Monday 26th May 2025

 Today we travelled south west stopping off at a view point along the way.

Growing lavender is big business round here.

Typical Provençale farm buildings.

We moved on and stopped for the day at the Camping Car Park Aire at Fontaine de Vaucluse. It cost 16 euros to stay here for 24 hours.

There are impressive limestone cliffs all around.

I took a walk up the river from the Aire.

The village is very pretty.

There are some nice old buildings.

There are a lot of waterwheels hereabouts.

As well as being pretty this place is a horrendous tourist trap.

There are eateries and nick-nack shops every where.

I crossed the bridge into the village centre.

Where's all this water coming from? There's no valley up ahead - just sheer cliffs.

La Sorgue is actually pouring out of multiple limestone caverns in the cliffs.

It's amazing that a big river can be generated so quickly!

No commercial opportunity is missed here.

This is as far as I could get where the infant river Sorgue pours out of the limestone cliff.

Back at our parking place there is a steep stairway leading down to an old mill race. There is a wooden platform at the bottom of the stairs.

Here's the old mill wheel.

We went down onto the platform.

It was very peaceful down here.

This is looking up the hillside from the riverside platform.

We climbed back up to the Aire.

Ann got her chair out.

As the afternoon wore on there was great light on the cliffs from which La Sorgue emerges.

What happened next we both found really unpleasant. This couple in a French registered motorhome turned up an asked us to move our van for no reason apart from the fact that they wanted more space! We refused. They continued to generally pressure us for a while. It ended up by us saying that we wouldn't speak to them anymore. 

They parked right next to us. We retreated into our van quite intimidated and stayed there for the rest of the day!

Today we travelled 37 miles (60 kilometres). We are at: N43.9207 E5.1244

Fontaine de Vaucluse    Street View