May 16 Marseille to Arles

Today was the first ride day of the Pathfinders tour.  It was a 91.5 kms (57 miles) ride with 480 meters (1561 Ft) of climb. Bright sunny day without a whisper of wind and the temperature was 15 C.  In short the perfect ride day.  All of the elevation gain was within the first 15 kms as the route came out of Marseille. Unfortunately I was not on the ride but stuck in the back seat of the car.  My bike is to be delivered to the hotel this afternoon.  

The parking spot at the Airbnb was an incredibly tight spot in an inner court yard of a two hundred year old apartment complex where we staying.  It had taken a lot of maneuvering to get the car into the spot and there was considerable worry about getting it out but Agnes backed it out in very short order.  Judy and I were both amazed how easily Agnes wheeled it out.

 Out on the road and as it was only 95 km down the freeway we were down to Arles by 10:30.  We stopped by the hotel to make sure that the hotel owner knew about my luggage being delivered and then we were off to see old town Arles.  And Arles is very old.

There are a couple of major structures which dominate the sky line the first being the Roman Hippodrome built in 56 ad.    While much smaller than the one in Rome it is still a huge structure and sat 20,000 people.  The second major structure is the Roman Amphitheatre. The Hippodrome has had a lot of work put into it with a lot of the original stones replaced with concrete block.  This work has enabled it to still be in use today as a bull fighting arena. The Amphitheatre is still used as well to produce local music shows.  Around these two structures a city has sprung up which is also several hundred years old. So most of the streets are very narrow and the ones where cars are allowed are one way.  Naturally there is no parking anywhere so it is a complete mess, but a very quaint mess with lots of walking streets filled with sidewalk cafes, art galleries and local flavour. 

Agnes, Judy and I decided on  a Cambodia meal for lunch in a picture perfect little square just down from the Hippodrome.  It was great.  After lunch we walked around it and then headed down to the Vincent Van Gogh Museum.  Everything in the town is a reference to Van Gogh and even though he was Dutch but did spend a portion of his life painting in the little town of Arles.  So there are statues, street names, restaurants, galleries, book stores and just about anything you can name.  I was looking forward to a a large collection of his works and a fair amount of history of the life of Vincent Van Gogh.  Instead there were only four of his actual works and certainly none of the more famous paintings a couple of pages from his diaries. The rest of the gallery was devoted to some Russian painter who was influenced by Van Gogh but whom I have never heard of before.  Personally I thought the Russians work was not all that good.  They were all wild life pictures “deer drinking from a stream” ,  “coyote howling at the moon”,  etc. Bottom line I was quite disappointed in the Van Gogh Museum. 

By now it is just after 3:00 so we headed back to the hotel.  Bob and Ken had arrived two minutes ahead of us and were still standing by their bikes when we pulled up. So we checked in and unloaded the car. 

As my luggage had still not arrived I went down to the front desk to get them to phone the airline about my luggage. Just as the lady who owns the hotel was phoning the airline a deliver van pulled up with my luggage. I was so happy to see my bike and the rest of my stuff show up. 

I put my bike together and went for a quick spin around the block to make sure all was in order.  Looks good so I am back on the tour. 

Tomorrow is a short day but it looks like a rainy one. 

terry hot biker