This week, the kids are on a school break. Around the Christmas holidays, we found some decent airfare to Marseille, France on RyanAir that left last Thursday, so we pulled the kids out of school for a day and a half, and toured Provence through Monday. Our goal was to see 4 cities in particular: Aix-en-Provence, Cassis, Arles and Avignon. We had read about and seen movies about these cities and had always wanted to experience them for ourselves and sample the fantastic food and wine and wander their ancient Roman streets. At first, we were going to try to stay in Aix, but logistically it would have been too difficult to connect to all the towns we wanted to see without having to go back through Marseille, so we made Marseille our sleeping spot. We found a very nice hotel that was only about a 5 minute walk to the train station. So everyday, we either hopped on a bus or train and headed out to explore Provence.
Excitedly awaiting our flight to the South of France (very early in the morning)
Some of the views while flying into Marseille
:)
Map of Provence region
While the flight into Marseille was absolutely gorgeous, the city itself was unfortunately quite the opposite. It's a busy port city, and the words, gritty or grimey, might be a friendly way to describe it. From our sixth floor balcony looking over the city, the Mediterranean Sea, and the beautiful hilltop church Notre Dame de la Garde, the city appeared very pretty, but seeing it on the ground was another story. As we were getting ready to grab a quick bite to eat after our first day in Aix, I asked the hotel desk attendant how to get to a good restaurant at the port. She told me that due to it being Thursday night and the weekend approaching we should not walk through the old centre on our way to the port as there would be drug trafficking going on. Needless to say, we heeded her advice and avoided that area ;) Good thing Jessica wasn't within earshot.
Notre Dame de la Garde, Marseille
Marseille
Cheers!
Marseille at sunset
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