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Prophetic words from George Costanza.
In my case, however, it was the sky that was angry. As early
as Thursday, the experts were predicting rain for the weekend.
I was prepared to endure my first weekend of total rain.
I had a ton of work to do, and the Rugby World Cup final
between England and Australia was on TV. On Saturday morning,
I walked outside to put my meteorological expertise to the
test. Massive black thunderheads were moving in from the
south and it was windy. It was also warm, which meant that
the warm wet Mediterranean air was coming from the south
and clashing with the cold northerly air from the Alps.
A recipe for rain - a lot of rain. But to the north, there
was some clear sky, and I thought if it held out long enough,
I could go for a hike. I looked in the trail book and found
a “medium” hike in the area of Fontaine de Vaucluse where
the sky looked hopeful. So I was faced with a decision –
watch the rugby final or go for a hike.
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Following the Sorgue, a tributary
of the Rhône, up toward the Vaucluse Plateau and the
white-capped Mont Ventoux, one comes to the town of Fontaine
de Vaucluse. Fontaine for the spring that made
it famous and Vaucluse from the Latin Vallis
Clause or “closed valley”, complements of the Romans.
Aside from being a stop for seemingly every tourist bus,
Fontaine is also known mainly for water and paper. Starting
with the first mill in 1522, Fontaine used the force of
the Sorgue to become a center for papermaking. Rags were
pulped between grinding stones powered by water wheels,
pressed, and dried to form a medieval version of paper.
The last paper mill closed in 1968.
Fontaine is also rather famous for
having hosted the Italian poet Petrarch (Francesco Petrarca)
from 1337-1357. While attending mass in Avignon one day,
Petrarch caught sight of a woman named Laura. Although they
never met, she became the inspiration for a number of poems
on Petrarch’s unrequited love and eventually lamenting her
death. While there are theories on the identity of Laura,
it has never been established, and Petrarch’s love poems
became world renowned for their poignancy. They even prompted
Giacomo Casanova to visit Fontaine in 1790 to pay homage
to the poet. |
A fountain in Fontaine
with an old paper mill and a 15th century castle built by
the Bishops of Cavaillon.
Another fountain
near the town's church.
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The spring at
Fotaine to Vaulcluse.
Another view of
the origin of the Sorgue.
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Tracing the Sorgue upstream for about
a mile out of town, one comes to the real reason people
visit Fontaine de Vaucluse – la source. At the
base of a 700 ft cliff sits a pool of emerald green water
from which rushes forth the Sorgue at a rate of 165 billion
gallons per year, making it one of the largest springs in
the world. At peak flows, the spring captures rain from
the Vaucluse Plateau and snow melt from Mont Ventoux as
well as other nearby mountains. In summer, the level of
the spring can fall low enough to reveal the mouth of a
cave at the base of a cliff. As early as 1878, divers have
tried to explore the subterranean formations looking for
the bottom of the spring. Even Jacques Cousteau gave it
a go. An expedition in 1985 used cameras to find the bottom
to be over 900 ft before moving off horizontally under the
plateau.
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As I’ve mentioned before, I now own
several books with various recommended hikes throughout
Provence. One book I hadn’t used yet details a hike from
Fontaine up some of the surrounding hills and back down
to town again. It was estimated at 4.5 hours and described
as “medium” due in part to the 1600 ft elevation change.
I was soon to learn that the ranking of “medium” is not
consistent from book to book. All of the elevation was at
the beginning of the trek resulting in two and a half straight
hours of walking uphill. That's like walking up a ramp to
the top of the Empire State Building (which is only 1250
ft). To make matters worse, it was through the woods where
you can’t see how far you’ve gone or even more annoying,
how far you still need to go.
One of the real plusses of hiking,
especially in Provence, is that it either allows you to
see things that you wouldn’t normally see, like the Fontaine
de l’Oule. Hiking is also an activity that can be enjoyed
by people regardless of age and ability. It’s a very flexible
recreation. I was reminded of this when my parents came
to visit. When showing them my place of work, I pointed
out that there is a rock climbing club formed by some of
the employees of the company, and they practice their art
on the Colline St. Jacques. My parents asked if I had looked
into it, and I replied with my theory on sports for the
oversized. Basically, there are a number of activities in
which the portly sportsman does not typically participate.
Rock climbing is an excellent example. Others include spelunking,
deep-sea diving (two reasons: buoyancy and the rubber suits
are not flattering), bungee jumping, kayaking (I exclude
sea-kayaking since there is no hole to get stuck in), and
anything with the word “extreme” in it. Instead, the hefty
confine themselves to milder pursuits such as golf, darts,
bowling, and softball (the kind you play with a beer in
your hand).
