Next stop was Buis les Baronnies in the Baronnies Provencales Natural Park. Nearby was this easy walkway along beside the River Ouvèze at the Gorge d'Ubrieux. The water was really milky as there had been recent rain.
The little town was rather cute and in Place du Marche the houses were built over this vaulted arcade which is different from any I've ever seen before.
From the outside they had these buttresses, which have been added at a later date. I read that adding another floor to the buildings necessitated reinforcing the arcades below. I don't know which floor/s they meant though! All the upper floors, or just some of them?
Up the other end from the above photo, the houses became very colourful. I love buildings painted in different colours like this. The following day the weekly market was held, with the food section here and all the way up a narrow street leading off from it, whereas the non food section was held in a car park nearby. It was a huge market for a small town and really good. I got a new handbag.... 😀
We encountered this cute ginger cat on our wanders. It reminds me of Harry, only a slimmer version!
A building next to the church, Notre Dame de Nazareth.
Notre Dame de Nazareth.
This is a building with cloister from the 16th century, Le Cloitre des Dominicains, which has been converted to appartments for holiday rent. There were paintings for sale on display in the cloisters, but they were really expensive.
I loved the courtyard and the beautiful olive tree.
The map below shows our first few places visited. I have left the map large like this so you have an idea of where we were in relation to Marseille, the Camargue, Avignon et al, if you know southern France at all that is!
This is going back to our autumn trip to Provence in September last year. We started where we left off on our previous Provencal holiday in June 2023, but it was so hot that day that we did not see everything that we wanted to.
So back we went to St Remy de Provence and the Roman ruins there called Glanum. I've already written about our last visit there so I'm not going to post many photos, just the ones we took from higher up on the scenic path with lovely views down over the site.
This juvenile Black Redstart hadn't learned to be fearful of humans yet, and perched quite close to us.
I missed this the last time - this is the spring/well of the Roman town. It has goldfish in it now! Poor creatures.
Our campsite was within walking distance of St Remy so the next morning we walked into the little town for a look around. It had the usual tourist shops and was quite pretty in places, but we preferred the neighbouring Les Baux de Provence whose village is up a hill with old ruins above, a place we visited years ago.
We did have a fabulous lunch - it's rare that I see swordfish on a menu. My steak was delicious!
We also visited the town of Vaison la Romaine, which as it's name suggests, has a lot of Roman ruins in it! I'm not going to bore you with loads of pictures of Roman ruins as I've posted plenty of them on other posts.
It's always great seeing mosaic floors, even though I am surprised that so many are left open to the elements.
This is the latrines!
You can see how these ruins are sited right in the middle of the town and are dotted about throughout it.
We also visited the museum and this is a mosaic floor which is more ornate with a peacock in the middle, and has been (somehow) moved inside. It has been restored and the text in front says that parts have been painted in in a trompe l'oeil effect (3D), though it is quite hard to tell what is original and what is not. It's not necessarily the lighter colour vs. the darker colour, as I can make out a painted part on the bottom right, which is dark.
Being interested in archaeology and Roman things we have decided to go to Italy this coming September to visit, amongst other non archaeological places, Herculaneum and Pompeii which we’ve seen a lot of on the TV in recent months. 😄
We saw a spot suitable for eating our packed lunch down by the stream so I managed to scramble down the bank to sit on the rocks (note my blow up cushion, which I take everywhere! I still can't sit on hard things).
This is a Lackey Moth (Malacosoma neustria) caterpillar.
This picture shows where glaciers were 25,000 years ago, and you can see where we walked - from the Bains (thermal baths) of Llo, up the river valley, then around and over the hill where St Feliu is marked, then a steep slope down to the top of the village. You'll need to click on the photo to see the details.
This Pink was very bright and pretty though I have no idea what it is as there are umpteen species of wild Dianthus in Europe.
Fragrant Orchid (Gymnadenia conopsea).
The view. There was the worst haze I have ever seen - there should be mountains across the valley there! Yet we were in lovely warm sunshine so apart from the lack of views, it didn't matter.
Possibly a Heath Spotted Orchid (Dactylorhiza maculata). It has spotty leaves.
Keith is very good at taking photos of me with my eyes closed! 😀
Broad-leaved Marsh Orchid (Dactylorhiza majalis)
My favourite flower of the day was this Black-eyed Heron's Bill (Erodium glandulosum). Erodiums are related to the Cranesbill Geraniums, but much smaller plants.
Houseleeks, one of the host plants of the Apollo butterfly, along with sedums. The one on the right and bottom is the Cobweb Houseleek (Sempervivum arachnoideum). The other one that is flowering I am not sure but could be the Common Houseleek (Sempervivum tectorum).
