Down on the Durance

And other water courses. It is hot hot hot but we can't stay in all the time. So today we broke out and zoomed to Mallemort on the Durance. Why? Ah well, just on the other side from Mallemort is the start of our new best friend, the Canal de Carpentras. It runs out of the Durance just by the EDF barrage.

 Rather an unprepossessing place in some ways. To find it we had to strike out down narrow unmarked lanes but we are map people so had no trouble. The canal itself runs alongside the main road from Cavaillon - full of water and quite wide at this early stage. But the poor old Durance is a much abused river. Like a permanent blood donor with pipes and canals draining off its life juices for water and power and irrigation.  All it has left are a few channels and weedy sandbanks! But it also provides a great haven for birds along the banks. A lot of the area is cultivated with cereal crops and market gardening. Melons galore!
Anyway we saw kestrels and kites, cormorant, heron, bee-eaters, woodpeckers and what we think is an African Roller. Bit like a jay but more blue. Adrian got a good picture of it sitting on the wire.

As we were in the area we went to Cucuron for lunch at the Bar. Very quiet in the town and some changes. The Hotel de l'Arbre de Mai has changed hands and is not so pretty but the road up to the church has been transformed with tubs of oleanders. Le Grenier looks like it has been sold. Sad... The étang itself is lovely as ever and full of carp of all sizes from minnow to Zeppelin.

Can't go to Cucuron without going to Vaugines. A sit by the church in the shade and a pilgrimage 

to the fountain. Posters advertising their annual soapbox trolley race that we witnessed all those years ago! I never noticed this odd street name before. Could it be where they house the pickers and packers?!

Finally back homewards via the big aqueduct over the canal at Fontaine de Vaucluse. It has been pointed out that I haven't got a photo of it from the bottom, but you all know what an aqueduct looks like - high bridge with arches over a road or river. Well done! Instead I offer you views from the top as we crossed it. 

It carries the canal of course.