a concrete triangle that seemed the epitome of bad architecture. Falling away in the gray starkness of a concrete pit were the remains of the Roman circus, the curving apex of the racetrack. The rest disappeared beneath roads and marshland.




The inside of the museum was a completely different story than the outside. Here we found one of the richest and most complete museums of antiquity we had yet seen. The towering, heavily muscled statue of Augustus from the the destroyed amphitheater at the apex, the museum fell away in the smooth geometric lines of a triangle. You begin in the prehistoric period but rapidly move into Arelate, Roman Arles. There are beautiful carven marble heads, Augustus, Tiberius, Hadrian, Caius and Lucius Caesar. There is a great augustan shield of marble and the intricate relief carvings of sarcophagi.


But it is the stories of everyday life that most fascinate. Lead pipes by the dozen, keys to locks crumbled to rust, most fairly conventional but many on rings in a style I have begun to associate with the grandeur of Rome. Objects for primping and preening that have not changed in 2000 years of history, especially tweezers. There are mock ups of the major areas of town, forum, circus, arena, which help visualize the scale of the structures on which we stood. And there was the most impressive collection of mosaics yet. Europa abducted by Zeus, an homage to Triton, the allegory of the seasons in small bits of colored tile. Most are damaged but some are impressively intact. Telling stories to the descendants of the descendants of those who sacked Rome. There is so much to see. The few preserved remains of the 28 000 wooden pilings that form the base of the circus, the shattered head of a marble child.

One exhibit that caught my eye is the remains from the hydraulic mill of Barbegal, a flour mill that ran down a hillside and was powered by twenty waterwheels. With one structure enough grinding was done in one mill to feed the entire population of Arles.

Arles sat on a crossroads of trade, the Via Domitia, the Via Agrippa and Aurelian Way all pass through the city. The Rhone with it’s cargoes of rich wines bathes the banks, the camargue plains region teems with sheep and bulls. The legacy of ruins and structures and a pervading sense of history that Romans left Arles is a powerful one indeed.

When we finally left the museum and headed back towards our humble lodgings for the night we were more tired than I thought possible. But still we have found time to follow the small yellow tiles inset in the concrete to the sanitarium of Arles where Van Gogh spent some of his time. The Garden, sheltered from the wind and rain in the courtyard of the hospital, was untouched by the ravages of weather and was beautiful in the depths of November. The hospital was clean and crisp and exuded a sense of health. But whet, I wonder would Van Gogh make of the shops that had replaced the wards, ship-owners the doctors and tourists the sick? 

Previous Entry: Day 100. Arles

Day 100. Arles. Nov 14 2001.

I began to wonder If there was not, perhaps, some sort of problem in Avignon. Yesterday as we walked we saw more genetically damaged people than anywhere we had yet traveled. The streets had far more people exhibiting deformities, twisted arms and legs, wrenched feet and hands, that I believe I have seen in my entire life and everywhere we stopped it seemed that there was a person with some form of brain damage or mental handicap. Even as we left the campground the people working in the office seemed only modestly functional. Perhaps there is a hospital nearby and those out and about are part of a program to reintegrate them into society.

The hard part of the day's trip begins at once. We had to leave Avignon by a small southbound highway. We followed the road around the city all right but after what seemed like hours of pedaling and fighting unsympathetic traffic we found ourselves on the road to the autoroute. Definitely not where we want to be. The wind was not helping, pushing us into the paths of oncoming traffic. We backtracked and, after another hour in the chaos, found our exit. For some reason it was not sign posted from our original direction. 

Heather has announced that the cycling portion of our trip is drawing to a close. After much discussion I convinced her that we must bike to Marseilles before we well and truly decide but the chaos of this morning did little for the cause of biking.

But the ride outside of Avignon was almost ridiculously easy. At times the Mistral pushed us with such force that we didn't have to pedal to reach our top speeds. If it was always like that then the whole world would be on bicycles.

The landscape became very rocky and promontories of white stone thrust skyward with unexpected power. The maps shows only a small rise and green forests but the hills seem to be living things rearing from the land with vengeful fury. At one point the railway tracks the road follows cleave though the middle of a small but steep hill and it suddenly looks for all the world as if a massive Faberge egg had been folded back to reveal the miniature trail within.

The land began to level out after that and soon we were on grass flats that rippled and swayed to the wind we couldn't feel as it pushed us along. There seemed to be castles spreading from every hillside and I realized that this will be the thing I miss most when we return home, the sense of history surrounding you whether you visit everything or not.

