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FRANCE 2012
Day 12, Friday, Sept 14
Avignon to Nimes
We did better getting to breakfast in a timely fashion. The Mistrail is
still blowing hard. We left about 10:30 and drove to Pont du Gard,
which is about a half hour drive. After we parked in a huge parking
lot, we walk
ed
some distance to a little information center before seeing the bridge.
The Pont du Gard is part of an aqueduct that was begin in the year 50 AD
to supply water to the Roman city of Nimes. Long before the Romans
arrived, Nīmes's was an important agglomerate of 24 Volscian fortified
cities along this hillside overlooking the source of the local
God:"Nemausus".
In 120 BC, the inhabitants of these towns became
Roman subjects. A century later Augustus founded the "Colonia Augusta
Nemausus" (Nīmes). The Romans continued to worship the spirit "Nemausus"
in his holy source. A sanctuary was built, with a magnificent basin to
collect the holy waters.
The Roman Nīmes geographic position made in an important intersection of
the Narbonese was embellished with its beautiful antique monuments.
The purpose of the aqueduct was to bring large
quantities
of water to the city of Nīmes, for its fountains, baths and gardens.
Along the 31 miles covered by this aqueduct, the most spectacular part
is the Ponte du Gard. It is also one of France's most famous
architectural works from Roman antiquity. The height of the aqueduct is
160 feet which makes it the highest Roman aqueduct bridge.
Above the first row of arches (that go into the river) is a bridge.
Above the very top set of small arches is the channel that carried the
water. You can go up and walk in the water channel, but it looked like
too many steps. We walked across the bridge and along the river on the
other side. The wind was still blowing very hard. We came to a plaza t
hat
had ice cream, crepes, and a large tourist center with cases of prepared
sandwiches and quiches. We both had a quiche. Then we walked back
over the bridge and back to the parking lot.
The Pont du Gard was a wonderful experience. We are so happy that we
included it in a side trip from Avignon. In a gift store, I found a
small model kit of the bridge.
SEE MY MODEL. It was one of Alains . We have bought
a book at every church and monument that we have visited we may have
to leave our clothes in Toulouse when we leave.
It was about 1:30, when we left so we decided to go on to Nimes as we
had planned. Nimes is a big town of 140,000. The traffic was very
heavy and many, many round-abouts (traffic circles) in which it was hard
to count the exits, even though TomTom kept giving them. One of our
problems has been that everything is in kilometers here, so we set the
TomTom for kilometers. We start counting down at 150 meters and it
hard to realize that 30 meters means you are right there. We had it set
for the parking garage at the Maison Carree. After we made several
wrong turns, the TomTom got us there.
Our main purpose in going to Nimes was to visit the Maison Carree,
which is the best preserved of the Roman temples still standing. It was
built under Augustus reign (late first century BC) and was inspired by
the temple of Apollo in Rome, consecrated to the Imperial cult and
dedicated to Augustus's grandsons. The temple faced the forum and was
surrounded by a portico of finally carved columns. The pure lines of the
building, its harmonious proportions and the elegance of its fluted
columns denote Greek influence, which is also found in the temples'
ornamentation. Like all classical temples, it is composed of a porch
defined by a colonnade and an cella, or in a room, consecrated to a god,
which is reached by a stairway of 15 steps.
This temple has survived since the Roman times. 
So we climbed more
steps! The inside of the temple is not available to visitors, instead
there is a small movie theater inside . They normally show the film
Heroes in 3 D but it wasnt working, but the 2 D was spectacular
enough. It was about some of the famous Romans who had lived in Nimes
and what they had done plus scenes of gladiators and bull fights. It
was a very well done and interesting film.
Across the street was a huge modern building called Carre dArt ,which
was designed by the British architect, Norman Foster. We had seen
Fosters work in Berlin last year at the restoration of the Reichstag
and the huge dome.
This building is a museum of Contemporary Art and
its media l
ibrary. We enjoyed seeing the architecture and using the
facilities in the building.
The Roman Amphitheatre (Arena) was several blocks down the street.
The streets were very crowned with end to end tents selling food and
souvenirs. When we got to the Arena, which was quite magnificent, and
we were told that we couldnt go in because it was closed for the bull
fight that night. Evidently the reason for the crowds and tents was a
weekend of bullfights.
The arena was beautifully preserved and is twin to the one at Arles,
both built in the late 1st century. It measured 436' x 331' and had a
seating capacity of 24,000. The Nīmes's amphitheater is ranked 9th out
of the 20 most significant amphitheaters discovered in Gaul; however, it
is the best preserved of the Roman ones.
On our return to the parking lot, we found a beautiful church
- St.
Paul's, which was built in 1849. According to a sign on the church which
was written in French and English "the city authorities chose a design
by a young Parisian architect, Charles Questel, in a national
competition for the building of a new church. The first neo- medieval
church in France, St. Paul's makes reference to the Romanesque churches
in the south of France".
We spent some time exploring the beautiful
interior and taking photos. There is very little information about this
church.
We found our car without difficulty and worked our way out of town in
the 5:00 Friday afternoon traffic. After a couple of wrong turns, we
got to the A road and headed home. The wind was terrific, we felt
like we were going to blow off the road; otherwise it has been a
beautiful day with bright blue skies. The sun was hot I had worn
both my sweater and jacket, but when the wind blew it felt good.
We got safely back to our hotel in Avignon, and quickly found the bar in
our hotel. We did not have any reservations for dinner, but since there
were so many places to eat , we thought we would just take our
chances. We stopped a very attractive restaurant, called the Opera
Café. Kathleen had a mozzarella and tomato salad for a starter, and
for dinner she had lamb. I had a onglet steak. It was long and
narrow, sort of tough but had a wonderful flavor. I couldnt eat it
all. It was a nice meal and service was good- and we didnt spend the
whole evening eating, which made us happy.
After roaming around the square, we headed back to our hotel for good
night sleep after a good day seeing beautiful sites.
