Thursday morning, the Catherine docked at Viviers, a small and sleepy village that many visitors have called a place that time forgot. We had visited Viviers two years ago with Uniworld, and it seemed that little had changed.For more on Viviers, you can check my earlier blog. Yet one thing was new to us at least. As our ship glided into its docking space, we noticed a small marina on one side. I learned later that it held 18 boats and included a sailing school for dinghies.
Much to our surprise, in the afternoon, we saw a fleet of three tiny vessels, following their leader out on to the river. Yes, people do boat on the river, and some towns have much larger marinas, but there were not as many on the Rhone as we had seen on the Rhine or the Danube. Not sure I would want to sail a boat on the Rhone, especially if one of the fierce Mistral winds came up. More about the Mistral later on…
Although the area around the dock is flat, the village itself straggles along a road that winds its way up to St. Vincent’s cathedral at the top of a nearby hill.
For most of the way, the road is lined by Plane trees, a relative of the sycamore, that, according to legend, were ordered planted by Napoleon to shade his troops on the march. Although this story isn’t very credible, there are certainly a lot of plane trees in Provence. All are pollarded which means they are consistently topped to keep them from growing too tall, and encouraging a wide, lush growth of leaves and shade.
St. Vincent’s has the honor of being the smallest cathedral in France, and as a cathedral, is the seat of a bishop. Indeed, there is still a bishop of Viviers. That is not St. Vincent’s only claim to fame. It also has a marvelous, organ and great acoustics to go with it, along with some excellent Gobelin tapestries supposedly donated by Napoleon. They were stolen but later returned.
Honestly, I am not a fan of tapestries but I do love organ music, so going on this tour was a no-brainer. The senior Rambler is not a fan of organ music or tapestries, so he stayed on board as this was our second visit to Viviers. The first time we walked up the hill, this time I rode in the van.
The cathedral is one of the oldest you will visit on most river cruises as it was originally built in the 11th century, along with St. Michael’s tower which stands next to it. Centuries ago, it suffered damage in a series of wars and was remodeled, if you will, in the then current flamboyant Gothic style. In the 17th century during the wars of religion, the cathedral suffered fire damage. Its wooden ceiling similar to that in St. Julians in Tournon, was burned to ashes. It was replaced by a vault made of stone in the 18th century. Now, on one side, St. Vincent’s shows its romanesque beginnings and on the other, it looks very Gothic.
Today, we were not the only tour group in the cathedral, and so the local organist had a good audience. The music was wonderful, as before.
Afterwards I decided to hop into the Uniworld van for a ride down to the historic center of the town. We were all given options to visit either a town resident or one of the artisan shops in Viviers. I would have enjoyed visiting one of the residents, but my lot was again to visit one of the shops. I guess I could have asked to visit somewhere else but just decided to head back to the ship. However we can’t leave Viviers without a mention of its second most famous attraction, the House of the Knights.
This is a tall, four story building with an elaborately carved facade built in the 16th century by Noel Albert, a wealthy salt merchant. He sided with the Protestants during the Wars of Religion and prospered for a time. Albert was responsible for the destruction of St. Vincent’s wooden roof, and despite his early success, came to a bad end. Today the House of the Knights is in need of major repairs and restoration and fortunately it is scheduled as a work site for for one of France’s preservation groups. Volunteers who want to learn the stone mason’s trade and get a taste for historic restoration.
As I am not much of a shopper anymore, I headed back to the Catherine, and had lunch with the senior Rambler. We had just time enough before our scheduled visit to a truffle farm and the village of Grignan.
Grignan, as is often the case in Provence, was situated at the top of a steep hill. At the very top of the hill, was an interesting castle, but…it looked a hot and dusty walk so the Ramblers decided to hang out at the bottom, Fortunately there was an interesting cemetery not far from the bus parking spot and we decided to explore it instead. However, I won’t neglect Grignan as it is a picturesque spot.
In this photo you can see both the castle and the large chateau that was originally the home of the Grignan family. A daughter of the famous writer, Madame de Sevigny married into the family who owned the castle and chateau, and she visited Grignan several times.
This photo was taken not far from where our bus parked. For those who have never been to Provence, tour busses can rarely enter the historic centers of these old towns. Most streets are too narrow even for cars. Thus one must be prepared to walk or view from afar. In this case, the Ramblers decided to view from afar, our decision was helped by the existence of the town cemetery which surrounded an ancient chapel. The entrance was not far from where we were dropped off. We learned later that many streets of Grignan were paved with bumpy cobblestones, so we were very happy with our choice.
The cemetery with its tiny chapel of St. Vincent was another story. As it turned out, this was the oldest monument in Grignan. The chapel dated from the early 11th century, and though it obviously had been much restored, it provided a welcome respite from the August sun. The doors were not locked so we walked inside to find a small bare room, with soft colored light coming from plain stained glass windows. It was furnished with pews so the Ramblers had a place to sit down when we got tired of wandering around the cemetery. It was left undecorated, I believe, to appeal to both Catholics and Protestants as it was completely bare of any religious symbols or statues. Yet it was a very peaceful and spiritual place. The cemetery also included both Protestant and Catholic graves; they slept together to await the last Judgment.
I found the name St. Vincent somewhat unusual here and in Vivers as such ancient buildings were probably not named for St. Vincent De Paul. Although Vincent De Paul is well known today, he lived in the 16th century, much too late for this chapel. I thought here must have been another St. Vincent who lived nearby in ancient times, and I was right. After some research, I found St. Vincent of Lerins, a holy monk who lived in Southern Gaul (France) in the 5th century. It is likely these ancient place honored him.
As we waited for the rest of the group that had climbed to the castle, we were able to enjoy the air conditioning in the bus as we rested up for our final stop at a truffle farm. The south of France is famous for its truffles which fetch a high price in the local markets and elsewhere. At this point I must confess that I had never eaten a truffle, though I knew what they were. There are two main varieties, the black truffle found in fall and winter and the white truffle found in summer. The black one is more prized and therefore more expensive.
One of the reasons truffles are so expensive is that the term, “truffle farm” is a misnomer. You don’t farm them, you find them underground with the aid of a dog trained to sniff them out. They don’t grow everywhere but for some reason, southern France with its warm summers and chilly winters provide an ideal climate for truffles. The truffle itself is a fungus that grows entirely underground near the roots of mainly oak trees. They have a powerful scent which can easily be detected by a trained dog, but not by humans. The dog will point to the spot where the truffle grows underground, and the truffle farmer then gently digs it up. Pigs can also locate truffles but they tend to eat the ones they find before the farmer can dig them up.
The process does work as we soon saw. If the process seems like a lot of work for a fungus, I can only say that black truffles especially demand a high price. For example, in 2018 when we visited, 16 grams of whole black truffles sold for 17 Euro while the same amount of white ones sold for 4.20 Euro.
After watching the truffle hunt, we were invited to a truffle tasting at the Ayne farmhouse. As you might expect, the senior Rambler had absolutely no desire to taste truffles so he stayed outside while the rest of us enjoyed trying truffles fresh from the ground. I ate more truffles that afternoon than I am likely to eat in the rest of my life. Needless to say, I enjoyed them. They were served sliced thin on crusty bread with a drizzle of olive oil and they were tasty, but don’t ask me to describe the flavor. Obviously others must have enjoyed them because many bought Ayme products to take home.
Sated with truffles, we headed to the bus for the ride back to the Catherine which had sailed on to Avignon while we were touring.
Only 2 full days left of this cruise. Time has gone by very quickly.