The title of today's entry doesn't really tell it like it was. We had booked for lunch at La Closerie at Ansois; a 1 Michelin star restaurant. It's half an hour away via our usual gorge drive. Always a good experience, and I am getting faster.

We pottered around this morning and set out at just after noon for the restaurant. I had anticipated that we would be finished by 2;00 or 2:30 and therefore had said to Ches that we would have to make L'Isle-sur-la Sorgue & Fontaine-de-Vaucluse part of the days schedule or we would never get to see them. Big ask after lunch and a half hour drive north. We'll see.

Lunch was lovely without being spectacular. Jenny had told us that when they ate there recently, most of the locals ordered the 29E set menu so they didn't feel guilty.
Lunch was lovely without being spectacular. Jenny had told us that when they ate there recently, most of the locals ordered the 29E set menu so they didn't feel guilty. When the Maitre d' explained the menu of Crab Roulade, Shrimp Risotto with new season Fava Beans and Lemon sorbet confection, we decided on that as well.

The portions were small but adequate, although the "Shrimp" were singular jumbo prawns. One each; Ches’s a third bigger than mine so that four small mouthfuls didn’t go a long way. Most tables were having the same menu as us, however tow tables, including 4 Americans had the major tasting menu. We were kept waiting longer between courses than everyone else. A table of two locals who knew the Maitre d’ arrived after us and finished and left before we were served our desert. Look, the food was fine although nothing so different that we would associate with other Michelin stared restaurants in France.

We left at 2;30 for the drive to L'Isle-sur-la Sorgue. As the name suggests, this is an “island city” (town) with the river Sorgue surrounding it and canals are cut through the narrow streets. There are dozens of the old water mills still turning for the benefit of tourism, but not to generate the energy to drive any of the old industries of silk and paper making.

Back in 2005 when we stayed at Sancerre, we had visited a town that also featured canals in and around the medieval centre. It had been a great disappointment, but not L'Isle-sur-la Sorgue. Even at this time of the year without any leaves on the trees, it was still very pretty along the banks of the river with the café’s well patronised by tourists.

We actually walked through the town and across to the other side which must be the residential side of town. It’s probably not much more than 700 metres or so from one side of town to the other. I’m taking about the old town contained by the river which splits and runs around both sides, re-joining down river. Here on the far side was a mother and daughter feeding the ducks from one of the bridges. They had a large paper flour sack, the kind used by the boulangeries, with bread already torn into pieces.

We walked on a couple of hundred metres where we saw men playing Petanque or Boules on the other side of the river (only 20m wide). We watched the last two players. The first used his two balls to cleanly lob onto the opposition balls near the cochonnet ("piglet") or jack and move them well away. The final player put both of his near the jack and won the game. I got the feeling these guys played a lot.

Back up the river, little miss was following the ducks downstream still feeding them the bread. All the ducks we have seen in France and here as well are in pairs. Here there were three pairs, paddling like mad to stay stationary against the flow of water but drifting down nonetheless. Had she only known how much power she had; she could have stayed stationary up river and the ducks would have worked harder to stay with her.

In the middle of town is the church (Collegiate church Notre Dame des Anges) which dominates the town. The only other building of similar size is the Silver Tower. Here I have to resort to the net again:

L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue (L'Illa de Sòrga, L'Illa de Venissa in provençal dialect according to traditional norms or L'Ilo de Sorgo, L'Ilo de Venisso according to the "mistralienne" norms) was once called « L’Isle en Venaissin » because it was a real island in the middle of the swamps.

Historically L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue was a town of fishermen : from their flat-bottomed boats (the nego chin), they used to catch crayfish, trout, grayling or eels all year long. It was named "the Comtadine Venice" after construction by the Romans of the existing canal system surrounded by houses raised on piles as in Venice.


With the development of paddle wheels some of which are still preserved today, wheat mills were sprouting as early as the XIIth century, followed by the building of workshops for making wool and silk. The town then became one of the major wool production centers in Provence.

