The Romans Were Everywhere.....

Glanum. Bill  loves doing panoramas.

......and they left a lot of things behind.  In France, everywhere you turn, there's something the Romans built.  A lot of the time, it was built on what the Greeks had left.  Glanum is such a place.  A thriving town under the Greeks, it was expanded by the Romans.  The town was under several feet of dirt when excavations started in the late 1800.  They knew to start looking here because of the Mauseleum and Arc de Triomphe, they were right out in plain sight.  In the 1700's they replaced the roof on the Arc.  They weren't sure what it was, but knew it should be saved from further deterioration.

The Mausoleum de Jouls built in 400 AD.

Arc de Triomphe built in 4 BC.

VanGogh's painting with the two holes in the rock was done where Glanum now is uncovered.  He wouldn't recognize the place, except the two holes are still in the rock. 

The main street in Glanum leading toward the Forum.

A portion of the temple that has been restored.

The rock with two holes, when Van Gogh painted it there were olive trees in the foreground, now there is archaeological site of Glanum.

We really enjoyed the visit to Glanum, except the part where a wasp bit me on the arm, for no good reason.  We of course, killed him dead, then ground his little wasp body in the dirt.  Ouch, that hurt!

The aquaduc spans the River Sorgue.  The part that carried the water is on the very top and originally was covered.  The rest of the span was to hold up the water and allow for the correct height and angle for the flow.

A little closer to Nimes, there is Pont du Gard, the remains of an aquaduc that carried water to Nimes.  Built in 19BC it carried 20,000 cubic meters (1,020,000 gallons) of water per day.  It ran 50 km and was in use for 1000 years, 500 of it without maintnance.  The aquaduc has survived in near intact condition.  The bridge attached has always been use, but was rebuilt in 1829 by local stonemasons who left their marks for posterity.

To get an idea of how tall this is, make the picture larger and you will see people walking across the bridge.

There were several tour buses on the day we visited.  Most were English, but there were a few Americans, including a man from Tucson.  I think he saw my MMM cap, which has Southern Arizona RoadRunners, embroidered on the back.  He was having a fun trip, too.

Both of us in the same picture, amazing.