Staying the weekend at the campsite on the outskirts of Lyon meant we all could be tourists for a while, exploring France’s second city which straddles the Saône and Rhone rivers which meet at Le Confluence.

Lyon has an efficient and low cost public transport network of buses, trams, metro, funiculars and suburban rail network. For just €8 you get 48hour access to go wherever you please on whichever mide takes your fancy. It makes one green with envy when one has to endure the fragmented, inefficient and costly transport system in the UK that Government policy regards as a money making enterprise for business.

Our two days were packed with wanderings around many parts of the central area of this attractive city. A short walk to a local bus stop meant that we could be in the city centre in about 30 minutes in a ‘bendy bus’.

The weather was sunny and pleasantly warm for our stay and we were able to use a “hop on hop off” tour bus to help with our orientation.

An interesting feature of the city is the wonderful collection of tromp l’oeil murals scattered about – one utilising a blank wall to depict famous Lyonnaise residents through time, and another ‘Le Mur Canuts’, which particularly caught our fancy. It was created by a local arts cooperative that was commissioned to brighten up the area.

A huge blank end wall of an apartment block was transformed into a typical streetscape of the area. Not only that, but several iterations of the mural over time incorporated new characters and activities into the scene, even with some characters having been depicted as aging a few years!

Here are a few other murals we came across!

The Vieux Ville was very attractive with many buildings dating from the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries. Attractive courtyards could be explored via narrow entrance passages, and the narrow streets were full of historic frontages and curiosities.

We explored the interior of the Cathedral, which, at the time of our visit, had an exhibition of some very expressive modern artworks of Christ’s Passion which were exhibited in the knave . We also enjoyed the stained glass, transmitting the powerful morning light.

The Basilica, reached by a funicular was pretty impressive on the outside, but we didn’t venture in since there appeared to be long queues at the entrance. Instead, we enjoyed the views across the city from the high vantage point on the plaza beside the Basilica.

Lyon, over the last decade or so, has transformed itself into a bit of a cultural hub. Taking advantage of a large area of derelict docklands, an area known as Le Confluence, a bit of a mini eco neighbourhood has been created, together with Le Musée Confluence (a sort of humankind/cultural/eco museum) with much bold architecture in evidence.

With an early start the following day to catch our early train to Torino, we had packed down our tent earlier in the day so that it could be stored in the motorhome alongside our tandem, sleeping bags and cooking equipment that Abi & Guy were looking after temporarily, whilst we continued our travels into Italy and Albania.

We slept soundly in their vehicle in the secondary sleeping area and managed to catch the early bus and tram connection to catch our train from Part Dieu Station to Torino.

Today we are on our way to Lyon, to meet up with Abi (Molly’s daughter) and Guy, her husband, who are living in France in Morzine, Haute Savoie.

This time however, we swap modes of transport and start the second phase of our journey without our tandem.

We cycled on return visit to Arles with our tandem to get to the station in good time to dismantle it ready to board the train to Lyon.

Our plan is to spend the weekend in Lyon, sightseeing, camping on a campsite on the outskirts of the city beside Abi & Guy’s motorhome.

We spent today in Arles, an attractive town south of Avignon. It was an easy level ride of around 10 miles from our campsite on our (temporarily) unladen tandem and, although it poured with rain just as we arrived (this time we had rain gear!), it soon cheered up to turn into a pleasantly warm day.

Arles is an historic town, with plenty of Roman structures and sites, and interesting medieval streets. It’s also a town very much associated with Van Goch, the Dutch painter who spent a few months here at around the turn of the 19th/20th century. He produced many works here but also, whilst here, suffered a breakdown, during which he notoriously cut off his ear.

We visited the Hôpital de Dieu where Van Goch spent some days following his breakdown. The pretty courtyard inside was the subject of one of his more popular paintings.

We paid a visit to the 12th –  14th centhry Cloître de St. Trophime and marvelled at the expressive detail in the world renowned carvings and sculptures which decorated the cloisters.

There are reminders of Van Goch’s works scattered around the town, many of which are marked by visual displays of his painting(s) in the setting in which they were created…. mostly still quite recognisable..

We explored a few examples of Arles’ Roman heritage including a theatre, huge amphitheatre and remains of Roman baths.

We enjoyed wandering around the old streets with its interesting doorways and attractive vistas.

We even visited a little gin distilliery installed by Jamie Baxter one of Molly’s Clerical Error friends, set in an old house with a beautiful courtyard to the rear.

After a happy day, on our ride back we were fortunate to come across a hare at close quarters. It stopped to study us before scampering off into the undergrowth. It was the first time either of us had seen a hare at such close quarters!

It has been a tradition since the 15th century that Gypsies from all parts of Europe and further afield come together, taking part in a pilgrimage to Les-Maries-de-la-Mer to celebrate their patron Saint Sara on 24th and 25th of May each year.

Originally, most came in their brightly painted traditional horse drawn carriages, but nowadays, caravans and motorhomes are used. There’s rather a nice piece of background to this occasion written by a blogger, Sara Aran, who lives in Gers and runs a company providing bespoke travel tours in southern France. You can find her article  by following this link to her website.

