The Laundry Adventure

We saw all of Arles, but let's get to the important thing. Laundry at the Speed Queen. Once again, for all I know we have this kind of laundromat in the US but I haven't walked into one in a while.

Nicole always over packs so she had lots of dirty clothes but she had sand in her suitcase from the delta and had also spilled sugar in it.  We decided to wash everything whether we're going to wear it again or not.

The clothes filled the bigger suitcase which Nicole rolled to Speed Queen.  It didn't look odd because most rentals are by the river and we see people all day rolling suitcases to walk to their airbnbs.

The coolest thing about these washers is they add detergent and softener automatically. No buying it or deciding how much detergent or softener to put in. Or, more importantly, what to buy. I'm convinced I once washed clothes in softener only. Laundry words are hard to decipher in other languages. 

The large washers cost 8 euros, the small cost 4. Small dryers cost 1 euro per 10 minutes and larger ones cost 2 euros for 15 minutes. You pay by machine number at a central machine. We used 1 large and 1 small. Then we sat around for an hour watching clothes spin.

These are self-explanatory:

Guidebooks say Arles is not a pretty town and that's true. There seems to be no renovation of the outsides of buildings but our apartment,  for example, has been renovated inside. The bathrooms are nicer than mine. The windows and balcony door block all sound when closed so I'm sure they've replaced the glass.

The old town is small. We walked to the biggest structure, the arena,  and found the rest of the tourist sites close by. The world heritage organization and the city is investing in its renovation. 

There are still a few bullfights held there. I read that they no longer kill bulls in Arles but I can't say for sure. I can't get a clear answer on what types of fights they have but the one coming soon is the kind where the matador has to remove "attributes" which are tassels and ribbons that were hung from the bulls' horns and head. He uses some type of hook to remove them.   Some bulls, as well as matadors,  become famous for their fighting skills. I imagine some matadors get gored but that wasn't in the article.

The antique theatre is in worse shape than the arena. There seems to be some renovation happening but it looks like they'll need to practically rebuild it since little of the original remains.

The highlight of Arles is all things relating to Van Gogh. The city has renovated the cafe he painted to its original design. (The food gets mostly bad reviews.) They have also dedicated a "space" to him that includes the garden he painted. The space was dedicated in 1989 but the garden was there long before that. 

Van Gogh painted 300 pictures when he was here. There are none in display. Instead, there are about 8 or 9 replicas next to the scene he painted.

The Van Gogh Cafe

The Van Gogh Garden and the painting of it

There are about 10 restaurants in an area we call restaurant row. Everyone eats outside. The two nights we've walked there, we've seen acrobats performing for tips. They're impressive.  Tonight, we were in a restaurant when a man who seemed American went up to the head waiter and told him to make the acrobats stop because they play music when they perform. The waiter said he had no control since these acrobats perform between restaurants,  not for them. The guy said "You're the boss. It's very loud." It wasn't and not nearly as loud as the noise we experienced listening to him yell at the waiter. At one point the guy said "No tranquillo."

  We spent the rest of the meal trying to figure out whether he's American.  A couple he was with seemed to be speaking Italian and his accent sounded British sometimes. The waiter walked by us and said disdainfully to another waiter, "Americans" but I'm not convinced that's true. I'm going with Canadian.

The waiter seemed to hate us from the moment we walked in which was unfair since Nicole didn't speak a word of English to him and I kept silent.

The food was great. I had mussels and Nicole had linguini with tuna and capers. And she charmed the waiter by the end of the meal, asking him questions about French. So far, it seems there's not a single menu in any language other than French. I think Provence has not prepared itself for all the English-speaking tourists. The online reviews of hotels, rentals, restaurants, etc. are mostly in French. I also think they don't care to prepare for English speakers.