I am happy that we have reached our hundredth day. We have been in Europe as long as Napoleans failed return to power lasted. “The Hundred Days” his return is derogatorily called to emphasize its ephemeral nature. But a hundred days seem like eternity to us. I look back in this journal and even things ten days ago seem hopelessly out dates. England seems like a lifetime ago and Canada a fevered dream of the mystic who believes in reincarnation.

We reached Arles faster than expected. We arrived before noon and coasted into the city in bewildred amazement. The youth hostel was closed for the afternoon, from ten until five. Neither of us was in any mood to explore the city and we are both tired. The coldness of the day grows and once we are no longer moving we feel the cold as the bitter bite of a million tiny needles. We wrapped ourselves in jackets and mitts and as much clothes as will fit and still we were cold. We waited and we waited. Time passed at a snails pace and by the time the hostel opened we were frozen and almost beyond caring.

We stood mute in the entrance for long minutes while the old woman who runs the place looked at us impatiently. Finally the warmth seems to thaw our frozen brains enough and we get a room for the night. We are led to a room with a leaking radiator and we remembered with a sudden laugh that Chantal, from Nimes, and her boyfriend had complained that they were forced to stay in a room with a leaking radiator in Arles. This then must be their room.

This time our hostess notices and leads us to a dorm upstairs that we have to ourselves. It is cold but the blankets are plentiful and thick and warm. We turn the radiator on full and pile beneath the blankets. We are tired. Too tired. We do very little this night.

I have begun to worry in recent days. I wish for my journal to be so much more than a record of places and dates, an index for the inevitable photos. I want to paint pictures with words and bring us back in all our later incarnations to the travelers that we are now and to what we now experience. But I am so exhauseted by the time that I set pen to paper that my mind is numb and the least desire of my heart is to search for adequate words. All I can do is a mechanical recitation of facts and figures, places and things. The only witness to the beauty we have seen is photographs after all. 

Next Entry: Day 101. Arles
Previous Entry: Day 99. Avignon Continued.

Day 97. Nimes. Nov 11 2001

A day of rest.

Our disgust at the horrific carnage of the night before cast a pall over us for the rest of yesterday evening and it seemed to take so much of the beauty out of everything we had seen in Nimes. It was hard to reconcile such a beautiful city with such ugliness.

But it unfair to tar the whole city with the same brush. Nimes is a very beautiful place, a glistening city of marble and stairs. Oh the stairs. They have left a lasting impression on us, most especially in our calves.

The long sinuous curving stairs that cling to hills in the Jardin de La fountain, winding their way through vertical avenues lined with plane trees, impossibly green in the depths of November. Stairs that climbed over a waterfall that spiked into a small pond far below. When the stairs finally burst from under the trees to the base of the Tour Magna it was with a shock. The air had grown warm beneath the sheltering trees and now the cold assaulted us once more.

The great tower rose up like a monolith, impossibly white. The inside was alarmingly hallow, like a jar flipped upside down and scrapped clean by a child desperate to have every last taste of flavor. All that rose in the centre was a modern staircase of concrete, looking alien with it’s smooth spiraling contours in the rough brick of the tower. Climbing stairs became painful now, a strain on our legs and feet. The top, when it came, was a burst from the darkness to brilliant light and blowing air. The view, or the wind, was breathtaking.

Knowing the emptiness that was in the tower beneath us I was overcome by waves of vertigo even as I took in the landscape. I tumbled back against the wall and held the cables to the lightning rod that rose next to me and reflected on the irony of being electrocuted while worrying about the dangers of height. All that separated us from the gardens below was a thin lip of stone and a fatal drop. I cannot say now that I was sad to climb more stairs, this time down.

Next were the stairs of the Maison Carre, the building a testament in stone to so many of the reasons we came on this trip. Flawless white marble, chipped and stained by the passing eons, in a design so ancient and familiar that we almost felt compelled to drop to our knees and genuflect to gods long dead.

Then there were the stairs in the parks. The long singular staircase of Imperial faith leading to the sheltered sanctuary of the ancient temple, dedicated to Diana I have since discovered.

Then the short stairs that descended to spring of Nemausus itself, and exposed us to the source of all Nimes fountains.

Fountains abound, almost as much as stairs. The Jardin De La Fountain of course, but the Place D’Assas as well with it’s illusion of waters flowing uphill to fall in a cascade on a startled man while nearby a monolithic face spews water.

Or the Fountain Pradier with its cryptic name and nameless heads spewing forth a torrent of icy water that chilled to the bone.

Finally there are rough hewn wooden steps of the arena as well. Always today my mind is drawn back there. The pain and the suffering we saw has left me filled with words and yet speechless, filled with poetic rage and yet reduced to incoherent ranting. I write rants against the human race, filled with shame and despair for the future of our species. I am surprised by the depth and virulence of my own reaction.

