Road Trip = Unplanned Awesomeness

As a reminder, at this point in our road trip, we’ve just left Arles and are heading towards Les Baux de Provence, a town I’d been told to go see if I was in the area. 

For those of you who haven’t had the pleasure of driving in France, one of the things I appreciate is how well their signage is! Every major intersection or roundabout will have signs indicating which direction to go to get to the nearest major town or city. Another thing that will be indicated is if there is an historical monument nearby. If there is, there will be signs that will lead you directly to it!

One rule of this road trip was that if we saw an historical monument site that was less than 10 kilometers away, we followed the signs. As we were leaving Arles towards Les Baux, one such sign appeared, and we didn’t even have to go out of our way, it was right on the road towards Les Baux!

The Abbey from the top of its tower.

 We saw the Abbaye Montmajour from the road and had to stop to visit! It’s up on a hill, as many such places were, and huge! We decided to pay the 8€ to visit – and I’m so glad we did!

The site was originally a necropolis (a large tomb/cemetary) with a couple of chapels built in the 11^th century. One of the chapels was actually cut out of a natural cave in the hillside, and it was connected to the other chapel by underground paths and rooms.

Here you can see best that it was originally a necropolis.

 In the 14^th century, a tower was built above the old cemetery by the Abbot-Cardinal, who wanted some protection due to some turmoil in the area; the papacy being moved to nearby Avignon being one thing, issues with the les Baux dukes nearby (we’re going to Les Baux after this and we’ll learn all about them). In the 15^th century, they added some buttresses to support everything.

At the beginning of the 18^th century (in 1703) the monks of Saint Maur, who had taken possession of the abbey in 1643 per the wishes of Louis XII, started the building of the large monastery. 

The 25-meter high stone building was finished in a mere 15 years and had 5 levels with richly decorated rooms. We were able to climb all the way to the top of the tower – and the views of the valley were amazing! The tower itself is quite tall, and we were already way up on a hill. I particularly appreciated the herd of white horses hanging out in one of the fields. I did have a slight moment of pause while I was taking pictures when I realized that if I dropped my phone from the ramparts, it would most definitely fall through the holes and end up in little tiny pieces way down in the stone courtyard! I took less pictures and just enjoyed the view after that! 

Van Gogh's “Sunset at Montmajour”

 It was all so picturesque that it was no surprise to find out that it was a favorite place of Van Gogh’s to go to draw and paint. The most recent Van Gogh painting that was “discovered” is actually entitled “Sunset at Montmajour” and it rocked the fine art world when it was officially attributed to Van Gogh in 2013, after 2 years of authentication efforts.

We were also able to go down into the original cave/chapel/hermitage from the 11^th century. It was interesting to see that it was a fairly primitive half cave, half chapel, and quite a small space. There were some windows where you could see out into the valley from the cave, which were lovely views. 

One thing that annoys me though is when I visit an historical monument like that and see that people have carved their name into the stone.

 I think takes a particular level of arrogance to carve your name into a 1,000+ year old monument, contributing to its deterioration… seriously Terry: you’re not cool, you’re a jerk.

The location was classified as an historical monument in 1927. On some of the signs it says that the Abbey is a UNESCO Site, but as I’m well versed in those that are in the area ad hadn’t heard of it, I was doubtful. I looked it up later and it turns out that when the Roman sites in Arles were submitted for UNESCO review, they actually included Montmajour as part of the proposal (the proposals are all available to the public – as are the decisions). The two Roman sites were accepted as a grouping, but because Montmajour is a little ways out of town and not from the same century as the other two monuments, it was not included in the listing, nor re-proposed as a site in its own right.

 

360 views like this = not bad!

It was an absolutely beautiful side stop on our way to Les Baux, which was supposed to be the subject of this blog, but I got distracted by the Abbey! So Les Baux is the next blog, promise!! In the meantime, you can watch this video about the Abbey - the imagery is great!