In late June 2018, we flew from Lisbon to Marseille, and then collecting our rental car headed up to the north of the Gard Department, past Nimes and Ales, to the hamlet of Rochegude. Here our AirBNB sourced 400 year old farmhouse was waiting for us and a fantastic two weeks exploring that northern Gard countryside, up into the Ardeche and across to the Cotes du Rhône Villages.
More on the Ardeche and Cotes du Rhône Villages in separate travel blogs.
Barjac
Barjac was the nearest, biggest town to where we were staying in Rochegude . About a 20 minute drive took us to the fantastic Friday Market in Barjac, and it’s a very pretty town with a number of great restaurants – we sampled two – excellent!
Barjac also had a Tourist Office next to the market, with very helpful staff and some brilliant walking maps of the area which we used to great effect.
Our visit coincided with more Soccer World Cup action. In Barjac our two evening meal choices, just happened to also have big screen TV Soccer action – and great food!
So there we were, settled at an outdoor table, big screen TV ready for the Soccer, cooling fan and then it started to pour with rain!
The stone pathway and restaurant outdoors area turned rapidly into a river, water dripping onto the TV, “ quelle domage”! Undeterred , le Patron, ushered us and our food & wine indoors, set up the TV, cooling fan and an electric fly trap machine like one finds in some butchers. Not only was the food and wine excellent, we had an entertaining conversation , largely in French, with Le Patron about his lovely “ grandmother clock”.
Ceze River Valley – Rivière, Rochegude and surround
Our farmhouse accomodation was in Rochegude which is a little hamlet next to the village of Rivières. It’s a lovely rural area, farmland, hills, woodlands with wild boar that we saw signs of when out on our walks, and actually came across a family of, one evening returning from dinner in Barjac.
This area is in the Ceze River Valley and villages like Rochegude, Tharaux, St Jean de Maruejols et Aveyan, all within a few minutes of each other are built in the local limestone, full of character and wonderful to explore. A little further up the Ceze River Valley is the town of St Ambroix with the supermarkets we needed for our self catering, and more restaurants to watch the Soccer on big screen TV.
Rochegude and Rivières
We chose Rochegude as a centre to explore from, based on its location and the AirBNB accomodation we were looking for. We had family joining us on holiday, needed two full bathrooms and the farmhouse we found was perfect. A randonnee actually went right by the property and up the hillside behind, as keen walkers, a great bonus.
Our walks usually tend to be between 1 and 2 hours in length. France is so well set up for walkers and using the Walking Map from the Barjac Tourist Office we managed at least half a dozen different ones, usually well signposted, from the farmhouse.
The Ceze River Valley is clearly some distance from the sea, and our accomoddation did not come with a swimming pool. However after a morning of exploring the area, the Rochegude Bridge over the Ceze River became a wonderful place to bathe or to just lie back amongst the river pebbles with water running refreshingly over one. Bonelli eagles soared overhead in the clear blue sky and a gentle breeze stirring the trees.
Impressively the river water quality was regularly checked, with results posted by the bridge. We watched this in action one day, it certainly gave one confidence in the river being a super & clean place to bathe.
Tharaux
Tharaux was a ten minutes drive from the farmhouse. A little village perched above the Ceze Valley, with no visitor car access, meant parking in the valley below and having a great walk up through some woodland to the Church, a few houses and the view.
Saint Jean de Maruejols et Aveyran
Saint Jean was about half way from the farmhouse to Barjac, so a ten minute drive. The centre of the village was a block back off the main road, so the square and Church were a peaceful setting. The Tour l’Horloge is beautiful and impressive, standing above all other buildings.
In the square the only shop open was the boulangerie, with cakes and biscuits to die for. Saint Jean also had a little fruit and vegetable market on a Saturday and most usefully a tennis court that we hired through the Mairie Office on the Main Street.
Just outside Saint Jean we found a small Goats Farm, which not only sold a whole variety of goats cheeses and goats milk, but also kept free range chickens and turkeys. The farm shop sold all of these, and we were regular visitors , being very partial to goats milk and cheese. On a Friday and Saturday you could order a spit roasted chicken or turkey, and the aroma of the cooking that greeted you as you stepped out of your car – memorable!
St Ambroix & supermarkets
St Ambroix was our first Port of call, when we drove up from Marseille, as it had the nearest supermarkets in the area.
French supermarkets gave up providing plastic bags many years ago. So as we prefer to self cater, we always take a stout shopping bag and a soft sided frozen food bag as well on our travels. You can often get cardboard boxes in the supermarkets as well.
Some supermarkets require you to weigh fruit and vegetables, and to put price labels on them at the fruit and vegetable counters. Some do not. Intermarche seem to and Le Clerc seem not to. It’s something to watch out for, study other customers, or ask!
Many supermarket trolleys are kept outside in the car park and a 1 Euro coin will release them, and be reimbursed when trolley returned.
St Ambroix is a key crossing point on the Ceze. In July 2018, the river was tranquil, the sun shone and although we witnessed Belgium beating England at soccer, with a cafe full of Belgians – so perfect- a couple of months later the Ceze River Valley would see major flash flooding. The road we took a few times from St Ambroix to Rivières, past swimming spots , canoe rentals and camp sites, all disappeared under flood water.
Travels with My Wife 