Awesome France: a big trip to Provence and Paris 
We visited more than 20 cities in the South of France, Provence region.
We traveled more than 1,300 km by car. We met four French couples, visited both tourist spots and quietly corners of Provence and finished our trip visiting Paris. We made a video for us in Paris, which you can watch below.
We started our trip from Poland because Ryanair flies from Warsaw. We visited the Market square at last – pretty, but Lviv’s is better in our opinion)
You can’t do without a car. It ‘s very convenient to rent a car. This is our car – compact, but we didn’t complain, people drive simple cars in Europe, rather than jeeps, unless we saw many cabriolets and a dozen sports cars.
The first city – Marseille. A giant city, lots of cars, it’s impossible to find a free space on a parking lot. At first, it was difficult to figure out how to drive on their roads: unusually arranged traffic ways for cars, imperceptible turns, lots of one-way streets – despite the fact that we had a navigator.
As soon as we found a hotel (probably from the fifth attempt not to miss our turning), we hid the car in their paring lot and decided to take a walk.
We enjoy using Subway – it’s very comfortable and better than Ukrainian buses. Although we noticed that mostly French immigrants use Subway in Marseille and in Paris, very depressing aura – everybody is sad, tired, with red eyes), only a few people read books and looked well…
Another problem was with food – there are cafes at every corner, many people inside drinking beverages, or some cafes with ice cream or sweet pastry and fast food outlets. Nobody understands English. Later on, the French told us that they have cafes, where you can only order drinks and restaurants, where you can order food, but if you want to have a drink, then you should go to cafe. Fortunately, we found a supermarket and managed to buy some food. What the French can be proud of is cheese. As Romain said, there’s a different type of cheese for every new day in France, and there are 365 days in a year)
Marseille is the cultural capital of France, the same as Lviv is for us). There are many interesting modern museums; we were near one of them. It’s interesting to walk down the streets, but the city is dirty, lots of rubbish near cafes, “suspicious” people are walking in quiet streets … (they say that mafia controls garbage in Marseille and if there are disputes with the government, the city is simply not cleaned). There are many new French – immigrants (Arabs, Muslims, Moroccans..). Of course, we captured only the good with our lenses)
The next city – a resort, of course, smaller than Marseille. However, the same problems with parking lots, place on the beach.
Almost all motorways are to be paid for in France, – but it’s really cool to drive 130 km per hour, which many times speeds up travel time.
A cat came to us; he walked on the car, and wanted to come inside)
This is our first couple Nico et Nora. We had a wonderful evening with them. We bought a firewood-baked pizza prepared in a van. Their friends also came and we all sat up late, and they told us that the French do not have to learn other languages, because they live in France – and here everything is in French 🙂 Although they also have an opportunity to learn English at school.
Aix en provence. The next city – also known as Little Paris. Real estate is very expensive here, plenty of streets with boutiques, they sell many souvenirs, but everything is theirs – French, local.
We were very impressed with the French fountains – they are alive and goldfish swim there) The city –Salon en provence
Another great couple Romain et Sylvaine. We were treated to delicious food and, of course, the pride of France – cheese. They told us that France is not really a gastronomic country. They have a lot of fish, but there are no fish establishments with own fresh fish, and if there are, they are very expensive – and it’s a maritime country! Going here, we thought that we will eat our heads off with seafood, and there were fast food outlets every now and then with long queues. It’s good that’s not a problem to buy cheese)
Romain et Sylvaine pointed us towards an incredible place – De Camargue – this is a part of France, where they grow rice, extract salt, where there are flamingos and an incredibly large wild beach.
Camping cars come to this wild beach from all over the world and people live here, some make fenced yards, we even saw some bar counters). However, there is so much space that those few thousand people with cars are not noticeable on the very beach. And if you go further along the beach, you can remain alone at all. There’s always a strong breeze and you do not feel the scorching sun, as well as intense waves.
In the evening we visited one more city – one of three cities of the triangle (Saint Remy de Provence – Eygalierles – les Baux-de-Provence) – if you look at their location on the map. Romain et Sylvaine told us that very wealthy people live in these cities. We were lucky to come here during the holiday. They made fences in the city center, let the bulls in and everyone could tease them and run away. Fortunately, the bulls were not killed, but they injured people, and there was Ambulance onsite. And in the end everybody gathered together, sat side by side and sang songs with the musicians.
