We are up early today. Actually we’ve been up early every day that we’ve been in Vienne due to the terrible internet connectivity at our hotel, La Pyramide. I really don’t want to give them a bad review because everyone seems like they are trying hard and are extremely likeable. But we have two complaints, the air conditioning is very feeble and the room is hot and the internet does not work except for a small window between 3 AM and 7 or 8 AM. We have told them the internet is not working four times and they just say sorry. I think they need to try to get it fixed. But we are leaving now and we all say au revoir with smiles and we depart.
We stop at a service area for breakfast. It is not like our 22 Euro per person breakfast at all. Just a roll and some coffee but totally adequate.
We plan on stopping in Orange and visiting their Roman theater and museum before heading to our next stay in St.-Remy-de-Provence hereafter known as SRDP.
We find the theater with no difficulty and rent the audio tour. It is a really fine Roman theater and the audio tour is excellent. We learn a lot. I am always surprised when John learns something new. I have peppered him with questions about the Wars of Religion, the Hundred Years War, Charlemagne, Viking invasions and a lot of other things and he always knows the answer. He’s like my own personal Google. But we learn about the House of Orange and the Protestants in this part of France and the Edict of Nantes and the revocation of the Edict through the audio guide.
The theater itself is the most impressive one we have seen so far. The seats are built into the side of a hill and the stage wall is over 100 feet high. Until the Christians took over and banned public frivolity it was the site of comedies and tragedies for hundreds of years.
There’s a lot of climbing up and down the steep steps but we manage slowly and neither of us fall down. At the top of the theater you are up really high.
The audio guide is really good and gives us a lot of interesting background about putting on plays in ancient Orange.
Before heading to the Museum we stop for lunch at a cafe across the street. It is much warmer now that we’ve headed south and we sit outdoors for lunch. We order the plat du jour.
After lunch we take a quick look around the museum.
We check into our little apartment for the next five days in Saint-Remy-de-Provence. We take a trip to the grocery store for supplies and chill out for the rest of the evening.
