We walked around the town. It has a lovely church, and the view over the cemetery – Wow. There was a beautiful hat shop where the owner was sitting in the back with her sewing machine making hats. Four restaurants that we wanted to try, alas we leave today. We must come back here again.
Started to drive towards Marseilles through the mountains. It was amazing, there were fields of lavender in bloom. As we drove through one small town, we found a small castle and got out to take pictures. At the castle we discovered a cave cooperative and bought several bottles. The guy there was knowledgeable about how to ship wine back to the states. He said DHL could do it because they are both a shipper and a wine importer, but it costs €10 per bottle. Yikes.
Drove into Marseilles. It is quite the city. We could see the Notre Dame De La Garde on the hill in the distance. Dirty and large, but the architecture is amazing. We stopped to visit the Cathedral Major. Was absolutely incredible except for the 30 minutes we spent looking for parking. In that regard, the city is a mess. There were cars parked on every sidewalk. At every turn we saw cops writing tickets and having cars towed. At one point a truck on a one way small alley road just stopped and two guys started loading the back of the truck while everyone behind them just waited. We then drove down to the waterfront, and fortunately there was parking readily available. We had a nice lunch there – salad with shrimp, corn, avocado, tomato, and a stone ground mustard balsamic dressing.
Arrived at Mas Du Soleilla. I didn’t realize when they booked that they had a view of the sea. The wind was blowing at about 35 miles an hour though, so sitting by the pool and enjoying the view wasn’t an option. We went to dinner in Narbonne Plage which is their version of Seaside Oregon. Very cute, touristy beach town. Kristine, the owner of the Mas Du Soleilla told us where to eat because “not all the restaurants are good”.
