Provence 2005
Day 4 - North-East into the Mountains

Breil sur Roya

The trip into the Maritimes Alps took an hour and 1/2 with lots of gorgeous scenery as we traveled up into the mountains. We kept hopping from one side of the train to the other to take pictures in between tunnels, lots of tunnels. One was really cool, in a spiral inside the mountain.

Saorge

I love the connections and the resonances you get from travel.

As we twisted our way, I thought about poetry. In college, I took a number of classes in French medieval poetry. In these perched villages and preying castles, with Saracens raiding and internecine disputes over border and control, the troubadours first sang the poems of love. The fair lady loved from afar. The lover made worthy by his love. Metaphors of birds and leaves and time. Poetry that drifted North to the Court of Eleanor of Aquitaine. That went East to Italy, where Dante transformed it into the Dolche Stil Nuovo, the sweet new style. Into the Divine Comedy, where the faint light of Beatrice moon, enables Dante to see the blinding primal love that moves the sun, the moon, and the stars.

And here in these valleys and ways is where that trend started. Connections. Resonances. Like a butterfly flapping it’s wings in Asia making it drizzle in the south of France.

Peille

Tende - end of our line north

The museum had lots of casts of the carvings in the valley, with explanations (in English!) of what the archaeologists think they mean as well as displays about the shepherds and farmers who’ve lived in the area since Neolithic times. Interesting and cool.

We walked up some really twisty, tiny streets – still very medieval, no shops, just houses with shutters and tiny balconies. We stopped in a plaza with a view of the cathedral to eat our bread and cheese.

As we came to the cathedral, an old woman walking with two canes and her family came to the door. She’d come up on the tourist train with us and was wondering if there was another way back to the train station, because the walk had been hard on her knees.

That really struck me. The determination to see what there was to see despite obstacles in her path. She could have stayed on the flat Riviera promenade, but she came to the mountains and cobbled streets and difficult ways.

Good for her.

Ventimille Italy

It was raining as we came down from the mountains.
Ventimille, on the other side of the Italian border from Menton, is a fairly large city. Well, it’s a city. We saw it from our rain spackled windows and then out again as we went back to France. We may have spent ½ an hour in Italy. Perhaps on another trip.

Eze - perched village

Since we’d missed the bus to Eze, we decide to walk. The climb was steep . It started to sprinkle. The air got that smell that the desert gets during a light rain. Heat giving way to life. Delicate. Rich. Waiting.

I climbed in 1st gear, enjoying the movement of muscles and breathing as we climbed the steep way.

Unfortunately, Karen was having asthma problems, which were worrying. More so when the warm coastal sprinkles gave way to cold needle-like Alpine rains.
We climbed.

We rested beneath gnarled trees and brush as it rained.
We climbed.

So, we walked.

However, it would be more accurate to say we hiked and climbed a mountain. Note to self: use inhaler BEFORE starting any hike with an increase in elevation.

Crystal wondered if she’d have to carry me…

It started to sprinkle about 1/3 of the way up and by 2/3rds it was raining. We were drenched, but at least it kept us cool.

We finally reached Eze and it was very cool – a medieval town / fort perched high over the sea with tiny twisting lanes. It reminded me of Carcassone, but better – it was in a similar state of repair, but didn’t have all the really cheesy stores. Instead it had artsy cool stores, including a few that sold glass.
We wandered through the city shopping and seeing a few landmarks, but we were still soaked and it looked like everything was closing, so we headed down for the last bus.