Bucky the Tour Guide

As many of you know, I’m in a bit of a job-search mode these days. I considered entering the Bee Keeper vocation, but found it too smokey and in the summer you have to move all those hives around in search of flowers. So, when our dear friend Heidi Becker asked me to fill in for her to conduct an historical tour for a group of visiting students, I jumped to the task! Maybe this is my new career….

The deal was that Alton College in the UK was sending about fifteen high school students to Provence for a couple of weeks as part of a mutual exchange program with the Lycée Val de Durance in Pertuis. And, after a few emails with their French coordinator, I agreed to be a tour guide for St. Remy du Provence, St Paul de Mausole (a hospital famous for treating Vincent Van Gough)and the medieval city of Les Baux de Provence. So, on one of the coldest March days Provence had seen in decades, I met the tour bus at the Tourist Office parking lot in St. Remy and began our day. I had made a twenty maps of the town indicating in colored markers (thanks to Kathleen!) where the outdoor market stalls were located, the toilets (in yellow, of course) and our meeting place at the Marie.

So, when I got on the bus, I discovered there were about thirty students and half of them only spoke French. Now, I’ve gotten to the level where I can order food and get meds in French, but that’s about it. So the English speakers had to team up with their French counterparts for the duration and began with a short tour of St. Remy.

BRIEF SUMMARY OF SAINT REMY DU PROVENCE: It’s truly a beautiful small city and my favorite in the region. They have a big market on Wednesday and that’s usually where I get my coffee. The city dates back to the original inhabitants, the Celto-Ligurians (water people). The Greek and then Romans built on top of the original settlement a city that is now referred to as Glanum (see a future blog about Glanum). The 14th century town is surrounded by walls and still has the four original portes. The most notable resident is Nostradamus, known in ancient France as an outstanding physician and elsewhere in the world as prophet. St. Remy is also famous as an art center as being where Vincent Van Gough created many of his most famous paintings. The town was re-discovered by writer and friend to Parisian artists, Gertrude Stein and her partner Alice B Tolkis. Alice, who is famous for writing a Provencal cookbook that included the first documented recipe for hash brownies. After a good bit of shopping, I gathered up the students and we headed back to the bus for our trip up the road to St Paul de Mausole,

A BRIEF HISTORY OF ST PAUL’S: It was founded in 1080 as a monastery and got its name from the Mausoleum of Antiquities at the gates of Glanum about a hundred yards away. It was built away from the current town of St. Remy because back then the area where the town now resides was a swampy mess. It is still a hospital treating women with depression. It also still uses art therapy and we bought a patient’s work for our dining room.

Van Gough arrived at St. Paul’s on May 8, 1889 and stayed for 53 weeks. While a patient, he underwent various bizarre treatments but somehow completed 143 paintings, 100 drawings, some of his most famous. After he left St. Paul’s he headed north to a small town near Paris. There, he committed suicide. His brother, Theo lived only for six more months and is buried next to Vincent. After Theo’s death, his wife, Joanne burned all but 300 of Vincent’s paintings in her back yard. His real room is actually still in use, so St. Paul’s has a replica for tourists to see.
Note: Albert Schweitzer was also "hospitalized" here in 1917-18 for the remainder of WWI. He wasn't so much ill as German. He took advantage of his internment to write The Decay and the Restoration of Civilization and Civilization and Ethics, part of his philosophical study of civilization.
After a quick bag lunch, we boarded the bus and headed up the hills to Les Baux.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF LES BAUX: What you see in the Disney movies is the real thing here; a medieval city high on a jagged peak that once served as the fortress for the war lords who ruled Provence. It has funeral remains that go back 3000 years. The mineral, “Bauxite” gets its name from Les Baux as it was discovered in one of the many quarries that surround the town.

The town of Les Baux was first founded by Pons the Younger, a warlord who decided that the location would be a great place to dominate his friends and family. He claimed that Belchazzar, one of the Three Wise Men, as a descendant; so the town’s symbol is a 16-point star. Interestingly, there is a lack of Roman influence in the architecture here. The reason being that the Romans were all into settlements near water and roads and purposely avoided locations that could be subject to siege. Some smart guys there (except of course eating and drinking from lead utensils…)

The highlight of the tour is the ruins of a large castle that sits at the very top of the hill. It is in ruins because it was dismantled after a siege in 1630(they obviously didn’t consult the Romans.) The chief warlord at the time sided against King Louis XIII and, after a month-long siege, the town surrendered and had to pay a company from Marseilles to come and tear down most of the castle (I’m not kidding.)

After we descended the mountain, the kids and teachers boarded their bus to head back to Pertuis. They gave me 25 Euros, a bottle of wine and a postcard signed by everyone.

It was a great day, but I think I’ll continue to look for a real job.

Postcard from the kids!