But enough. Nimes has been a place of outstanding beauty and horror for us and I do not have the right words to describe the experience.

It has become cold and and the Mistral wind has picked up clouds of rain that turn the sky a sickly yellow. The small courtyard of the hostel is soaked and even racing to our evening meal has become a challenge. We will roll ourselves tight in our bunks and try to save as much of the radiators warmth as we can for the rest of the trip.

We have the room to ourselves tonight and it will be nice to be able to roll over without worrying that the creaks and groans of our bed will not awaken the room. Tonight I hope to sleep without dreams.

Next Entry: Day 98. Avignon
Previous Entry: Day 96. Nimes

Day 95. Nimes. Nov 9 2001.

The Day of Friendly Voices.

We woke to rain. We had woken every few minutes through the night, worried about time and the rising tide of water that threatened our sanctuary.

We dressed in layers and cycled back the long road into Bordeaux. The day was painfully cold and our small biking gloves did nothing to shield our fingers. We passed a clock that read out the time and temperature. 2 degrees and only an hour until our train left. We hurried. When we reached train station's welcoming bulk, its clock reading out a different time, two and a half hours to wait.

The train rolled into the station early, a gray series of bread-loaf cars, cold and metallic, the seats like ordered lines of soldiers with backs still at attention. No sign guided us in loading the bikes or our vast pile of luggage. Finally a harried station worker lifted a metal gate and led us to the baggage car with silent impatience. We stacked our bikes and made them as secure as we could before finding our seats in a cubicle designed for eight.

The train rested in the station while others passed, loaded passengers and hurried away in a mechanical dance. Our luggage filled the overhead racks and the spaces beneath the seats. The train jerked into motion with an unexpected suddenness and we changed our seats quickly to face the direction of travel. We moved out of the yard slowly, past trains that rested in the quiet indignity of old age, grass high around metal wheels, a patina of graffiti staining once proud cars. We passed gleaming silver and blue TGV Trains already stained with the tags of would be artists.

We quickly gained speed and were abruptly out of the city and racing through the Aquitaine countryside. The Garonne River swam lazily beside us, growing cleaner as before our eyes as silt and pollution disappeared downstream. The train began to slow before it reached peak velocity and pulled in a station many days bike ride from Bordeaux. People bustled through the narrow corridors, intent on finding open spaces in cramped quarters. An old couple filed into our car, watching a bevy of youth file past them smoking foul cigarettes. The man was dark of skin with ruddy cheeks and a white beard, like Santa Claus after a diet. His wife seemed younger, but not by much, raven hair streaked with snow. In their hands they carried panniers much like ours. They wore biking clothes like we would have wished for. They sat and dug into dinner like engines starving for fuel. Even as they ate they began to speak to us. The sound of cheerful French voices as we passed along the banks of the Garonne, the spires of churches dotting the horizon will remain an indelible memory.

Raymond and Maesa were no longer young, but if youth is measured in vigor they will outlast the world. They cheerfully share their food and their company, delighting in my stuttering French and the fact that I tried at all.

The train began to fill. The corridors flickering as people filtered through at every stop. The train pulled into Toulouse and the chattering voices fell silent in contemplation of the great blast here not so long ago. But the heartbeat of the city goes on and today was Friday, Toulouse a university town. Students filled the train in their hundreds to journey home for the weekend. Our cabin filled with youth and vigor to match our conversation. Voices sounded out in French, English, Italian, and Spanish. A young French girl whispering endearments to her Italian lover while Raymond practiced his ancient Spanish. A pretty woman across from us buried her eyes in her English copy of Harry Potter while Maesa, Heather and I bantered in a patois of languages.

The countryside flattened in a broad plain between two rising waves of hills, the vegetation became sparse with grey rock peeking from beneath low scrub and grass. We pulled between two hills closer together, the buildings becoming thicker and suddenly a vision from a fairy tale beckoned from the distance. The crenellated walls of the medieval city of Carcassone.

Here Maesa and Raymond left us and a gentle silence descended, as if no one could match the energy lost and all hesitated to try. The people crowding the train grew in number until every seat was filled and the crowds began to spill into the corridors, clogging them like unhealthy arteries. The train began the long descent into the Mediterranean basin and, somewhere between Sets and Montepelier we glimpsed the fabled sea for the first time, a thin line of brilliant blue racing along the horizon. But though we came closer and closer to the ancient waters we never saw them directly again. Ships crowded industrial harbors, canals ran in rough waves out of view, but the sea was always lost to sight until we turned away and began to climb the Rhone Valley even as the sun dipped towards the horizon.

