Two days ago Amy chastised me for thinking I might be ready to go for a run again and made me promise that I would wait at least till Wednesday, a couple days after I'll be done with my antibiotics. She's probably right, but apparently I was still allowed to tromp all over Aix-en-Provence, which is where we headed yesterday for a Sunday of local sight seeing. Something that hasn't stopped to bug me is the lack of season change in Montpellier. Even Bozeman gets fall, albeit a sometimes short and potentially wet and snowy one, but there are plenty of crisp leaves blowing around Montana right now I'm sure. Instead I'm stuck with humidity and palm trees. For a country girl from the Northwest this is a devastation, but I guess I can't really complain too much. However, autumn was in full swing just kilometers East of us in Aix and I loved it! Aix is famous for its long esplanade lined with majestic Plane trees and French cafes, but yesterday we were lucky enough to encounter a local artisan market sprawled down its length as well. If you haven't noticed by now, I love markets! This one had a vaguely Fall Festival feel to it and was full of fun and beautiful crafts and tasty nibbles. I find it is generally a grantee that you can walk out of any market here with a hearty snack of samples. Yesterday I tasted: cookies, fine chocolate, an olive, local spice bread, foie gras (my first taste and actually eatable, though I think I'll pass next time), berry preserves, and a calisson. A calisson is the traditional sweet of Aix-en-Provence, and I have found it rather common for each city to have its own traditional sweet, cheese or other specific food. Famous example: think Marseille and bouillabaisse. Calissons are a little diamond shaped, chewy almond and fruit sugar treat, which lays on a bed of wafer and topped with a white sugar icing.
Tasty, but I'm always a sucker for almond desserts! Soap, on the other hand, is what the province of Provence is generally know for, and Amy and I stopped at a cute little stand to smell about 30 different kinds of traditional vegetable soaps. I highly recommend green tea, fig, cucumber, and honeysuckle. We got to talking to the guy in the booth for a while who happened to be from England, but had been living down here for the last four years. He was super nice and while chatting we discovered it was his last day and he was picking up his boots and headed to Pittsburgh to meet up with his American girlfriend. Then out of the blue he causally asked if we would run his booth and sell soap for him while he ran across the street to pee and roll a cigarette. We laughed and agreed, and after quizzing us on the prices in English, French and Italian we were turned loose! Amy and I proudly made four soap sales, though all in English as Aix was teaming with English and American tourists. We almost didn't hear any French the whole day. Jerome, the soap seller returned shortly and thanked us with two free bars of soap each and sent us on our way. I will gladly pay for chic French soap in such a fashion anytime!
Then it was off down the Promenade de Cézanne, which is actually one of the major reasons we had ended up in Aix that morning at all. Cézanne is a famous French painter from the ended of the 19th century that lived in Aix for most of his life and painted a great deal there. The city is marked with a little path of gold plaques on the streets that meanders past important places in Cézanne's life like his favorite Café, first house, schools, bank, church and so on. It was a pleasant way to check out Aix and enjoy the lovely weather. On the path we stopped by the Musée Garnet to take in their collection of nine of Cézanne's famous works. Unfortunately his sketches were being kept in dark for several months for light protection, but we did check out his paint pallet left from the day he died. Plus, since it was the first Sunday of the month it was free, a little something to know about
French National museums. We also walked up the hill to look over the valley and visit the last studio of Cézanne, which has been absolutely unchanged since his death in 1906. It was awesome to look at some of his works and see the very object he painted sitting a few feet away. His gardens were also beautiful, and had a peaceful, relaxing feel to them. We just chilled at a little table under the trees for a bit to unwind. We finished out the afternoon by giving the market a second whirl, where Amy bought some gifts and we relaxed on a park bench to wait for our train.
Tasty, but I'm always a sucker for almond desserts! Soap, on the other hand, is what the province of Provence is generally know for, and Amy and I stopped at a cute little stand to smell about 30 different kinds of traditional vegetable soaps. I highly recommend green tea, fig, cucumber, and honeysuckle. We got to talking to the guy in the booth for a while who happened to be from England, but had been living down here for the last four years. He was super nice and while chatting we discovered it was his last day and he was picking up his boots and headed to Pittsburgh to meet up with his American girlfriend. Then out of the blue he causally asked if we would run his booth and sell soap for him while he ran across the street to pee and roll a cigarette. We laughed and agreed, and after quizzing us on the prices in English, French and Italian we were turned loose! Amy and I proudly made four soap sales, though all in English as Aix was teaming with English and American tourists. We almost didn't hear any French the whole day. Jerome, the soap seller returned shortly and thanked us with two free bars of soap each and sent us on our way. I will gladly pay for chic French soap in such a fashion anytime!
Then it was off down the Promenade de Cézanne, which is actually one of the major reasons we had ended up in Aix that morning at all. Cézanne is a famous French painter from the ended of the 19th century that lived in Aix for most of his life and painted a great deal there. The city is marked with a little path of gold plaques on the streets that meanders past important places in Cézanne's life like his favorite Café, first house, schools, bank, church and so on. It was a pleasant way to check out Aix and enjoy the lovely weather. On the path we stopped by the Musée Garnet to take in their collection of nine of Cézanne's famous works. Unfortunately his sketches were being kept in dark for several months for light protection, but we did check out his paint pallet left from the day he died. Plus, since it was the first Sunday of the month it was free, a little something to know about 
French National museums. We also walked up the hill to look over the valley and visit the last studio of Cézanne, which has been absolutely unchanged since his death in 1906. It was awesome to look at some of his works and see the very object he painted sitting a few feet away. His gardens were also beautiful, and had a peaceful, relaxing feel to them. We just chilled at a little table under the trees for a bit to unwind. We finished out the afternoon by giving the market a second whirl, where Amy bought some gifts and we relaxed on a park bench to wait for our train.
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