A day with the relatives

We were picked up this morning by Hilary's cousin Jean Paul. It was in invigorating day with a fast driver with a sure brake pedal foot. We switchbacked over the hills three times charging through old villages as if there was no-one else on the road. Our brains were stretched with delving for French words for architecture and buildings and re-explaining English words for Jean Paul. We first went to Chasse sur Rhône where great great grandfather Jean Louis was born.

We went on to look at a Vieille Pave [old pavement] that Hilary's g,g,g grandfather would have walked on to a job further south. The road is being restored which Jean Paul doesn't approve of.

old in front, restored at the back

checking the new work

looking for caves

Drove on to look at a pisé wall topped with Langlois tiles. Jean Paul said he phoned the owners – as he was taking a tile off to show the mark, the top part of the wall crumbled! The tiles are stamped with the name and date on the back.

I have a better one at home - I can cut the name off at the top if you want.

Roussillon still has a large part of the town wall. The stone work is very interesting – all round pebbles. Another cemetery.

 

Jean Paul took us to lunch at a lovely restaurant with a beautiful view of the river Rhône.

We went to a romanesque church, one of the few completely romanesque. The outside had used stones from roman times in odd places up the walls. Also, when the road went through, the front three metres was cut off the church and the front wall redone! Hilary asked Jean Paul about the bible in the car. He said he was in a monthly discussion group at his church, the bishop had asked them to discuss Acts of the Apostles. When we went into the church we prayed for the locals as we do. Jean Paul suggested we hold hands and say the Lord's Prayer together – him in French and us in English.  Afterwards he said, “We are all one under God.”

 

 

Chartreuse de Sainte-Croix-de-Javiz is no longer a monastery but is still a beautiful building which is lived in – the monks had apartments and gardens, and has music festivals in the chapel.

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We got back to our hotel at 6:45 after an amazing day.  We saw the huge river Rhône with chemical plants, nuclear power stations and vineyards up the steep sides one row on each terrace, tiny villages with tall buildings that housed woollen looms and made a friendship with a generous cousin,