We scurried nervously out of our packed compartment to the luggage compartment beginning to worry about how we would transport our bikes. The cars were full, no room to move and though all were friendly our constant shuttling luggage back and forth began to wear on the patient smiles. We struggled to maneuver bikes in tight spaces, rubbing rubber tires against skin and losing more goodwill. Finally we pulled into Nimes. Other bikers wrenched open the door with powerful tugs and we dropped our bikes the meter to the pavement below. A chill wind raged through the tunnel to the station and the light began to dim.

Our connection Avignon appeared on none of the boards and seemed to have passed from the knowledge of bewildered station personnel until finally one calmed us by saying slowly, in patient tones “It has been delayed for two hours.” Not willing to wait and not ready to face the stress of reloading our bikes when our connection arrived two hours from now we agreed to forgo the rest of our journey and stay in Nimes.

We biked away from the station with trepidation in our hearts, but soon we passed the golden lit colosseum rising from the street in gracefully arched tiers that put the ruins of Saintes to shame and lulled us into a sense of security, We pedalled on past fountains that sprayed the road in the wind and graceful buildings that glittered under golden lights even as they vomited hordes of youths reveling in the freedom of a Friday night on the town. We passed the Roman Temple and the Garden of the Fountain, a beautiful city that left us eager to explore.

The hostel was high atop a hill and it took our last reserves of energy to push our heavy bikes up the slope. We were greeted at the hostel by music and by a cheerful ex-patriot Brit who demanded to be called Andy, On discovering our Canadian nationality he cheerfully assigned us to the “Canadian Room” where he had put the other Canadian couple he was hosting.

We waited in trepidation for our roommates to return from their exploration of Nimes, feeling like intruders in spaces they had claimed. Chantel and her boyfriend were Quebecois taking advantage of cheap prices to explore France. They were as delighted as Andy to find fellow Canadians sharing their rooms. We talked about everything from the separation question to their itineraries through France and found a deep and comforting camaraderie. Chantal barked short quick coughs in a sound so familiar to us from our sojourn in Talmont St. Hilaire and Heather sympathetically plied her with remains of our medicine. We talked into the late hours of the night as the wind howled outside.

Today has been a rarely social day, filled with long conversations with fellow travelers. All seemed delighted, energized by the chance to share stories and complaints and recommendations with those in similar circumstances. Everywhere today were quick smiles and helpful hands and words of advice. Each person seemed excited by the tales of the others and it was hard not lose oneself in the romanticism of the road.

When we finally gave in to hoarse voices and nagging exhaustion it was with the comforting feeling that we were no longer really alone on the road and carried the spirits of our companions with us.

Next Entry: Day 96. Nimes
Previous Entry: Day 94. Gradignon

Day 86. Saintes Oct 31 2001.

Halloween. The dark night has closed in around us, but nothing roams the streets.

Based on the sight of a single pamphlet we have come to Saintes hoping to see the wonderous Gallo-Roman ruins. We set out from our well feathered nest early, our tent, bikes and bodies bedecked with dew. Leaving was hard. It has become harder every day that we are in a comfortable spot, the unknown ahead of us.

The trip back into Rochefort was quick, if a little confused and we saw in passing anything that we might have missed on our previous visits. The library, the war memorial, the thermal baths (flying a Canadian flag, among others) and some of the town wall. I was enthralled, there is no other word, by the industrial port as we passed by. Enormous freighters filled the small space. The only entrance or exit was a lock that seemed no more than two or three of my body lengths across. It was impossible to visualize the delicate skill that must be needed to maneuver in such a space.

Last night Heather and I had stayed up late and watched as an empty freighter had chased the disappearing tide down the Charente river. The night had been inky black, the river so low the bottom was creating new rapids and the freighter has been so light in the water that its bow seemed to lift from the waves. We had watched with held breath expecting the vessel to run aground at any moment or crush one of the tiny fiberglass pleasure craft beneath its steel hull. Nothing happened and the ship gradually disappeared down the river, heading for open ocean. The sheer weight of such a vessel on such a small river is breathtaking, a whale in a fishpond.

After leaving the city the ride had little in it worth writing about. The countryside was mostly flat, the road well traveled but not too busy. We passed a few vineyards and could not help but notice that they rose a little higher here, closer to how we envisioned them. But we did not stop. We were pursued by a dark cloud that bruised the sky and just as we reached the boundary of Saintes it began to rain. We biked down what seemed to be the main street and were unimpressed. The city was gray. The rain let up but still threatened. We stopped at a map and were unenlightened by it. No mention of our hostel anywhere. We stopped at the tourist office, it was closed from noon to two, then after five. So tired were we that we assumed it must be after five. I found a small map with our destination marked on it so we set out, down the long slope towards the Charente river.

