Provence, Day 6
Today was a logistically challenging day as we had 3 destinations in our plan, all to be done by trains and buses. We arrived early at Nimes. The first thing we did was to get the timetable for buses to Pont du Gard and Uzes. After studying the schedules, we decided to aim for the 11am bus to Pont du Gard first, and see how the day would go from there. Before then we’d be strolling around Nimes for 2+ hours. The first sight we saw was the arena. But since it wasn’t yet open, and we’d already visited one in Arles, we did not go inside. At this point we really should’ve taken a side street towards the old town center. But instead I led us on to the first main boulevard that I saw, took a wrong turn and got us off the map, literally (well, at least off OUR map). We must’ve walked for half an hour before I got us back to the old town.
After breakfast, we visited the cathedral, the Maison Carree, and the Fountain Garden, where we finally saw a game of Petanque being played for the first time. Before we knew it, it was almost 11am, so on we went to the bus station heading to the Pont du Gard. Even though we arrived there before noon, we didn’t actually see the aqueduct until after 1pm because we spent so much time at the museum. The
museum is so big and has so much on display that one can easily spend a few good hours in it. Since it was now after 1pm, there was no way we could catch the 1:35pm bus to Uzes. We would now have 2+ hours to kill before the following bus at 4pm, so we took it easy, had a picnic lunch, and walked down to the Gard River away from the tourists.
I’d been carrying around the engagement ring for almost a week now at this point. At the back of my mind I probably had always planned to propose in Paris, perhaps on top of the Eiffel Tower. But since I know that Chris doesn’t like big cities in general, and touristy places in particular, I thought the peaceful and private place that we were now enjoying would be perfect. So after I nervously popped the question, and she pretended to have to think about it :), we were engaged!
The next couple of uneventful hours flew by quickly. We arrived at Uzes after a short bus ride. Uzes was never a must-see destination on our itinerary, but I was very glad to have made it there. It’s not so big to feel touristy, and not so small to feel like a dead town. Unfortunately we only had 2 hours before the last 6:30pm bus back to Nimes. The town is definitely worth a longer stay.
