Stunning. This aqueduct, the Pont du Gard had a drop of 12.83 meters over the 50-km length of the run between the spring that fed it (we tried to get there and couldn’t—private property) and the catchment in Nîmes. The Romans of Nemausus wanted more water, and this is how they got it.
By observation, we would note that single kayaks, like this, carried quiet people, but if the kayaks passed by in clusters, yikes!—the noise.
Châteauneuf-du-Pape is so named because the popes of Avignon came here back in the 1300s and developed grape-growing to have wine for their tables and to “share.” Now it is quite the wine center, with tasting places frequently encountered, both in town and along the feeder roads. The castle looming over town is a shell of its former self. The upper level has what look like machicolations that resemble those of the gothic Palais des Papes in Avignon.
5 October 2012 at 4:25 pm
Leslie says:
Did you know that “neuf” in that usage (like the Pont Neuf in Paris) means “new” and not “nine?” So, that makes it “the new castle of the Pope” which, of course, makes sense with the history.