famous Musquee de Provençe pumpkins
At first I was a bit disappointed with Aix, as it is not an especially inspiringly-looking city from its edges. After where we had come from in Tourtour though, anything would have been a letdown. We knew how special from whence we had come had been.
Aix en Provence provides more of a little challenge, one to find the charm. But, once you realize this, there is plenty to be found. That’s how I would put it. After all of the right-in-your-face overwhelming beauty in Paris and Tourtour, it is an adjustment. But, there is plenty right in town to find.
Also, we had some rain and gloomy skies. Once we sized up the situation though, we just made our plans, to enjoy what we could here and then to venture off to some of the wonderful venues outside of the city that we had on our bucket list.
On Saturday we combed through the market, at least twice. No one seemed deterred by the rain. It was busy and bustling. Everyone and all had their mission in hand and went right about it. There are actually really nice bargains to be had among this grand collection of flowers, produce and seafood:
Strolling around town:
We visited the Cezanne museum, but never made it to his studio.
where these two paintings are prime sitings.
A random though delightful site:
As you can see, this was the beginning of the terrible weather which came into southern France and resulted in the horrible deaths on the coast around on Saturday. While we had some violent thunderstorms, we were not aware of what had happened until after it was over. And so, we went to Arles, to visit Van Gogh’s last residence and home of his abundant productivity of about 300 canvases, right before he died.