Voyages around France: Moustiers-Sainte-Marie

It's already been 2 weeks since we were in the village of Moustiers-Sainte-Marie which is almost a 2 hour drive from here. Definitely a tourist type of village with lots of shops and restaurants for the many who come to visit there.

A stream flowing from the cliffs above the village slices the town almost in half with a few waterfalls along the way. There are also lots of fountains large and small that you will find as you take a leisurely walk around town. Chains suspend a star above the town that was originally put there by a knight who promised he would place a star above the village after returning from captivity during the crusades.

Above the town is the Notre-Dame de Beauvoir chapel which was built in the 8th century and restored in the 12 and 16th centuries. I made the very steep walk to see the chapel up close which also gave me some great views of the village below and the surrounding countryside.

Last Friday night I had good intentions of getting some photos of the blue moon. However those good intentions were thwarted by clouds and very high winds. We were returning from Monteux when off to our left we could see that big fat moon on the eastern horizon. A quick trip with the camera and tripod to the hill above Vedene was made in about 5 minutes after that. In those 5 minutes clouds had completely covered the moon leaving me with nothing but darkness to photograph. When the moon appeared about a half an hour later I tried to take some photos with no success. The wind was blowing so hard that even with a tripod getting clear photos was impossible....I got some nice blurry ones though. :-)

Sunday we took a short drive to the town of Chateauneuf du Pape which is in big time wine country. I'll share our visit there and post some photos in my next entry.