We crossed and found a massive Roman arch, the Arch of Germanicus, the ancient entry to the town’s Roman bridge. Its sheer bulk was impressive, the physical presence of long dead Romans made manifest in cracked and pitted stone.

We stopped to read its scant information then hurried on to our hostel. It too was closed, opening after 5. Our exhaustion had played with our minds, it was hardly after 1 o'clock in the afternoon. We had hours to wait.

We sat and ate lunch and I read to Heather. Scarcely had I finished the first page when a lady approached us from the hostel and asked if we wanted a room for the night. At that moment our gloom lifted. Not in a physical fashion, it was still blustery outside, leaves whipped in a frenzy across the lawn, but our gloom had not been physical, more the constant pain of readjustment we felt every time we pulled up roots and left a city. We stowed our things in a room much like La Rochelle but with carpet and comforting brick wall that changed cold into warmth and gave the room a certain intrigue, as if we had set up camp in the warmest most comfortable back alley in existence.

We rested for a while and then set out to see Saintes. The city's name comes, oddly enough, not from any medieval Saints who may have dwelt there but instead from the tribe of Romanized Gauls who had built it, the Santones.

We found an abbey next to our hostel and walked its covered walkway. L'Abbey aux Dames, a cluniac nunnery with an almost beehive shaped bell tower. Tours of the inside were offered but at a price, a price paid more for an exhibit of French photographers’ works than for the abbey. We passed.

We walked back towards the river and discovered a park tucked neatly away. We went in and walked beneath green boughs while young lovers courted and kissed on benches, looking up in annoyance as we walked by and disturbed them.

We passed, to our surprise, the Lapidary Museum of Saintes, a small building that housed the greater portion of the Roman statues found in the city, their intricate carvings almost faded to nothingness with the ravages of time. The prize of the collection was the torso of a Julio-Claudian prince, bathing in a soft golden light while ancient stone muscles flexed in a posture frozen by age.

A marble of classic proportions in a room of decaying stones and headless torsos, all excavated from the fragments of the city wall the inhabitants of Mediolanum Santonum threw together in a panicked haste to ward off the barbarian hordes. They had pulled down the forum and the baths and the houses of the rich and poor alike in their terror.

We stopped again at the grandeur of the arch and admired its power even in decay. But we had more of the city to explore. Tomorrow was All Saints Day, a religious holiday in France and we don't now what will be open. We crossed the river once more and followed tiny medieval streets to the Cathedral of St Peter. The cathedrals clock tower loomed over the city. It seemed as though it had been built in stages, each stage piled atop the other, like some Egyptian step pyramid transported to the western coast of France. St. Peters was like dozens of other flamboyant gothic cathedrals we had visited, the outside a beautiful series of flying buttresses. What shocked us was the stores and shops that had nestled between the foundations of each buttress. The cathedrals main walls forming the back walls of beauty salons, galleries and private residences.

Next we followed the marked path to the Roman Arena that had brought us here. We followed streets that narrowed and grew rough beneath our feet. We passed the manicured beauty of the L'Hotel de Ville into coarse alleyways and stairs that seemed to climb the walls of houses to the rooftops of the city many times over, only to descend into a valley once more.

The Arena lay at the head of a valley, along a wide swath of grass that had once been the main roman road, so that the gladiators could march down in a dazzling public spectacle. The Arena was amazing, even from behind locked gates closed for the night. The stones seemed alive in their decay, as if infused with centuries of bloodlust and excitement. I longed to clamber over the iron bars blocking my way and race among the ruins. Instead we left, vowing to return tomorrow.

We followed the signs leading to the church of St. Eutrope and its famous (although unknown to us) crypt, a milestone on the pilgrimage to Compostella. The altar had been dedicated by Urban II in 1096.


The church was darkly beautiful, lost in shadow, the crypt lost to sight. Urban's face gazed down from stained glass windows in a beatific peace, irony in glass. We went out and walked around; looking for the crypt, but found nothing. The clock tower rose above our heads, sheathed in scaffolding that made it echoed the layered temples of the far east, an unintended symbol of ecumenical outreach.

We dropped back to the Charente again, the highway the Vikings had followed in search of pillage and plunder. Fishermen lined its tranquil banks. The fish were wise to the devious plans of those with rods and clustered in schools of schools that chased and fed on another in the shallows on our side, away from the rods and hooks, their silver underbelly's flashing as they climbed the road of the pier in search of other fish. It grew dark and as cold as the October night it was. No ghouls, ghosts or goblins emerged to torment us, either in search of candy or earthly recognition. Instead clusters of young girls puffed rebelliously on cigarettes while nearby boys watched and waited for the cool moment to saunter over with the requisite "feu" We bought our dinner for tonight and tomorrow and walked home, glad to be out of the cold, for tonight at least.



