Driving through the Tarn gorges in the rain doesn't make for good photos. It reminded me of Somerset and Cheddar, with limestone outcrops and adverts for farm produce. The roads were a bit more extreme though, winding round steep hills with a sheer drop on one side and nothing to stop the car from sliding off the road.

The photos would look so much better with a blue sky, but we didn't have one...it was windy, wet and only 8 degrees.

We arrived in Avignon and found a hotel in the old city. Rather a contrast between this one and last night's: this one is in an old building, we have a balcony overlooking the street whereas last night's was behind a bowling alley and we found our way back by the neon sign saying BOWLING EL BAR as the HOT bit was missing.

The city is a World Heritage site and is full of beautiful old buildings as it used to be the Papal city in the 1200s and so Italian banking families moved here to be close to the power centre. It was independent until after the French Revolution, to the annoyance of the French kings who kept trying to annexe it.

Sunday 21 April

Blue skies today made for better photos. The Popes' Palace was amazing, built in 12 something, so probably contemporary with the tower of London, it is huge, with beautiful vaulted ceilings and a number of wall paintings which survived its use as a prison and an Army barracks from the late 1800s until 1926. It was the biggest building site in Europe for 20 years, with craftsmen coming from all over to work there.

I sang on the bridge (video proof to be uploaded). There were originally 22 arches spanning the river Rhone, which was very wide and fast flowing but fairly shallow most of the time. It often flooded the city and also changed course frequently, building up islands then washing them away when the meltwater flowed from the Pyrenees. There are only 4 spans left, interestingly these were the first to be built, using the same principles used by the Romans at the Pont du Gard nearby. The other spans were built more quickly and were washed away, the last few as late as the 17th century.