Arles

Arles was never going to compare well having come from Nîmes. Arles has a connection with Vincent Van-Gogh; the painter lived in Arles’ hospital for many years and a number of Van-Gogh’s paintings are scenes of Arles.

Arles was a bit of a mystery from the outset. I was surprised how difficult it was to book any accommodation in the town for the time we would be visiting. For such a small town this should have been a warning. It transpired that a photography event was being held in the town that week. So we were battling against hundreds – maybe thousands – of DSLR toting characters, in addition to the normal stream of tourists bused in to see the sites Vincent Van-Gogh painted.

We ended up staying just outside the border of Arles and the trek to and from our hotel was revealing. We saw much of the residential side of the town, rather than the tourist parts.

The old hospital has been turned into a public building and includes a library and gift shop.

We did not visit the big Roman monuments. We had already paid to see inside the equivalents in Nîmes and at Arles could see all we needed from the outside.

Near gardens in Arles we saw a flea market selling what can best be described as anything that could be unscrewed or removed from older houses; rusting watering cans, brackets and hinges, maps of Europe with long since changed borders, anything that might be sellable and much that was not.