Next Entry: Day 87. Saintes
Previous Entry: Day 85. Rochefort

Day 81. La Rochelle Oct 26 2001.

Breakfast was joke. Not a quick slap on the knee joke, but a comic farce that was elaborately staged and set, delivered by unsmiling kitchen staff who had missed their calling as straight men for an army of comedians. “Why?” it was asked by a bevy of puzzled hostellers, “Why is there a menu, when our choice is between sauced apples and apple sauce, sliced baguette or a baguette in slices?" With a choice, it must be added in fairness to the hostel, between minuscule containers of jam or microscopic containers of honey. But we were given a full choice of drinks; water with our orange juice, or orange juice – watered down. The hot chocolate was a hit with the desperately hungry inmates sopping up the dregs with stale bread, desperate to preserve every drop of flavor. The offered cereal and yogurt never materialized and the only toast was dried bread left in the sunlight. To quote Mel Brooks: “What a world.”

The hostel was crowded and some of the youth seemed barely into their teens, how they could afford to travel a mystery. They filled the cafeteria and the front office but seemed strangely absent elsewhere. I got a strange feeling from them, as if they were at the hostel because it was cool and not because of any real travel needs. The same way as adolescents we would tune in to the university radio station and read the Gauntlet, not really understanding the content but sure in our hearts that if university students did it, it must be cool.

We left quickly, leaving almost everything in three stainless steel drawers locked by our feeble locks. We followed the boardwalk back into town, enjoying the sound of calmly lapping water broken by the ringing of bells or the slap of steel cables against metal masts as a breeze swept through. By the maintenance shed of the pleasure port a great orange beast of a machine had lowered its slings into the water and we paused to watch as it hoisted a small dis-masted craft from the water, its owners watching anxiously. The boat broke contact with the water hesitantly and looked forlorn as it rocked in its cradle, dripping water like tears. Behinds us boats of all description lay in hard metal cradles and shed water like artificial rain as proud proprietors cleaned and scrubbed and painted.

There was an air of activity, as if being near their boats made the owners feel more alive and they scrubbed with an enthusiasm that made it seem more pleasure than chore. Something about the sea air perhaps. We passed slowly, reluctantly, as if wanting to partake of their energy and by the time we passed we felt more awake and revived.

The Saint Nicholas tower leaned over us like a drunken soldier of fortified tower of Pisa. A long walk up the stair of the rampart walls brought us to the office, a space filling the second floor and reached by crossing an ancient wooden drawbridge. The center of the room was a stone circle around open air, covered by glass and looking down on the first floor, closed now as it was too dangerous to visit. Above us a similar eye looked down. We were given a badly translated guide in English and left to our own devices. We climbed the stairs and found ourselves in the governor’s chamber, a large circular room occupying the centre of the structure, an ornate carved merchant’s ship of stone hanging over the fireplace.

The governor of the tower swore never to leave the building during his tenure and was paid with a portion of the profits from every ship that entering the port. Around this room was a series of modern collages detailing the first exploration of the Mississippi. As France's largest Atlantic port La Rochelle is, appropriately enough, obsessed with the New World and many of the new world’s explorers have set out from the area.

The displays led us in a ring to the stairs that climbed higher to the roof and we followed the hallways that cut through the walls like mites in worm’s tunnels. Everywhere was ancient graffiti, much of it religious. La Rochelle had seen some of the worst fighting in the Wars of Religion and was once France's strongest Protestant stronghold. The stairway to the Protestant dungeon had long been walled up, to protect the governor and his family, so we took the stairs to the roof instead. The view from the roof was fantastic, looking out over the rooftops of La Rochelle or out to sea. A distant red pillar in the channel to open water marked the spot where Richelieu had built a massive dyke to cut off the Protestant La Rochelle from the rest of the world, especially aid from Great Britain. 20 000 French died of starvation in that siege and only 5 000 remained when the finally surrendered. 10 days later a tidal wave opened a breach large enough for the British ships to enter, too late.

From the main rooftop we climbed even higher to captain’s lookout. Even more impressive and a little nerve wracking. We could look out through the crenellations and see everything on down to the green water far below. Looking down on flying birds is an interesting experience. From here we could also look across and see the chain tower a stones throw away, closed for renovations. We climbed back down and explored a little. Tunnels honeycombed the main level so that the activity of the tower could continue without disturbing the governor’s family. One such tunnel widened unexpectedly into a small chapel, ornate once but now eroded with age. The font drained directly out of the building. From there stairs led down in a spiral so tight that my feet did not fully fit on the stairs, a bit of a dangerous descent. Then we were back in the office, the tour complete.

