It might seem a bit decadent to take another day off after travelling only about 150 km’s over two days, but we keep reminding ourselves that we are ‘travelling by bike’, we’re not on a bike trip. So when we get to an interesting place like Vaison La Romaine we’ll take some time off to check it out.
It’s an interesting place with features that attract a variety of communities. For hard core bikers, it’s on the north slopes of Mount Ventoux; for history buffs it has a 10th century area, and a 20th century discovery, for lack of a better term, of a 1st century Roman town that’s still under active archeological excavation; and for winos, well it’s in the heart of the Côtes du Rhône appellation.
We’ll be biking around Ventoux over the next few days, so we focused on the other two elements today. First up was an exploration of the medieval town (pics to follow … and not that many), the highlight of which was lunch.
Time for a bit of an off-ramp - as we were wandering down one of the very narrow streets we saw a small car pull up in front of a tiny restaurant and disgorge a family; They were greeted by the owner/chef/waiter/chief of everything and shown to a table on the terrace beside the restaurant. As it was lunch time, and we were peckish, we figured we’d grab a table too, so we did.
It turned out to be a great meal, a great people watching experience (our table was basically in the street) and an anatomical educational experience. The restaurant was called La Caillette, and the plat de jour was a caillette en feulleté. Okay, it’s something wrapped in pastry, but what’s a caillette? A quick google translate revealed that the English translation is ‘abomasum’ - the fourth of the four stomachs that ruminants have. That sounds tasty - and it was. The dish was more of a reference to the look of a cow’s stomach wrapped in (a very light and flaky) pastry, it did not actually contain any offal. Who knew that lunch could be this entertaining and educational.
As far as entertainment value, the chef/cook/ etc was a blast. Funny, engaging and an absolute whirlwind keeping the place running like a tight ship. What a great stumble upon.
We spent the afternoon exploring the ‘still under excavation’ Roman section of Vaison la Romaine. As with our 2018 Rhone trip, we continued to be amazed at the reach and sophistication of the Roman Empire some 2000 years ago, and how this area of France has some of the best examples of that time and culture.
After that, back to food … dinner was at another place recommended by our super gîte host Sabina. La Bartavelle is a small ‘s’ sophisticated family restaurant, and very popular as well. It was another beautiful night and we had a lovely table in a sheltered section of the outside courtyard. A few minutes after we were seated, a large family group arrived and were seated at the large long table adjacent to us and who were the first two people in that group to arrive - None other than Serge and Stephan, our father and son new-friends from the campground yesterday! Word gets around too, as several other family members seemed to know who we were.
One more day in this town and we’ll be like locals!
Tomorrow we ride again, and there’s been another modification to our original plan, Stay tuned for that news.
SOTD Day Tripper , cover by Tok Tok Tok , ‘cause that’s what we were doing today.
We started the day with a wander around the old medieval era part of town
To us, the most interesting things in these medieval era towns are the narrow jumbled streets and architecture. At this jumbled intersection we saw a French family arriving at a very tiny restaurant for lunch
At the upper level of the Roman Theatre. The seating area is well preserved / renovated but the theatre wall is basically gone. Still very impressive. It’s about half the size of the Theatre in Orange which is still largely intact, and a wonder to see
About five minutes after we sat down, a large family group arrived …. None other than Serge and Stephan, our campground friends from yesterday, plus 12 of their family and a few dogs! Just like old times!
Kirsten KaarsooMerci d'avoir lu notre blog. C'était tellement amusant de vous voir, vous et votre famille, au restaurant hier soir. Reply to this comment 11 months ago