So anyway, I’m trudging up this hill
for two hours trying to remember why I wanted to do this
over watching rugby. I’m cursing myself and the very fit
lady who wrote this stupid hiking book. I have to stop every
ten minutes now to rest. I’m sweating profusely in 45 degree
weather trying to move my largesse up 1600 feet of mountain.
My water is almost gone, and I nearly lost my lunch (both
figuratively and literally, I accidentally left my backpack
open and my baguette nearly fell out). So after
all this, I come across an elderly French couple who are
picnicking in a small clearing by the side of the trail.
They give me the obligatory bonjour! and ask me
how long it is to the summit. I pull out my worthless guide
book and tell them that I think it’s 30 min but that I hope
it’s only 15. Apparently feeling sorry for the heaving sweaty
mass standing before them, they rub salt in the wound by
offering me a glass of wine. So not only did they hike up
this same mountain with a full picnic lunch including a
blanket, but they brought two glass bottles full of wine!
I graciously decline and shuffle on my way. Thirty minutes
later I finally reach the summit, and what’s the payoff
for all that work – a spectacular view of haze. |
A
small spring along the way called Fontaine de l'Oule.
The payoff. Pictured
but not visible are Gordes, Rousillon, the Luberon, and
Mont Ventoux.
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Ruins of the plaque
wall running alongside the GR6 and GR97.
The remains of a
guard tower situated along the wall.
Reconstructed wall
with marker.
The rebuilt wall
with ruins of the original wall winding up the hill in the
distance.
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In 1720, a ship from Syria pulled
into Marseille laden with silk, cotton, and unfortunately
plague. Within days, so many people were dying in Marseille
that they had to pile corpses in the streets because they
couldn't dig the mass graves fast enough. In two years,
the Great Plague of 1720 would kill 50,000 of Marseille’s
90,000 inhabitants. Survivors fled the city in droves horrifying
people in the rest of Provence who had already experienced
ten epidemics over the last 400 years.
To try to curb the spread of plague
northward, lawmakers in Aix-en-Provence initiated a death
penalty for anyone in contact with Marseille or its inhabitants.
A second initiative was the building of a 20 km wall through
the countryside to stop potentially infected citizens from
fleeing to the north. Much of le mur de la peste
(plague wall) still stands today, albeit in ruins, and it
runs alongside the GR6/GR97 for several miles on the hike
from Fontaine. Since the wall was of the pierres sèches
variety, it now looks like a 3-foot high line of rubble.
Towards the end of the ruins, however, the wall has been
recreated to its original height and width.
Standing next to the wall, I began
to ponder the practicality of it all. Frankly, the whole
idea smacks of a bunch of politicians sitting around a conference
table and saying “Well, shooting people didn’t seem
to work, so let’s build a wall. But to keep costs down,
we won’t use any mortar.” The reconstructed portion
stands about 5 feet tall and, as I mentioned, was built
without any mortar. Now if I’m running for my life from
a city in which I’m almost certainly going to die from plague
and I have already climbed up this damn mountain, I’m not
really sure that this wall would serve much of a deterrent.
I mean even if you couldn’t climb over this thing, you could
always just remove rocks to go through it. Sure there were
guard towers periodically spaced along the wall, but they
can’t see everything. Even if they did, muskets had terrible
accuracy from long distance. Think about it, the Romans
built a wall out of dirt across England and much of it is
still there. And then there’s the Chinese. If you consider
this plague wall and the Maginot line, the French don’t
exactly have a great track record of creating barriers.
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To offset my epic journey around
Fontaine de Vaucluse on Saturday, I decided to take it
easy on Sunday. My feet were killing me and it looked like
it was going to rain, so I chose a short “easy” hike from
the book not too far from home around the Chapelle Saint-Gabriel.
Essentially, you can see the chapel from the road without
getting out of the car, but I gave it a go and walked for
2 hours around a circuit that began and ended at the chapel.
The chapel is all that remains of
the Gallo-Roman town of Ernaginum. The site was used as
a port to launch boats into the surrounding marshes created
by the Rhône. Once the course of the river changed
and the marshes dried up, so did Ernaginum. The chapel has
some interesting features including the guano-covered lamb
over the door and the ornate carved-stone frame that once
held the chapel window. The rest of the walk had some decent
views of the Tarascon plain, but was otherwise unremarkable.
By the way, England edged Australia
in double-overtime to win their first rugby world championship.
Some are claiming it was the greatest final ever played,
if not the greatest Rugby World Cup game ever. |
The Chapelle Saint-Gabriel
near St. Rémy de Provence.
Close-up of the
chapel façade.
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