Just behind the desk was a giant iron rectangle bound in iron strips and studded with enormous bolts that held the thing together. The door was almost invisible so well did it blend in and was only discernible because of the hinges. The locking mechanism made no send sense at all and seemed almost like belt buckles. Not at all how I pictured a medieval safe.

A beautiful painting hung above it, Richelieu on his dyke. “siege de 1628, Richelieu sur la dique” by Henri Motte.

Our tour at an end we returned the guide and walked out into the city. We made out way to the Cathedral of St. Louis. From the outside it was ugly, a low bunkerlike building looking more like a train station than cathedral. Inside it was ugly too, except for the fantastic decoration that transformed ugly stone into mere frames for beauty. The church had been built over the ruins of a destroyed Protestant one in the 17th century. Richelieu’s final nail in the Protestant coffin. While it was being built they excavated the nave of a Templar church and displayed the vault covers and gravestone in a niche near the front. Eleanor of Aquitaine had granted the templar’s two tidal mills in La Rochelle.

From the church we wandered the streets aimlessly and found city hall, an old fortified building with an elaborate clock tower and a memorial from the second world war.

La Rochelle had been the centre of a massive Nazi submarine base and so had been the last place in France liberated. From city hall we walked into the gardens by the remains of the templar mills.

We are still undecided about our future. Do we continue on our journey or head home? Heather is feeling very homesick, but beyond family it doesn’t feel like I have much to return to.

Next Entry: Day 82. Rochefort
Previous Entry: Day 80. La Rochelle

Day 80. La Rochelle. Oct 25 2001

We hadn't actually intended to go to La Rochelle, our planned destination for today was Rochefort. But our plans are as changeable as the weather. Our eloquent host of the night before virtually insisted we go to La Rochelle and extolled its many beauties.

The ride into La Rochelle was long but probably easier than it felt to us. Marans proved harder to leave than to enter. We found the main road out easily enough but avoided it based on the advice of our host last night “It is shit, all the drivers are assholes.” He had been kind enough to point out an alternate route, following the La Rochelle-Marans canal. But the French have an interesting habit of changing street names and “La Rue De La Stade” which we kept biking past was in fact ”La Rue Des Quatre Chemin” and the one we were looking for. Of course when we found the Canal there was nothing to indicate that it was THE canal and in a land composed entirely of drained marshes we really wanted to be sure. Needless to say we ended up a little lost.

The road to La Rochelle was flat and featureless, befitting a road raised from wetlands. The ocean breeze had picked up and although we could not see open water we could feel its influence as it ruffled our hair and pushed back our bikes with unrelenting force. Herons and sea birds took to flight as we passed and a pair of antique spitfires fought a mock duel across the sky. Our only companion was the constant howl of the wind and we tried to drown it out by singing, our voices making up for a lack of skill with a surfeit of enthusiasm. The birds took to the air in greater numbers, but since I leave their chirping uncriticized I felt they should have afforded us the same courtesy. We passed a fortified church and a sad multitude of cats that had fallen victim to murderous rubber.

La Rochelle did not so much as appear as fade into existence. First we saw jagged peaks, like hard rocks emerging from a grassy hill in the distance. The traffic passing by grew; one car, two, a whining motorcycle, then a flood of vehicles, drowning us in their roar. The distant rocks grew harder, more solid. From a distance they looked like castles, fortified towers, the peaks of great cathedrals. Then the illusion dissolved and they were merely apartment buildings and cell phone towers.

We followed a lush green park as it curled its way through the city like a serpent, ending at the bustling central terminal for all of La Rochelle’s public transportation. A thousand people swarmed about us on their diverse errands, each unerringly heading to their destination. But we were lost. To our right was a great cathedral in a style new to us and a map of the city’s bus routes. I can only stare at it blankly but Heather finds our destination, the Auberge de Jeunesse, on the other side of the city.

We ride down beside the cathedral, its glory shrouded by spider webs of scaffolding and dimmed by students getting drunk in its shadows. But the street we follow is straight out of the movies. Narrow pavement with overhanging buildings three stories high, a covered sidewalk arched over with stone, turrets rising from the street corners and shop fronts. A maze of streets with a dazzling array of shops and scintillating smells, freshly baked baguettes, chocolate and coffee. We dodge around fashionable ladies, beggars with their dogs and frowning gendarmes. Suddenly we emerge from a great gate topped with an ornate clock tower. We are in the old harbor and two of La Rochelle ancient defensive towers rise before us like sleeping sentinels. The one on our left, the tower of Saint Nicholas, tilts at a strange angle, reclining in its sleep. We walk our bikes around the slippery stone at the edge of the harbor. One slip will plunge us into the jade green water of the inner harbor. We walk for an eternity, until is seems like we are walking out of the city. We pass ships, then boats, a vast flotilla of boats, and then we arrive at the hostel.