We decided not to hike up this steep hill to the remains of the chapel called St Feliu, which you can just see at the top. We wouldn't have had a better view up there due to the haze.
Another Fritillary that I can't ID. Without pictures of the underwings, Fritillaries are very difficult to ID. This might actually be the same species as the unknown one in the previous post.
Another photo by Keith - this time it's a Robber Fly with prey of Provence Orange Tip butterfly.
The only part of the walk that I didn't like was the very steep descent back to Llo, and I thank goodness that I had my alpine stick to help. I find steep slippery slopes terrifying - the last thing I want to do is land on my bum! 😱
We came out at the top of the village. I just love this kind of old rounded slate tile that is still seen here and there in old villages in the mountains.
Down at the bottom of the village with the old ruin of La Tour del Vacaro in view on a hillside.
Back to where we parked near the Thermal Baths. Our route started off to the right out of this picture.
Well what a day! Other species of butterfly seen but not photographed:
Speckled Wood
Provence Orange Tip
Orange Tip
Black Veined White
Large White
Comma
Spanish Gatekeeper
Brimstone
Cleopatra
Clouded Yellow
Painted Lady
Red Admiral
White Admiral (or Southern White Admiral)
Small Heath
Wood White
Total approx 26 species for the day. 💜 The good thing is that this place is only 2.5 hours from home, so I certainly want to come back again, though I would like to walk further along the paved road towards the refuge next time.
The next day we went home, via Villefranche de Conflent, another Vauban citadel not far from Mont Louis. I don't have any great photos from there so I am winding up this travelogue with a final photo of me with a very strangely presented chicken kebab!!!
I hope you have enjoyed coming along on our travels with us. Many thanks to those of you who comment and let me know, or like on facebook.
This was the last full day of our holiday, and it was perfect. So perfect, it made up for the not so good weather during the first couple of weeks, and the lack of interesting fauna and flora.
We headed to Llo, where I had read about a circular gorge walk that sounded interesting and just about the right length for me (about 7km/4 miles).
We followed a quiet paved road which lead uphill, but not steeply. In any event, there was so much stopping to look at the wildflowers and butterflies that the uphill wasn’t a problem!
The first butterfly I saw was this one below, one I’d never seen before. It was perched on one of its host plants, a Cranesbill Geranium. The sides of the road had lots of large flowered Cranesbills along it, not something I see very often in the wild.
Alpine Saxifrage (Saxifraga paniculata)
Geranium Argus butterfly (Eumedonia eumedon) * (a lifer!)
Either Common Spotted (Dactylorhiza maculata subsp. fuchsii) or Heath Spotted Orchid (Dactylorhiza maculata). I can’t tell the difference and as you will see, I saw many that are one or the other (or indeed, something else!). The ones where I took photos of the leaves had spotty leaves.
Queen of Spain Fritillary (Issoria lathonia)
All along the way we walked beside this mountain stream, the Segre.
Above and below: either Heath Spotted or Common Spotted Orchid (Dactylorhiza species)
Yet more lifers! I saw five on this day! Asterisk denotes a lifer.
Iberian Marbled White (Melanargia lachesis) *
Pearly Heath (Coenonympha arcania) *
Unknown Fritillary
Round-leaved Restharrow (Ononis rotundifolia). I thought this was a delightfully pretty plant.
Apollo (Parnassius apollo). This is the butterfly we have been longing to see for years. It’s not a lifer as we saw some in the Jura mountains above Geneva more than 20 years ago, but we weren't into photography much back then, and didn’t have a digital camera at that time, which helps i.e. taking loads of pics! There were tons of Apollos flying about along this road and up the gorge banks. 💜
These are Keith’s images, as mine were not so close up.
Heath Fritillary (Melitaea athalia).
Piedmont Ringlet (Erebia meolans) * This butterfly took a liking to K’s foot, and jumped onboard to drink some of his sweat!
Unknown Blue butterflies. I'm not sure if they are the same species though they look similar. Possibly Amanda's Blue?
Alpine Saxifrage (Saxifraga paniculata)
Below is the only building we came across, a farmhouse called Mas Patiras.
Large Wall Brown (Lasiommata maera) * Slightly larger and lighter than the regular Wall Brown.
We came to where we turned off the paved road at a bridge and looked around for somewhere around the stream to have our picnic lunch. The rest is in the next post.
Relief map showing the Cerdagne and the places that we went to. Not marked is Llivia and its hill, where we went in the last post, bottom left.