This road lead to someone’s villa) A great light there. In those districts there were simple road (not highways) planted with trees. So sometimes one can neglect time on the autobahn and ride down these avenues.
A typical Provencal town, there we took pictures of a French couple Thomas et Astrid, love story photo can be found here.
This town – number one for us) It’s the most beautiful!
We found an English menu and English-speaking waiters! and at least something from seafood!
Here we spent the night and then there was another celebration, from our cozy Provence balcony we could see the whole city and we enjoyed the fireworks for half an hour, it was very charming!
Morning for the French – means to sit in a cafe, drink espresso with a croissant or a baguette and jam. In Lviv, we are used to drinking Latte, while in France you can find this drink in rare cases.
Owners paint their windows and doors in different colors, it looks very cute, and you want to live having fun here. (these are not gray uniform “Khrushchovki”)
The second city the best for us, there are many tourists, but the city is unique because there something red is mined and therefore all the houses are red)
There’s no one in the streets, everybody is sitting in cafes)
On our way, we found these roses!
There are three large parking lots in the town 500 spaces each – and all occupied) A tiny bunch of lavender costs in various places ranging from 6 euros) A lot of soap is sold. It is produced just right in Provence.
There are bakery shops in France – they sell only baked products there. You can buy baguettes only in the morning, because later on no baguettes will be left. We didn’t see different kinds of bread, let alone black one. Only baguettes and in local markets you can find toast bread on the shelves. The French walk out of the stores with five baguettes). They eat baguettes with all food)
Another interesting town is located at the foot of hill, wherefrom a mountain stream flows with incredibly clear water. It rises from the depths of 360 m.
We arrived at 9 am, there was nobody there, we found a free space for the car, bought a baguette, ate it with jam and saw – invasion of tourists) All came to see where the river flows from, there emerged a parking attendant, who let the cars in the city for 4 euros)
A shoe store attracted tourists with a trail made of shoes)
This is incredibly beautiful place. It’s located in the Alps, people come here from everywhere, there are places for Camping cars as well. Parking and entrance is free of charge here. However, it’s extremely difficult to find a place for car as well! All these Balado twin-decks, boats and kayaks have a single tenant. Therefore, you have to stand in a very long queue to rent it. However, we didn’t want to wait and decided to come in the evening, when the main load of people would have already swam along the canyon and what’s more the sun would have been more tender.
We spent that time for swimming, sunbathing and went to the mountains along the canyon and climbed up 1000 m. The road is narrow, over a cliff, but there are special places for stops to look down the canyon.
And voila. 5 P.M. – three people in a queue. We took a Balado for 12 euros per 1 hour and sailed.
People took not quite a little puppy in kayak with them) the dog kept spinning and would get out of the boat 🙂
And the Italians one by one jumped from the mountain in the spaces between the Balados and the boats.
On the way to the next town, we saw lavender fields. There’s plenty of them in those regions.
Here we met another French Claire et Christophe. They told us many interesting things and recommended us where should we go and what is worth seeing.
This town is located at the seaside. Water and a variety of marine life reigned here hundreds or thousands of years ago. Their remains are now visible on this wall – the bottom of the sea)
This road goes through another canyon where stones are hanging over you, we were lucky that the road was open, because it is often closed in view of the danger.
We returned the car, and got the train to Paris. Distance is about 600 km and 3 hours to go at the speed of 300 km/h. A double-decker train, fancy toilet, water in the toilet bowl matches the color of seats – blue 🙂
Paris! We took only several pictures, here we decided to make a video the one you saw at the beginning.
Our impression and impression of native French about Paris. Whomever we ask – yes, Paris is beautiful, but nobody wants to live there and the majority doesn’t like Parisians either. It is home to a greater number of immigrants – Arabs, Muslims and other people than the very native Parisians. And the French do not like newcomers, because they have to pay for their stay here since such is the law. Traders are getting to you suggesting to buy the Eiffel Tower keychain or other Chinese junk. It’s a little scary to walk in the streets in the evening, because of suspicious people, especially not in the tourist streets because their own laws and people reign there. We were lucky to go in the Subway with professional cameras and leave safe and sound).
However, Paris is a beautiful city from with the height of the Montparnasse tower!
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