Hannibal Bike Tour Avignon Dinner

Day 10 REST!

Stage 1 is complete and it is a good opportunity to enjoy some rest and recuperation in preparation for the most iconic leg of Hannibal’s journey – Across the Alps! Avignon serves as a great spot to explore. I slept in for a change, had a great filling breakfast and headed out to tour around Villeneuve les  and Avignon itself. Then a light lunch of octopus/ chorizo salad and local biere!…then a nap, light dinner, sack time early!!

  

 

Villeneuve-lès-Avignon

Villeneuve-lès-Avignon owes its prominence to those cardinals who (like us!), were seeking a retreat from busy Avignon, and established residences here. The view of the “City of Popes” is one of the most renowned of the Rhône Valley, and best enjoyed from the Tower of Philippe le Bel (built on a rocky outcrop on the edge of the Rhône) or from the 14th century Fort Saint-André.

  

Avignon

For 70-odd years of the early 1300s, the Provençal town of Avignon was the centre of the Roman Catholic world, and though its stint as the seat of papal power only lasted a few decades, it’s been left with an impressive legacy of ecclesiastical architecture, most notably the soaring World Heritage-listed fortress-cum-palace known as the Palais des Papes.

Of the 90,194 inhabitants of the city about 12,000 live in the ancient town centre enclosed by its medieval ramparts. Seven successive popes resided in Avignon and in 1348 Pope Clement VI bought the town from Joanna I of Naples. Papal control persisted until 1791 when, during the French Revolution, it became part of France.

And of course the famous children’s song Sur Pont d’Avignon, which is a story about this bridge on the Rhone

 

Avignon is now best known for its annual arts festival, the largest in France, which spans several weeks in July.

out in the distance is our next challenge: the Giant of Provence awaits us!