We haggle at the front desk seeking a room to share apart from the crowds, then we unload our mountains of gear and trudge up the steps to our new abode. What we were expecting I don’t know, but where Talmont St. Hilare was old and dirty this is sparkling clean, whitewashed concrete. It has no soul. We collapse on the beds and sleep.

By the time we go out it is evening, by the time we reach the harbor again it is dark and a fairytale vista beckons. The two towers of the harbor are lit and glow yellow in the night.

The passing lights of cars inside the walls are like glittering gems. We cross a footbridge and watch the crowds surge around us. The streets are busy, the city has come down to dine and the enjoy itself. The restaurants are full. We circle the harbor, smelling the salt sea breeze and we climb the ramparts. The lantern tower is aglow beside us, the tower of the chain behind. The tower of the chain was home to the great iron chain that was strung across the harbor at night to keep out the unwanted. It looks like a squat beer stein. But the Lantern Tower, prison since its creation, is a Gothic dream in the night. A pointed rooftop with a dozen gargoyles climbing its slopes, ornate windows looking out forlornly on the night while great crests and ornaments for the sake of ornament that fade to darkness as the tower curves away from the city into darkness. We follow the high ramparts around the city and peer into French windows like voyeurs. A home is lit comfortingly; a man sits at his computer and types beside a shelf sagging beneath the weight of books. Baguettes and wine sit untouched on his table. We follow the road around until it returns to the harbor.

The restaurants are alive now and their preparations spill into the streets. One, its staff serving a party its kitchens couldn't handle, spills oysters and ice cold trays of seafood out into the street. Chefs pry open oysters with knives that glitter in the streetlights, sliding harmlessly along chain mail gauntlets. We linger, secretly dreaming of pockets stuffed with ill gotten shells, but the chefs are too wary and we sidle away with the others who share our lustful watch.

Now we choose streets at random and pass through crowded night markets and deserted alleys. In a hidden square with age darkened statues a congress of the disposed is in full swing and the smell of cheap wine and urine taints the air as glass bottles are thrown at ragged dogs. In another square lovers embrace, oblivious to passersby, half hidden in the shadow of a decaying church. A crowd gathers at a nearby bar, cheering and celebrating until it seems impossible that today is not a holiday. We turn and avoid the man pissing down the storm drains and instead we find the harbor once more.

The walk back is calm, relaxing and as dark as a forgotten memory. A forest looms beside us waving gently. There are no leave, no branchs, no soil, only great fiberglass and steel trunks, spikes rustling with the faintest ripples of the water. 3000 pleasure boats like a bed of nails too large to contemplate. The view is awesome and more than a little frightening.
We find our hostel and climb to our cold concrete room and take our separate beds, soft but solitary, and dream of the sea. La Rochelle is dusty by day, beautiful by night, a chaos of old and new. I am glad we came.

Next Entry: Day 81. La Rochelle
Previous Entry: Day 79. Marans

Day 17 August 23 2001

My parents have left the British Isles and we said our goodbyes last night over the phone. It was difficult but I think the true crisis will come when, if, we leave England for Spain. Here the option of phoning someone to pull us out of any difficulty remains. There we will be officially on our own.

Today we reintroduced ourselves to biking in a leisurely fashion. We pedaled down the Wye valley towards Chepstow before turning aside to the hilltop town of St. Briavels. The Wye Valley was astonishingly beautiful with lush green trees overhanging the road and the dark Forest of Dean climbing the hills at our sides. The beautiful mystery of the place was shattered by the roars of modern dragons as the R.A.F practiced its maneuvers overhead.

We reached St. Briavels via a steep climb up the hillsides that formed the walls of the Wye Valley and found to our delight that the youth hostel occupied and ancient hunting lodge of King John. It is fascinating to live in the confines of a living breathing castle. Here the rooms are in working order and instead of the hard stone that show on every ruin we see the plastered and homely walls that would have faced the residents.
Here history is brought more to life than in any museum because here each room has functions to fulfill instead of being merely a dead display.

I am lodged in the “hanging room” where condemned men waited out their last hours. I can only hope the ghosts are dispelled by the snores of tired travelers. The only regret is that Heather and I must occupy different rooms. Sleeping in separate beds was difficult enough, different rooms may prove impossible. It is as thought there is an elastic bond between us that can be stretched, though its tension is felt, but not comfortably kept apart for long.



Next Entry: Day 18. Chepstow
Previous Entry: Day 16