My beloved Arles

It was around seven years ago that I first discovered Arles. I was on a train from the Languedoc in south west France to the Cote D’Azur (The Riviera) in the south east to meet my brother at Cannes, where the annual film festival was in progress.

One of the stops along the way – not quite midway between was Arles.

Why did I recognise that name? Think Susan…and then it came to me: Arles has a strong connection to the famous, late eighteenth century, prolific and mentally-unstable Dutch painter, Vincent Van Gogh.

It was in Arles that the infamous ear-cutting incident occurred. The self-mutilation had been in response to a suspicion that fellow painter and housemate, Paul Gauguin, most famous for his Tahitian paintings (who only lived in Arles under sufferance as a favour to Van Gogh’s art dealer brother, Theo) was planning to leave.

As the train pulled out of the station, I made my mind up to return; to find out why Van Gogh chose Arles in which to live, even if only briefly…and I did…about a month later and I have been returning regularly to Arles ever since.

Arles is in Provence, southern France, 18 minutes by train from Avignon and 40 minutes from Marseille (20 minutes from Marseille Airport). It’s around three and a half hours by train from Paris, Barcelona and Nice.

What I found in Arles is a lively town steeped in layer after layer of rich history, tradition and culture that goes back to Gallo-Roman times and the years B.C..

Even so, Arles does not rest on its laurels – with such a rich, cultural history and landscape to draw on, it still continues to add more. There’s hardly a month goes by without a festival, a parade, or a major event taking place – sometimes the events are steeped in history, sometimes they are contemporary and other times they can be controversial (like the tradition of La Corrida – the Bullfight) – but they are always a glorious tapestry and celebration of life. Arles nourishes my soul…and not only me, it seems:

Five years ago, I cemented my commitment to Arles by buying a small stone house on the banks of the River Rhone – a river that defines one of the boundaries of the town. The house, typically Arlesian, is hundreds of years old and, in typical fashion, is compact and multi-storeyed.

It has a stone spiral staircase and the four storeys are divided by three sections of 15 steps apiece (quite a long climb from top to bottom). The stone walls crumble. It has no grounds but it does have a roof terrace overlooking the Rhone and splendid views over the Rhone from all of the front (most) rooms.

I try to spend four months of my year in Arles. I love life there. The town is aesthically charming with its ancient architecture and its pretty cobbled streets. It has many lively squares lined with café’s and bars whose tables spill into the square underneath sun umbrellas (this is Provence, after all) Here you will notice the traditional drinking of rosé (the local wine) and pastis (the local aniseed flavoured liquor) at the ‘aperitif hour’ especially, but heck, anytime is a good time in Arles.

Arles has two weekly markets, one of which runs for two kilometres along the main street on a Saturday morning. The produce is stunning. Provence is renowned for its vegetables and the quality and variety available is large and mouth-watering. But it doesn’t stop there: cheeses, poultry, meats (both cooked and raw), biscuits, cakes, bread…and that’s just the food section – there are also clothes, hardware, bedding, shoes, baskets and handbags – you name it.

Oh, and not forgetting fresh seafood, including the local ‘tellines’ a tiny shellfish similar to a pippie that is sublime cooked with garlic, parsley and white wine.

Most Saturdays I will traverse along this market from end to end buying my weekly provisions. The market begins very near to my place and by the time I get into the middle of town, I am ready to sit in the sun and have a coffee and croissant in one of the many cafés lining the route.

By lunchtime, I have finished my shopping and I stop at a local bistro to have a plate of oysters (that they have just bought in the markets and shucked to order) and a glass of rosé prior to returning home with my packages. It’s the most wonderful way to spend a Saturday morning. Whatever, I’ve forgotten on Saturday I can pick up at the smaller Wednesday market.

So, all this and Van Gogh too!  (By the way, I can point out my house on Van Gogh’s (arguably) most famous painting Starry Night over the Rhone.)

It has been almost 12 months to the day (as I write) that I last left Arles and I left amidst some of the worst unseasonal weather; winter had come early to Europe. There were violent storms that had brought down power lines and cut transport services and the early snow falls had cut off some villages in France and in neighbouring countries. There had been severe flooding in several places and Venice was devastated by them.

With all this happening I thought it was time to leave as I watched the Rhone rising (so far it has never flooded down where I live but it has come close.) I arrived back in Australia to devastating bushfires. It was as if mother nature was preparing us for what was to come with the global Covid-19 pandemic. 

And so, for the time being and until there is an effective vaccine for this insidious disease, I am here in Australia – but I miss Arles terribly and am sickened to read of the devastation and death this disease has caused in Europe with Australia getting off rather lightly in comparison. And here’s hoping that the last words of Vincent Van Gogh will not prove prophetic

NB – I have deliberately glossed over the details of the delights of Arles because I intend to write about them in more detail at another time.  Stay tuned.