I'm starting to get the hang of Slowtravel again. No more trying to visit four or more villages each day. Even if they are only on a 30km loop, it can be tiring trying to allocate time in each village and keep moving to a schedule. From now on, we'll decide which of the villages or sites has the greatest allure and spend most of our time there. Maybe pass by the others for a photograph however unless there is something unique, no stopping.

Today really rammed the lesson home.

Ches had been overwhelmed by the perfume shops in the various duty free stores. Perfume was to be my birthday present to her. I had searched online trying to find somewhere in Provence where they might make a perfume to order. Grasse is regarded as the home of all the "parfumeur createurs" and is just too far away, not surprisingly in the mountains north of Nice and Monaco. Kathy sent me a link to a conversation at TripAdviser in which people had recommended L'Eau de Cassis in Cassis. We decided to give it a try and set out with no great expectations but prepared to give it a try, perhaps spend a little time there and then drive back to Silvacane Abbey (near Aix).

A leisurely breakfast when we fried our galettes that we had bought in Aix. We should have shared one however one each sustained us well till lunchtime. We didn't leave home till just before 10.00 for the 1.5 hour drive to Cassis.

Gudge and Richard, this is for you. The 12km drive from Bonnieux to Lourmarin starts with 2km driving up out of the village and across the top of the mountain. The road is about wide enough for two cars provided you're happy to loose your side mirror because you don't want to be the one to give up the middle of the road. You can also drive fast enough to satisfy any French driver following you. Then there is the 5km descent into the gorge. Galston Gorge on steroids. No section is straight for longer than 50m, so its 2nd gear all the way. Here you do frustrate the French who figure that accelerating for the first 30m of each stretch is obligatory. Once in the gorge, its 5km of road that is wide enough for 1.9/10s of a car, winds so tightly that on one bend I estimated it turns at least 300 degrees. Because its flat, the French want to overtake anyone doing less that 60kmph and I'm only capable of 55 at a real pinch. On the way out, I'm on the river side with a 1m high retaining wall, so only in danger of taking out Cheryl's side of the car. Last week she seriously considered sitting in the back seat behind me. On the return journey, I'm close to hitting the cliff face that rises vertically beside me and I cant see a thing around any bend. This is where I chicken out and break to crawl around the bend just in case there is oncoming traffic, cutting the corner as they love to do.

It;s a great way to get the adrenalin pouring out of your ears.

Everything after this is a breeze including a merge onto the motorway when a steel grey haired matron refuses to accelerate and merges at 70 onto a 130kmph motorway. You shoulda see the ducking and weaving of at least 6 cars trying overtake and undertake her before being mowed down by traffic already traveling at 130.

Then, just to make life difficult, the tool booths refused to accept our credit cards. You take a ticket on entering a toll road. When exiting, you choose from around 15 booths to pay. Some are automatic for those with e-tag, some just for credit cards and some just for cash. We chose credit card, tried all four of Cheryl's and all four of mine. Traffic behind had to back out of the lane. Press the button and wait for someone to come and take the cash and release the gate. OK, at the next one, it's E1.10 on entry because its the one that goes straight in to Cassis so no ticket required. Ches decides this is a good opportunity to get rid of her small change, so I'm trying to feed 1c and 2c coins into the slot. The machine is rejecting hem and I'm dropping every 2nd one trying to slide them from my palm to two fingers to insert. I'm too far from the machine anyway, so I open my door to reach further. I take my foot off the break to twist and reach further and the car starts to slowly roll forward. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I didn't say anything. Yeh right.

Once again Tom takes us in to town and tries to have us turn into a one way street. Fortuitously the way we do turn leads to a carpark.

It's barely 100m to the main street and square and another 200 to the harbour. It was love at first sight and the adoration at first smell.

We waled down to the harbour and out to the beach and beginning of the breakwater where the tourist info. office is located. With map in hand and the location of L'Eau de Cassis marked, it took us no time to begin the perfume adventure. Ches had anticipated that it could be quite lengthy and suggested I take a hike. I wanted to be part of it, so in we went. There was only one shop assistant and no other customers. He was young, smartly dressed ... Ches says "what do you expect, he is French"

Here's the really impressive thing, with limited English, he enquired whether Ches preferred floral, woody or fresh. Ches thought woody. He sprayed liberally onto a testing blotter, waved it vigorously and passed it to her to smell and explained the ingredients. To cut a long story short, and get to the funny bit quicker, he asked questions and narrowed it down to two other perfumes. From there he transferred to the floral end of the counter and zeroed in on Miss Cassis. Jackpot! Ches sprayed on her wrists and because she has found that some react against her skin, we decided to walk around for half an hour before deciding.

Half and hour later we returned to buy 100ml. One of Cheryl's all time favourite movies that she watches every Christmas is "Love Actually". I can't believe that this guy hasn't modeled himself on Rowan Atkinson. He produced a carry bag and shook it open with a flourish and placed it on the counter. He then selected a sheet of tissue paper, sprayed it four or so times and shook it, lay it on the counter, produced the perfume with a flourish and placed it in the center of the tissue paper, gathered the four corners above the box and lifted it into the carry bag. Taking the two red ribbons attached to either side of the carry bag, he extended them (with a flourish) and tied a bow before hand it over. It had to have been choreographed.

At this point, I went off to photograph the life out of the town and Ches went window and "real" shopping" I joined her is "real" shopping a little later and we ended up with some very smart summer gear and gifts.

We walked the waterfront restaurants and selected a sunny table out of the breeze that was freshening and ordered Moules & Frites. For an hour or so, we watched the passing parade, worked our way through massive bowls of mussels, the local Cassis wine (white) and finished with a shared crepe (sucre & citron). By this stage we had abandoned all thoughts of the abbey on the way home and spent the rest of the afternoon wandering the laneways and harbour. Very late in the peace, we decided to drive to the western headland to see the Calanque (very narrow inlet in the cliffs). Tom couldn't handle the road closures for street works in one of the wealthiest little enclaves in the region and when we tried it on foot, couldn't decide on which way to go. We abandoned the idea and decided for home as it was now close to 5.00 pm.

At this point I fess up to including a couple of photos that I didn't take. The first is of the Calanque and the second is of Montagne Sainte Victoire. As we were driving up the motorway this absolutely spectacular mountain range was spread out before us. For my part, it was one of the most spectacular natural wonders I have seen. Perhaps not on the scale of Uluru or the Grand Canyon, but beautiful enough for Cezanne to make it the subject of numerous paintings. From the motorway, the view is more spectacular than hundreds of photographs I have looked at on the internet. The great white mountain range extends from one horizon to the other directly in front of the motorway. No way to stop and photograph it.

By the time we arrived home the wind had blown up to 50kmph and we had to park in the bottom carpark because the market will set up in our carpark tomorrow morning. Almost blown off our feet as we walked up the wind tunnel streets to the apartment. When we met up with two Australian's on Friday, they told us that in several years living 3km away from Bonnieux, the past week had been the worst weather they had experienced. More of them later.