Waking to a sun-filled room, lying in a four-poster bed is marvelous. We weren’t able to discern it last night, but the top floor has skylights and even a small patio! It’s gorgeous. And perhaps that’s how I slept until 9:45! What?!

I make the kids breakfast at home, and it’s really nice to sit with them for a bit and discuss what they’d like to do this week. Lillian is particularly interested in the planning aspect of, well, everything.

We decide to spend the day in Avignon, about an hour away. It was home to the Papacy in the 14th century and is supposed to be really beautiful.

We walk back to our car and can now see how high up we are! This little town is set up on a tall perch above Provence. We can even see the bay from here! It’s lovely.

We drive to Avignon to find a walled city surrounded by parking lots. We snag the last parking spot in a crowded lot and get out to discover it is HOT. We have been shielded from the summer weather a bit by being in the mountains and then by the coast. But now unloading the kids in this sandy parking lot, it is sweltering.

We immediately find food. The place my guidebook recommends is closed, so we pick the nearest spot, Ripert. We sit in a shaded spot on the patio (really in the street). Our host is amazing and immediately orders the kids’ food. He must see how desperate Lillian is. Our salads are very fresh and huge! For perhaps the first time on this trip, we aren’t able to eat all our lunch. I hate wasting good food.

Avignon has a performing arts festival for three weeks every summer, and we are right in the middle of it. Performers walk the streets, both solo and in hoards, singing or gaining attention otherwise, all while passing out fliers for their shows. We see all sorts of strange costumes and hear interesting music. It’s a bit hectic given the streets are also packed with tourists, but the general vibe is fun. It would be fun to stay a night or two and go to performances. When planning, I couldn’t figure out which tickets to purchase, and I thought the performances would be booked up by this time. Now I see there are still a lot of interesting performances, for adults and kids. I’d check it out sometime.

Full and happy, we walk to the Palais des Papes (Papal Palace). It’s a large stone castle. Very impressive, but hard to see how splendid it once was. The papacy let it fall into disrepair, and despite the efforts made in the past two centuries to restore it, it looks like it’s falling apart. We do the full tour, but without the audio guide. We just read the signs throughout. It is very interesting to learn some more history. And some of the rooms are so huge and magnificent. It’s large and tiring to walk throughout, especially on a warm dry day like today. I recommend bringing water with you, but they have machines at certain spots along the way. We are out of change, so we can’t buy any water from the machines. The kids are super disappointed until we decide to sit and have a fake tea time with water and small cakes. It works like a charm, and we are ready to conquer the rest of the palace. 

When we make our way back to Oliver, tied up to the stroller, we are met by a French woman who is very angry with us for leaving Oliver out on a hot day like this. I understand her concern, but wow it sucks to be yelled at, in any language. I think our lack of a similar language may have saved us from a more intense altercation, though.

We walk around the entire palace and find a cool patio to sit and have a local beer. I recognized the name, La Manutention, from my guidebook. The beer isn’t great, but the atmosphere is superb. Musicians play a cello and violin a few meters away, and trendy people sip drinks on the patio.This place feels local. It’s 5pm by this time. Oly falls asleep on Stefan again. We realize he is getting used to doing this now! He didn’t use to like sleeping on us at all. He was very particular about being in his bed. Now when he’s tired, he just asks Stefan to hold him and passes out. It’s sweet.

We walk to our final Avignon destination, the Pont D’Avignon, a bridge built in the 12th century and mostly washed away at this point. One notable thing is there are two chapels on the bridge where mariners worshipped. They’re still in decent condition, except the large amount of vandalism (why do people love writing their names on old walls?). We cut the trip a little short because Lillian has another bathroom emergency (despite using the bathroom at the bar we just left).

We head back to the car. I still can’t believe we have our car back! The kids are so sweet about it. They are happy to make the car trip today because they have all their activities in the minivan. I think it’s also more comfortable for them. The point is we are happy.

We stop at a grocery store on the way home, 15 minutes before it closes. We race through grabbing items to make tacos.
It’s after 9 before we eat dinner (so ridiculous!), but it is good. Making tacos feels like I’m bringing a bit of Texas to France! We feel good eating at home. It’s healthier, cheaper, and there’s a contentment with everyone about it. We like spending time together like this. I wonder if the smaller tables (ours in Stockholm was huge) lend themselves to a certain cosiness we haven’t had before. Or perhaps our kids are just old enough to appreciate sitting at the table together now. Either way, it’s nice.