In the XIIIth century, the Tour d'Argent (Silver Tower) was buit by the Counts of Toulouse. In the XVIIth century the collegiate church of Notre-Dame-des-Anges was renovated on top of the XIIth century foundations, a gem of Baroque art at the center of the old town.

There may still be crayfish and certainly trout. When standing in the middle of town looking at a flat bottomed boat that was partially submerged in a narrow canal, a young boy passed on his bike with his fishing rod. He quietly said “bonjour” as he passed. Later, when leaving town we saw him and a dozen other people fishing in the big pond where the two arms of the river re-join below the town.

It was now 5.00 and the peak hour traffic for a little town was clogged. We still decided that as we were so close we should seek out the Fontaine-de-Vaucluse. This is the origin of the river Sorgue. This is the town that Tom had refused to take us too yesterday.

Surprisingly for so late in the day, the town was still packed and unfortunately two groups of very rowdy schoolkids made this tranquil river significantly less tranquil.

It’s a 2km walk up the river from the town, and the path is lined on one side with stand after stand of tourist “****”. The mountain cliff is sheer for a hundred metres or so above and at its base there is a largish pond. This is the source of the river. The water comes from an underground spring, deep below the mountain and despite sending mini submarines down, they have never located the source. For those who remember the famous Jacques Cousteau, even he couldn’t locate the source.

Today, the pond wasn’t overflowing into the river bed. The volume of water varies throughout the year. It did however enter the river around 100 or so metres back down where it erupted out of the rocks on the banks of the river. This really is a remarkable spring. As they say in the guidebooks, the river is created right out of the rocks, fully formed. Within 100 metres, it is a river. On average per year, 630 million m3 of water comes from this one spring, one of the biggest in the world.

We photographed and filmed. Well, I did.

This village of 600 inhabitants was once called Vaucluse or the closed valley (Vallis Clausa in Latin) and it gave its name to the French department of Vaucluse. Several trails indicate human occupation in the area since the neolithic era. Its spring has been the object of a major cult since Antiquity, and the Sorgue was used as a trade route by the Phoenicians of Massalia and later the Romans. Following some major discoveries from two cave dives by the SSFV, two archaeological sites under the protection of the SRA PACA has allowed more than 1600 antique coins from the first century BC to the 5th century AD to be brought back up to the surface. In the Middle Ages, a hermit supposedly lived in the spot.Eventually, he performed miracles that led to his being consecrated as Bishop of Cavaillon. His successor, Walcaudus, received the consent of the ruling counts of the area to settle monks there. A monastery was constructed, but was ruined by the 11th century. Clement, the Bishop of Cavaillon, ordered its reconstruction by Isarn, abbot of Sainte-Victoire. The poet Petrarch made it his preferred residence in the 14th century, writing "The illustrious source of the Sorgue, famous for itself long ago became even more famous by my long stay and my songs. " - Petrarch, Seniles, X, 2 .

The poet left in 1353 after his son's death. The village was razed shortly afterward by bandits, who withdrew at the sight of the intimidating episcopal seat (?). A museum stands on the spot of Petrarch's house today. Following this attack, the village and valley fell into oblivion. Thought of as a wild place, it was avoided through the 16th and 17th centuries. Vaucluse was again popularized by a duel between the famous Honoere Gabriel Riqueti and Louis-Francois de Galiffet. A letter published by Riqueti brought fame to the area again, and a column was built to honour Petrarch in the eighteenth century. In 1946, Jacques Cousteau and another diver were almost killed while searching for the bottom of the spring. An air compressor used to fill their tanks had taken in its own exhaust fumes and produced carbon monoxide - nearly killing them before they could return to the surface from a depth of approximately 100 meters.

We didn’t leave till 7.00 and Tom didn’t have any issues taking us home using main roads along the valley rather than over mountains and down gorges.