We pedalled the 23 miles to Les-Maries-de-la-Mer from our campsite in St. Gilles, following quiet backroads across typical Camargue scenery of rice paddies and shallow lakes, interspersed with  farms growing grapes for wine.

We passed an intriguing multi-storey stork’s nest that seemed to be shared with a range of different bird species, flitting in and out of crevices and holes.

Because we were following smaller roads we were able to take advantage of a free ferry service that crossed the “Petite Rhône” just before Saintes-Marie.

We were glad we were arriving at our destination ‘á velo’ since the Gendemerie were preventing any motor vehicles from entering the town on the outskirts.

Once there, we were greeted by throngs of people – lots of tourists like us, but also plenty of gypsy-like people who were obviously speaking various languages other than French.

Impromptu performances of guitarists and singers all around the town ( think music like the “Gypsy Kings”!) often prompted dancing adding to the general festive atmosphere.. commentators on the festival describe the feeling that Gypsies have in taking part as coming home to be amongst like minded friends.

The main objective of our journey was to witness the procession from the Church with the effigy of the black Santa Sara headed up by Camargue horsemen “Le Guardiens”.

There was a supposed schedule but inevitably, timing was a bit wayward;  eventually, after the reliquery was lowered from its niche high up in the church, and lots  prayers and blessings from the churchmen and congregation, the procession began…

It was quite a spectacle with crowds lining the streets and the horseman leading the effigy of Santa Sara, the patron Saint of travelling people.

As the afternoon drew to a close we saw ominous grey clouds on the horizon so we decided to start our journey back to the campsite by the most direct route we could identify. Sadly just a few miles in the rain started with a few heavy drops, then more persistently… and a significant headwind started to add to our discomfort. The weather forecast had predicted sunny weather with a low chance of rain late evening.. so we hadn’t taken our raingear with us…

Two drowned rats arrived at the campsite after an hour and a half of pedalling against driving rain which was not that warm.

Fortunately our campsite was close to the town centre, so after changing into warm and dry clothes, we were able to purchase a welcome eat-in meal in the warm at a Turkish takeaway with large greek style salads and two large portions of frites.

Our tandem provides a very convenient clothes drying facility for the few items we needed to dry

overnight ready for our journey. With the sun being quite strong and with decent temperatures it doesn’t take long to dry off our towels and washed cycling gear.

On the road again, we were headed toward Arles, most often known in association with Van Goch who stayed in the town for a few years whilst receiving treatment for his diagnosis of mental illness.

Most of the way we were hugging the coast, passing salt lakes and rice paddies, with our paths often lined by tall bamboo.

The coast is clearly a magnet for holiday makers, but there were some elegant examples of new builds with a very modern look to them.

These buildings were in La Grande Motte.

We enjoyed another beachside picnic next to a bar for our lunchtime refreshments, before continuing on our way.

We passed through/round Aigues Morte which had a very old and very impressive wall all around it. Sadly we didn’t have time to explore since we needed to get to our campsite before it got too late.

We were headed for somewhere close enough to be able to cycle to the great Gypsy gathering at Les Maries de la Mer. Sainte Gilles fitted the bill  with a little campsite tucked in behind the main street.

Miles travelled: 52 miles approx

Ascent: 625ft approx.

We started the day by following little roads from our campsite to take us onto the path beside the Canal du Midi which then took us down the flight of locks, along the aquaduct and away from Béziers.

The path towards the coast was surprisingly well surfaced so we kept a good pace to reach the Mediterranean at Marseillan Plage near Agde.

On the way,  we passed a very complicated piece of engineering, where the Canal  crossed a seasonal river.

The structures enabled the canal to be shut off completely when the river was in full flood. This meant the silt from the floodwater didn’t silt up and eventually block the canal.

Agde is where the canal flows into an étang  with Sete at the other end. Sete is supposed to be the end of the Canal du Midi, since it gives access to the sea..although we could locate as we passed Sete.

We enjoyed the feeling of achievement of crossing from the Atlantic to the Med, and celebrated with cool drinks at a beachside bar.

Then we paddled in the surprisingly cold feeling water. (our swimming kit and towels were buried deep in a pannier so swimming was off the menu even if it was a lovely warm sunny d

Beach picnic spot

From Marseillan we travelled along a lovely cycle path that ran along a thin spit of land with the Med on one side and a salt lake on the other.

Negotiating Sete was a bit of a trial, with lots of holidaymaker apartments and one way streets, that then led on to port infrastructure and the hgv’s and busy roads that go with it. We didn’t manage to find where the Canal met the Med, but it didn’t seem as though we didn’t miss much.

We passed lots of what appeared to be holiday residences as we travelled, which is not surprising really,  when you consider how close lovely sandy beaches are!

Beyond Sete we were then looking for campsites for an overnight stop… deceptively, we found ‘camping’ is a term that often only means motorhome stops… or banks of chalets with no room for tents in between.

Four attempts, after a long day’s cycling, eventually brought us to Vic-le-Gardiol and a small site just out of the village which, we noticed, had its very own flamingo pond!

Arriving after ‘Reception’ had closed we pitched our tent in a spare plot that, although level, had rather a lot of sharp feeling stones which made the groundsheet rather uncomfortable to sit on… fortunately our airbeds provided good cushioning!