Around the World in 8000 days: Avignon - dancing on the bridge strictly optional!

Welcome to our travel blog. We are Tabitha and Nic. In 2011 we 'retired' in our early 40s and set off to travel the world. We spent our first year in South America and have been lucky enough to make two trips to Antarctica.

Our blog is a record of our travels, thoughts and experiences. It is not a guide book, but we do include some tips and information, so we hope that you may find it useful if you are planning to visit somewhere we have been. Or you may just find it interesting as a bit of armchair travel.

Saturday, February 25, 2017

Avignon - dancing on the bridge strictly optional!

I get a break now, as Nic has written the posts for our short trip to Avignon and Barcelona. So over to him for this post and the next three......

Avignon

We took a mid-morning Eurostar on ‘Standard Premier’ tickets. This mid-price ticket has more limited lunches than before, and most seats have no table (not ideal for a bottle of bubbly).

Fewer passengers means more peace, but it feels like less of an upgrade than it used to. Instead of leaving London very early to reach Avignon the same day, we stayed overnight in Paris, in walking distance of the morning TGV from Gare de Lyon.

Our hotel, the Ibis Place d'Italie, was basic but cheap, and 5 minutes' walk from the metro (30 mins from the Eurostar, on line 5).

The area was decent for food and drink, including the relaxed Rue de Cinq Diamantes. We had some great cocktails there, in “FanFan by La Tulipe”: friendly and helpful staff, and drinks, such as a spicy mojito, and "smoke on the water"; London prices, but good value.

Avignon

The TGV to Avignon was quick, but cuttings often hid the countryside views from even the upper deck. At Avignon TGV station, we waited 30 minutes for a 5-minute train to Avignon central station. A cab from the TGV would usually be better, but we were staying near central station.

Our 3 nights were in an Airbnb studio flat in a quiet street, excellent value at only £28 a night (with kitchen).

In general, Avignon was a relaxed and undemanding kind of place, ‘doable’ in two nights to see the main sights and wander much of the city.

You could double that if interested in its various fine or contemporary art museums and collections, and visiting nearby Villeneuve-les-Avignon (with 14th century historical fort and monastery, and 10th century abbey).

Hotel des Monnaies (The Mint), Avignon

Avignon as a whole felt better than the sum of its parts, even though the 2 main sights are Unesco-listed. The surrounding city wall keeps in the old character, and the winding streets make it fairly easy to get away from tourist hordes. We were in Avignon as a place to stop en route to Barcelona (which we were travelling to by train to cut our carbon footprint) and as that it is an easy place to break the journey. Worth noting, though, that on Sunday most shops and quite a lot of restaurants were shut, so it’s not the best time to stay to see those things.

Papal Palace, Avignon

The Palais des Papes was built/lived in by 6 popes from the 14th-15th centuries, a French Pope having appointed lots of French cardinals to out-vote Italian ones when electing future Popes. Avignon at the time was across the river from the Kingdom of France, but owned by someone loyal to the Pope.

The building looks very chunky, suggesting lots to see inside. There are 25 rooms, but we found it a bit disappointing: there was often little decoration due to limited restoration, many walls having been whitewashed.

Papal Palace, Avignon

Since the French Revolution, many heads of statues had been sold, and alterations made to the palace to house soldiers. The interior would need major restoration to evoke the grandeur of Papal times.

A flower festival during our visit brightened up one of the internal courtyards. Their cheap (if fact-heavy) audio guide is worth taking as information boards weren’t always available.

Pont d'Avignon, Avignon

The famous Pont d’Avignon dates from the 12th century. The Rhone being the fastest and strongest river in France, portions were regularly swept away and rebuilt, but after the 17th century it wasn’t used. It may never at any point have been a wholly stone bridge (partly as the King of France in the 13th century claimed the Rhone and prohibited its crossing by the bridge).

St Benezet chapel, Pont d'Avignon, Avignon

It houses the small St Benezet chapel, named after the person who supposedly began building the bridge through divine intervention. There are a few decent information boards at the city end. As a tourist sight, its main virtue is the view back to town, but it still attracts the tourist numbers; it didn’t blow us away. For one thing, it’s harder to get excited about a bridge that doesn’t reach the other side.

Rue des Teinturiers, Avignon

We didn’t specifically seek good places to eat in Avignon. Some areas were predictably busier and worse value for money, notably Place d'Horloge and Place des Papes.

A couple of options at ‘our end of town’ are worth a mention. Milk Shop sells refreshing milkshakes and tasty cakes, and is under 10 minutes’ walk from central station (Place des Corp Saints).

We also enjoyed the atmosphere in the narrow, cobbled Rue des Teinturiers, with various food and options and a narrow stream with old water wheels. Can’t remember where we ate, but food and service were both good and the street didn’t feel over-run. In many ways it was a good example of what was best about Avignon; the more under-stated parts.