Hello From France -
It’s Sunday evening January 12th and we’re back from a trip – a short trip. Keaka had a hockey game in Avignon last night, so we made it an overnight trip and visited the famed Pont du Gard today.
The Avignon ice arena is small and old. So old it may have been built before I was born. If not, it was built when I was a young boy. So old there is no glass on the boards along the sides. So old that the hommes (mens) bathroom seemed ancient. Keaka’s team hadn’t played in weeks, so there was plenty of time to get ready. Keaka had not played well for a number of games, so we had a few chats over the last ten days. The theme was “you have to bring something to the game”, so you’d better decide what it’s going to be. Keaka (we) decided it was skating with energy. Dad’s happy, as he played a great game, despite his Marseille team losing 11-1 (still without a victory). Now, it’s a case of putting strong games back-to-back.
All of the players get sweat suits, with your name on the chest and jersey number on the leg. They’re about to be ordered and I was asked by the head of the hockey association if Keaka wanted “09” on this pant leg. I said “no”, that “9” alone was fine. He seemed quite surprised. I was a bit embarrassed last night when their new jerseys were used for the first time and Keaka wore “09”. They used a zero in front of all single digit uniform numbers. It’s beyond my understanding, as most everybody is thrilled to get a single digit hockey jersey. It’s a different culture.
After the game we went out looking for dinner, which we figured to be a challenge, though we knew we had McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken down the street. We actually came upon a fairly large commercial center (shopping center). At one end was a multiplex movie theatre, with a two-story restaurant to the left of the entrance and another to the right of the entrance. You couldn’t see much of the movie theatre entrance. Certainly an interesting concept. We went to the Italian restaurant to the right, which had all the markings of being a chain and looking like a U.S. restaurant. We had pasta and a pizza and found ourselves pleased. No olives on the pizza (every pizza in Aix-en Provence has olives on it) and we were only one hour from home.
We stayed at a hotel that was surrounded by a fence with barbed wire, some high hedges/fencing with barbed wire and an electronic gate at the entrance to the parking lot. That’s not unusual. We just laughed. We can’t figure out what they are afraid of. We keep joking that they’re afraid of the criminals from Marseille (which we’ve been told is the case in Aix-en Provence). Avignon is fully 90-minutes from Avignon. By the way, two men were shot to death on December 30th in a car on a freeway on-ramp in Marseille. The police think it was drug-related. Also, they were the 14th and 15th homicides in Marseille in 2013, most of which were drug-related, according to the police. So, you can see the extreme fear that must be gripping our French friends 30-minutes north in Aix-en Provence. The Marseille criminals are on the march. What must they think of crime in the United States?
Pont du Gard is an amazing Roman aqueduct located not too far west of Avignon. I had been there previously. But, it made a great little trip for the kids on a sunny Sunday with temperatures in the low 60s. There were very few people there, and, we know it’s jammed during the summer. The aqueduct was built in 19 B.C. as a critical link of a 30-mile underground canal which , by dropping one inch every 350 feet, supplied nine million gallons of water each day to Nimes, at that time one of ancient Europe’s largest cities. It’s amazing to me and you can see for yourself in the photos we took during our visit to Pont du Gard.
We’re sending five photos with this segment and another five photos in the next segment.
We’re about to start planning our next major journey, which starts February 24th and will feature Barcelona.
Hope all is well!
The Wilsons
