This is the Palais des Papes (Palace of the Popes). In the 1300’s, the popes resided here. In the late 1300’s there were two popes, one in France and one in Italy, because Italy wanted the pope back, so they named their own. (picture)
Since we were going thru Avignon, we had some time to look around.
Getting to Pont du Gard (old Roman aqueduct) required a little work. Took the train from Arles to Avignon (15 min), then an intercity bus near to Pont du Gard (45 min), then after visiting the site, another bus to Nimes (45 min), then a train back to Arles (25 min). The bus lets you off about a 10 minute walk to the site. When I planned the trip, I had downloaded the bus schedules. Sometime after we left home, they changed all the bus numbers, the 169 became the A15. The times changed by a couple of minutes too.
A Roman arena from 2000 years ago, still in use today as an arena for the ‘bullgames’, which require the bull fighter to remove a ribbon from the bulls horns. (picture)
