ITINERARY

HAVRE to ROUEN, plenty of pretty Gothic -- I can't find our Restaurant de la Couronne listed; but it is close to if not in the Hotel de la Poste, near where Joan of Arc was burned.

ROUEN to DREUX to NOGENT-LE-ROTROU (via Chartres if you dread getting lost)
to CHATEUADUN to LA CHARITÉ.

Detour, if you like, if you have time: NOGENT to LE MANS, glamorous
cathedral, to TOURS and a chateau or two -- CHAMBORD, near Blois,
the grandest; CHENONCEAUX the prettiest, AMBOISE the most romantic,
and convenient -- to BOURGES, big cathedral and amusing house of
Jacques Coeur, Louis XI's banker -- to LA CHARITÉ.

LA CHARITÉ to CLAMECY to **VEZELAY** -- lovely pink-and-white-striped church on a hill where crusades assembled -- to SAULIEU (Hotel de la Poste, famous little place to eat yourself silly) to CHALON to BOURG. At Bourg, see the **église de Brou**: famed memorial to conjugal love, fantastic Renaissance architecture and ornament, really beautiful Renaissance sculpture; all my life I have wanted to see this and never have...

BOURG TO CHAMBERY TO GRENOBLE, first-rate provincial museum, with moderns, and then you arrive at MONESTIER

ITINERARY II

GRENOBLE to VALENCE to MONTELLAR (nougat for B.) to AVIGNON: whopping
and handsome but touristy Palace of the Popes, to SALON.

Detour, perfect day or so sightseeing, my first delight in France...
AVIGNON to PONT DE GARD, vast Roman bridge of balanced blocks of
stone, to NIMES, Roman arena in good condition and still in use;
the Jardin de la Fontaine, Roman swimming-pools (?) redesigned by
Le Notre; and one of the finest Roman temples anywhere, the Maison
Carrée, as big as a minute, honey-colored, dedicated to youth.

Somewhat further, if you like, CARCASSONNE, fortified mediaeval town as perfect as if Cecil de Mille had built it, via AIGUES-MORTES little woe-begone castle, still more ideally mediaeval.

From AIGUES-MORTES or from NIMES, to ST GILLES and ARLES:
great Romanesque church-facades with saints and beasts of
precious Roman marble heaped up like fruit on sideboards.
Or, from AIGUES-MORTES or ST GILLES, drive south across
the marchy Camargues where bull-fight bulls are bred and
pasture wild, to LES SAINTES MARIES DE LA MER, the gypsy
church, where Lazarus and Mary Salome and Mary Magdalen landed.
Or, south of AVIGNON, north of ARLES -- LES BAUX, strange
RenaissanceRuins on a hill like a skull, like Golgotha; and
St Remy, fine bits of Roman magnificence in a meadow,,,
Thence to SALON -- none of this is far...

SALON to AIX-EN-PROVINCE (Hotel Negre-Coste, in handsome Cours Mirabeau),
pretty, with charming museum, Ingres, etc, to BRIGNOLLES to ST RAPHAEL to
CANNES.