April 18, 2026

It is hard to believe it our last full day on the second riverboat of the trip. It has been a great time, we love Uniworld, and we have met some great people. On this second ship there are primarily people from parts of the US but there are more other countries represented than on the first ship. Fun to meet new friends.

Our tour today was the walking tour of Arles. We have so enjoyed these tours because the guides have been excellent and we learn things that we wouldn’t know by going out on our own.

Today’s guide was Jeremie. He told us that Arles has a large amount of land, the largest in metropolitan France by area, but not so many inhabitants – about 50,000. The city dates back to the 7th century BC and features many Roman sites. Van Gogh moved here in 1888 so Jeremie had two albums of his paintings to help illustrate the work he did here.

Again, our weather was perfect so it was a pleasure to follow Jeremie through the streets of Arles and to hear about both the history of the city and the life and work of Van Gogh.

We saw the amphitheater, which was modeled after the Colosseum in Rome, but much smaller. The one in Rome held 50,000 spectators, this one held only 20,000. They still do bull fighting and bull racing in the arena as well as concerts and other performances.

Next to it is the Roman theater built in 12 BC during the reign of Caesar Augustus. Lots of renovations here.

Jeremie took us to the yellow house – Cafe de Nuit – which is still open and the same shade of yellow as it was when Van Gogh painted it.

Van Gogh paid tribute to the beauty of Arles in over 200 paintings including Starry Night Over the Rhône.

We had a previous lecture on Van Gogh and Jeremie told us some of the same information and added some additional stories about his tragic life.

Here are some of the other sites in the town.

We saw the hospital where Van Gogh was admitted after cutting off his left earlobe in December of 1888, the Espace Van Gogh. It was originally built in the 16th century as Arles main hospital and remained as such into the 20th century. He became friends with Paul Gauguin and they lived together until they had a falling out after 2 weeks. Gauguin was a very disciplined person and Van Gogh was not (and might have been bipolar) so their relationship didn’t last long and may have had a lot to do with why he cut his ear off.

There is a huge market in Arles on Saturday and a smaller one on Wednesday. So glad we were here on a Saturday! We spent over an hour wandering in the outdoor market which has everything from crafts to clothing to prepared foods to fruits, vegetables, meats and fish. I never saw so many kinds of olives as I did here. There are several walkways and hundreds of booths in an area that spans 2.5 kilometers (over 1.5 miles). Norm said it was the first time he got a broad sense of the cultures in France. It was very crowded and we were advised that there could be pickpockets but we didn’t encounter anything or even see any of that kind of activity even in the most crowded areas. We couldn’t even cover a third of the market.

After the market we headed back to the ship.

Well, sadly this will be our last dinner on board, we will pack this afternoon and we have a car coming to take us to Marseille at 9 AM tomorrow. The weather report is looking good and we will spend 3 days there before returning home.