Discover Uzès

Territoire in Castillon-du-Gard (3/3)

Visit Castillon, near Uzès, and meet some of its craftspeople:

Territoire à Castillon du Gard - Partie 3... par TVSud

Territoire in St-Quentin-La-Poterie (1/3)

A TV visit of St Quentin La Poterie, near Uzès:

Territoire à Saint Quentin La Poterie - Partie 1... par TVSud

Alerte Orange: Uzège and the Cévennes storms

Today the French met service has issued an "alerte orange" equivalent to a "flash flood warning" for the Gard department. Here is what you need to know about these typical local storms. 

Languedoc enjoys a dry climate for most of the year, but it is punctuated by occasional monsoon-like heavy rainfalls, known as Cevenol storms (Cevennes storms), which can dump large quantities of water in a very short space of time on the southern slopes of the Cévennes, causing major flooding of rivers such as the Gard or the Herault. This happens most often in late summer and early autumn when warm wet air comes in of the Mediterranean. Located to the South of the Cévennes mountain range, the Uzège is exposed to those "flash floods."

Discover St-Marcel-de-Careiret

Next to Sabran, about 20 km North of Uzès, another really cute Provençal village: St-Marcel-de-Careiret (click here for Google Maps), pop. 700.

Discover Sabran

Last week-end, I visited Sabran (population: 1,800), a village 20 km north of Uzès - made up of 8 different hamlets. Vineyards, hills, a huge territory - with the southern part turned towards Uzès, via St Marcel de Carereit, and on the other side, nice views over the Mont Ventoux.

Lilac and butterflies

Spring is here. This morning, at the Mas Mathieu in Montaren, near Uzès:

Peta's adventures in Uzège and Languedoc

I was looking for a well fimed, well researched documentary about Uzège and our part of the South of France. Thanks to Peta Mathias, we're about to enjoy 6 full hours ot it! I cant wait to see the real thing. Until then, here's a trailer:

Discover Montaren

Found on Midisun's website (Midisun is a house in the village available for holiday rentals) : "Montaren is a small medieval circular village centred around a chateau, just off route D981 from Uzes to Ales. A busy bakers shop is central to the village. It opens every day except Monday, offering a selection of bread and pastries. Good, inexpensive wine is produced from the local vineyards and is sold at the Montaren cave on the edge of the village. An annual village fete takes place during the first weekend of July.

Take time to walk around the village, it has many hidden places. For keen walkers, follow the track past the cemetary and up the hill to the Carcarie. There is a good view and it is possible to walk down the other side to our sister village St Medier or loop back into Montaren."

Sunset in St-Victor-des-Oules

On Adam Aitken's blog:

"St-Victor-des-Oules (pop. 250) is a little obscure to everyone but those who live near Uzes (6 kilometers away), the main town in this part of France. But St-Victor was once well known as a place to mine clay for ceramics. Now it boasts a three-star chateau, a telephone booth, a church constructed in the time of Louis the 14th, but not a single shop. It does however have the incomparable Monsieur Ratz, an eminent historian of the village who specialises in archaeology. On the weekend of Patrimoins, when all of France celebrates its historical ruins and treasures, the graceful professor gives informal lectures to the tourists, and opens his house to show the objects he has collected over the years, - ploughs and other farming implements."

Spanning the centuries

Centuries of settlers have left their stamp on Gard, making it a diverse and delightful place to visit, as Eleanor O’Kane discovers during an autumn visit she describes in Living France.

It’s not surprising the stone slabs of the Pont du Gard are the golden colour of just-baked bread; they’ve been toasting in the heat of the Mediterranean sun for a staggering 1,000 years. Rising to a height of 48 metres above the River Gardon, whose inky blue waters flow between the six arches of its first tier, this majestic bridge is one of those monuments, like the pyramids of Egypt, that become more impressive the more you learn about its construction. A UNESCO World Heritage monument, the stones that form this mortar-free bridge have been standing firm for centuries with nothing other than the ingenuity of Roman engineering holding them tight.

The Romans first passed through Gard in 118 BC during the construction of the first Roman road built in Gaul, the Via Domitia, which linked Italy to Spain. It was built over an existing road that, legend has it, was used by Hercules and Hannibal. Stretching from Italy, across the Alps and into modern-day Briançon in Haute-Alpes, across southern France to Perpignan then over the border into Spain, it facilitated the movement of the Emperor’s army and helped general communication across the Roman Empire. Less than 100 years later, a settlement was established in what is now Nîmes, capital of Gard, which became a thriving Roman town called Nemausus.

Civilised Roman towns required a great deal of water to feed their mansions, bath houses and public fountains and around their empire, the Romans constructed around 50 aqueducts to transport the water that was so key to their daily needs, including the aqueduct of Nîmes, which was built during 40-60 AD. The Pont du Gard is the most visible and impressive section of the 50-km-long aqueduct, a system of bridges, tunnels and pipes that carried 20 million gallons of clean water to Nemausus daily.