We rented a car in Beaune and drove about four hours south to the Le Mas des Herbes Blanches in the village of Joucas, France [https://www.herbesblanches.com/en/]. It’s a Relais & Chateaux listed hotel in the Provence region of France. A bit of a splurge, but we got a great deal on booking.com, so we we decided to go for it.
And we were glad we did. The hotel is a beautiful boutique hotel set on a hill overlooking the local vineyards. Our room was great and we took advantage of the e-bikes that were available for rent.
We rode first to the amazing village of Gordes. Located on top of a big hill, Gordes is an absolute must to visit if you are in the area. The fanciest hotel there is the La Bastide de Gordes. Stop in there for a cocktail on their terrace. Very peaceful and a great view. If your feeling like a big spender you might want to try their Michelin starred restaurant – Peir. More on that place later.
We had a great lunch at a small bistro called L’Artegal.
Next, we cruised to the picturesque town of Roussillon which is known for its red rock cliffs. It’s also filled with great restaurants and shops loaded with artisan goods. A great stop if you are in Provence.
The following day – our anniversary! – we took the car down the hill to Bistro LaTerasse in Joucas for a great omelette and fries. Great views from the restaurant. Then we took a long drive to the shopping outlets in Marmas. We thought it would be similar to FoxTown in Mendrisio, Switzerland, but were a bit disappointed. But still fun!
We decided to go to dinner in Menerbes on our way back, but didn’t arrive until 8:30 and found that all the restaurants were closing. But with the help of a really nice Spanish-American family, we navigated our way to a Pizzeria for some salads. Great anniversary dinner! By the way, Menerbes is another great village to visit in Provence. But just get there a bit earlier.
One of the highlights of Provence is a place called Fontaine-de-Vaucluse. It’s the fifth largest natural spring in the world, hundreds of meters deep that feeds a beautifully clear river. There’s a cool walking path with restaurants along the river bank that leads to the actual spring – which is inside a cave. You have to climb over the barriers to get a good view, but everyone does it. I guess the French figure that if you can climb the barriers you must be athletic enough to scramble down the rocks without killing yourself. They say that a young Jacques Cousteau almost drowned here while exploring 300 feet deep when exhaust from the compressor supplying air went inside his regulator. Very cool and a great place to spend a day. We went on a weekend and there were hundreds of people there to enjoy the great weather.
There are a ton of great places to ride in Provence so we took a second e-bike trip. First we rode to the village of Goult for a great lunch at Carillon. Highly recommended. Fantastic food! And a beautiful little village.
Next we rode to the village of Lacoste where you can check out the ruins of a huge estate on the top of the hill. Apparently it was purchased by Pierre Cardin. He still has a long way to go in restoring the place, but it has a couple of cool sculptures in front.
Afterwards we rode to Bonnieux – another quaint village with a big church – and then to Apt which is a bigger city. Not so quaint, but a good place to get a beer. The best part about Apt was the tree lined, car-free, bike path that went for miles. So fun to whiz through the trees. On the way back to the hotel I made a bit of a wrong turn that took us down a treacherous limestone gravel path. Good thing we had the electric bikes to power back up that hill! The 11 hour ride finished back in Joucas for dinner at La Terrase.
We did decide to make a trip back to Gordes for a proper anniversary dinner. So we made a reservation at Peir, the Michelin starred restaurant at La Bastide de Gordes. This really is a beautiful property. We had drinks on the terrace – with an incredible view – before our scheduled reservation.
Upon our arrival at the actual restaurant, the waiter sat us at a terrible table, behind the only other diners and next to a wall. Shawn asked if we could move and they told us that all the other tables were already reserved. Made us feel very second-tier. After looking over their monumentally overpriced menu, we decided that we were going to leave. Of course at this point they did miraculously discover that they could in fact find us a better table. But… too late. We were out the door and ended up having a wonderful meal at a charming French bistro called Les Cuisines du Chateau. Super fun.
While in Provence, we also took a trip to Avignon. It’s a pretty big city. But, you can visit the Popes Palace there. This is the place where the Popes lived for a couple of centuries before moving permanently to the Vatican. It’s pretty cool if you’re into that sort of thing. But after a while all these palaces start to look the same.
Now it’s off to Barcelona for two nights and then a week on Sea Dream One for a cruise down the east coast of Spain!