Day 38 - Thursday 19th October - Cruise

The ship sailed out of Avignon while we were asleep and we woke up in Tarascon. A bit sad because it's our last port.  Up for an early start for an 8.30 excursion departure. Sadly we're not in a picturesque spot in this port. We're just out of town and no views. Anyway we hopped on our buses and drove for 1.5 hours to another picturesque village called Aigues-Mortes. The countryside wasn't pretty at all. It was grey, flat, rocky and no pretty villages. It probably didn't help that it was a cloudy day. We got to Aigues-Mortes which was once an important harbour with a fortress from the crusaders' time. We didn't have a good view of the perfectly preserved city walls and towers because a fun fair  was setting up for the school holiday period starting the following week,  right in front of the gates to the town. We walked through the main street as this sleepy little town was just waking up at 10am with a few shops starting to open. Our guide took us to the little church with unusual and unattractive modern stained glass windows and the main square and that was about all there was to this town. We could have walked right around the top of the town walks but once you start, you can't turn back. Given my sore feet and the few rain drops we decided not to go. Instead we wandered around a few of the streets, bought some chocolates and then went to a cafe for a cup of coffee. On the way back to our meeting point we passed a shoe shop that had opened and John tried on and bought a nice pair of leather summer sandals which are made in Spain. Then we piled onto the bus for our 1.5 hour drive back. Back in time for lunch and then we had a free afternoon. John and I decided to take a couple of the bikes available on the ship out for a spin. They've got new e-bikes sinDay 38 thurs 19 oct cruise The ship sailed out of Avignon while we were asleep and we woke up in Tarascon. A bit sad because it's our last port.  Up for an early start for an 8.30 excursion departure. Sadly we're not in a picturesque spot in this port. We're just out of town and no views. Anyway we hopped on our buses and drove for 1.5 hours to another picturesque village called Aigues-Mortes. The countryside wasn't pretty at all. It was grey, flat, rocky and no pretty villages. It probably didn't help that it was a cloudy day. We got to Aigues-Mortes which was once an important harbour with a fortress from the crusaders' time. We didn't have a good view of the perfectly preserved city walls and towers because a fun fair  was setting up for the school holiday period starting the following week,  right in front of the gears to the town. We walked through the main street as this slept little town was just waking up at 10am with a few shops starting to open. Our guide took us to the little church with unusual and unattractive modern stained glass windows and the main square and that was about all there was to this town. We could have walked right around the top of the town walks but once you start, you can't turn back. Given my sore feet and the few rain drops we decided not to go. Instead we wandered around a few of the streets, bought some chocolates and then went to a cafe for a cup of coffee. On the way back to our meeting point we passed a shoe shop that had opened and John tried on and bought a nice pair of leather summer sandals which are made in Spain. Then we piled onto the bus for our 1.5 hour drive back. Back in time for lunch and then we had a free afternoon. John and I decided to take a couple of the bikes available on the ship out for a spin. They've got new e-bikes since our last cruise which are even better than the last. If the pedalling gets a bit hard you just increase the amount you want the bike to assist you and it takes over. It's  great!  Nicholas, the cruise director, suggested we cycle over the bridge to Beaucaire, the town on the other side of the river for a look around. We (I ) decided to ride on the footpath but had to go out onto the road for a short distance because the footpath just disappeared. We cycled past Tarascon's beautifully preserved castle and the statue of their mythical monster and over the bridge, stopping to take photos along the way. Beaucaire also had a castle which we could see at the top of a hill. We cycled to the base of the cliff it was built on and took photos looking up at it but didn't find the road to the top. We cycled around the quiet streets of the town which wasn't anything special so we made or way back to the bridge and left it to cycle around Tarascon. This was a much cleaner and prettier town with arches around every corner but also not much to see so after cycling under many arches and pulling over to let cars pass down the narrow little streets, we headed back to the ship. On the way back we cycled into the courtyard of the castle and had a look around but didn't go inside because there was nowhere to lock up the bikes on. That was enough for the day so we sat in the lounge, sipped cocktails, John read and I caught up on the blog. Then it was time to get ready for the Captain's Farewell Cocktails and then the Farewell Gala Dinner. Then we went back to the lounge for our usual after dinner drinks and dancing.