Our final stop for the week was Aix-en-Provence. We had a hard time figuring how to pronounce many of the cities we visited (even though Jenn supposedly took French in high school), but ultimately it was my boss, who is Italian (but lives in Paris and speaks fluent French), who taught me how to say this one ( it sounds like the letter X).
Aix was bigger than the other cities we went to during the week and it felt like it. If we had started there, we probably wouldn't have felt this way, but in comparison to some of the other towns, this seemed huge. With the look of the city and the shopping, it reminded us of a miniature Paris.
WIA: The well known pastry here is a calisson, which I'd compare to a small shortbread like cookie, but that's not quite it. Jenn tried one, but I wasn't interested. We had terrific Macarons from a modern looking shop called Morosso. I had an apple one that really good. Neither of us was that hungry, so we had a light dinner at the tiny
Carton Rouge consisting of a cheese plate and for some reason lentils with salmon roe. I'm not sure why I ordered the second dish, but it was fine.
On the second night, after a very long day, we ate dinner at Auberge du Provencale. They had several set menus to choose from. Jenn went with the lobster menu which included lobster bisque, lobster over pasta with cheese, and some kind of fruit kabob with citrus-y ice cream between shortbread cookies. I had what was called the Gourmet menu and dined on cream of mushroom soup and very rare beef (just the way the French like it) over mashed potatoes. Dessert was chocolate cake with ice cream.
All of our dishes looked pretty and tasted good, so we were happy. The place was completely empty. We ate by ourselves out on the patio, which was nice, even though the view was of the parking lot.
We picked up food from the market the next day and ate a picnic lunch in the park. We had rotisserie chicken because we saw it at every market and we'd been craving it all week. It was really good and juicy. No French picnic would be complete without bread and cheese and we also had fresh strawberries and raspberries. It doesn't get much better than good, fresh, simple food.
Our last dinner of the trip was a nice one at the Michelin starred Le Clos de La Violette. We tried to keep a balance on the trip between fancy and casual places as well as local eateries versus ones that cater to tourists. We always would like to eat where the locals eat. Often places start out as local hot spots and then get written up in every guidebook and magazine and against their own wills become tourist hangouts. As long as the food is good, we don't really care. The building that houses the restaurant was modern and sleek looking both inside and out. The surrounding garden is pretty and does a nice job of creating a quiet and peaceful atmosphere, almost making one forget that the hustle and bustle of the city is only a few blocks away. As with many of the restaurants during the week, there were very few customers. This was the very beginning of high tourist season, so maybe we caught the calm before the storm, or they are feeling the economic downturn just like everyone else. Everything was prepared beautifully and the portions were much bigger than we expected. After the sardine over polenta amuse bouche, I had the daily market menu: aubergine and rabbit, roasted duck, and a strawberry rhubarb for dessert. Jenn had scallops over risotto, roasted chicken with truffle mac and cheese, and chocolate cake for dessert. It was a really great meal to close out a week of really great meals.
WID: We did a lot of walking. We walked up and down Couers Mirabeau (the main street) and through the winding streets of the city. We did a little bit of shopping.
We spent a day exploring the awesome Gorge Du Verdon, also known as the French Grand Canyon. We drove through lots of small towns to get there and stopped in Moustiers Ste Maries to grab a sandwich and walk through their market. We drove along the North rim on the Route des Cretes, which had many scenic outlooks with amazing views. It wasn't as grand as the Grand Canyon, but it was very impressive. After driving the loop for a few hours, we got out of the car and hiked the Sentier des Pecheurs trail. It brought us down to the river and then all the way back up. The part along the river was really nice, but there was some tough uphill at the beginning and the last kilometer and a half was all straight uphill back to the parking lot. We then drove around the stunning St Croix Lake. We couldn't get enough of looking at the bright turquoise color. It looked fake, which it kind of is since it's man made.
On Saturday, Aix has several markets market, but as you walk through town, it just feels like it's one long ongoing market with different sections. There were lots of food stands, but also clothing, flowers, and household goods. After our picnic, we walked around a bit. We started to follow the Cezanne walk, which was much like the Van Gogh walk in Arles, but much more boring. We gave up after getting about halfway through it.
WIS: We spent a little more to stay at
La Pauline. There wasn't much information about it online, but what we saw looked promising. We were sold the minute we drove up the dramatic entrance through a tree lined path. The estate was originally owned by Napoleon's sister. The property was huge, with a small vineyard in back, a swimming pool (which wasn't functional during our visit), and two smaller guest houses. Our room was the master suite of Jenn's dreams. It was all white with nice antique furniture. We also had a front and back porch with a beautiful view of the countryside. I was disappointed that at a bed and breakfast, they still charged 20 eur per person for breakfast. We didn't want to go into the city the last day because there was a marathon going on, so we did spring for breakfast before heading to the airport.
WAM: On the drive back to Nice, we thought we gave ourselves enough time, but we cut it extremely close. We ran inside with our bags after returning the car (with an empty gas tank) and it ended up not being a big deal. Jenn already likes to be at the airport hours in advance of a flight "just to be safe", so I'll be paying for this in the years to come.
WTF: There are no public toilets in Aix. In Europe, it's rare for stores to have toilets available to customers and hotels don't necessarily love it when you walk in and use their facilities. On one day, we had to walk into a small cafe and buy a bottle of water in order to use their bathrooms and on another, we sat down at the famous cafe, Les Deux Garcons, and bought a 6 euro cup of ice cream just so we could again relieve ourselves. One might ask, why do you two have to go to the bathroom so much, and that would be a very fair question. It's true that the two of us probably are not the best at "holding it", but it is important to note that even if you wanted to go to the bathroom, when you're traveling Europe, in a town where there is no Starbucks or McDonald's, it is hard to find a place to go. Jenn and I are convinced that the bowels and bladders of Americans are trained to go when they have the urge because there are toilets everywhere in the US. Europeans are probably more used to not always having a toilet available to them, so probably have much better control of things. Someone needs to do a study on this.
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