Like it's straight out of a painting or something...

After spending the day in Avignon, we caught the train over to the famous Arles. Why famous, you ask? Well, mostly because of this guy:

His name is Vincent Van Gogh. Maybe you've heard of him? What's funny is that the whole time he lived in this city (1888-1889), painting a some-odd 200 paintings, everyone in town thought he was crazy and tried to get him put away. Think "crazy old Maurice" kind of thing. However, one-hundred and twenty or so years later, I think the residents of Arles are singing a different tune. They pretty much worship Van Gogh, and the entire city is a memorial to him and his paintings. I'm not complaining!

Arles also boasts a pretty extraordinary Roman history. Seriously cool. We ate dinner (I've been wanting a hamburger for a while now, and this one did not disappoint. AND, the salad tasted EXACTLY like dear Walan from New Cal's salad, so I was just in love) next to the biggest edifice in town: the old Roman arena. 

Check that out! They have been restoring it for a few years, which is why it's so white. 

We took a little stroll out by the bridge where Van Gogh probably spent a lot of time, seeing as how three of his paintings were inspired by this lovely view. 

It wasn't until we were on the bus on the way to Arles that I realized that it wasn't in this city that Van Gogh painted The Starry Night--as in, that super famous one. That was when he was in a mental institution in a city just on the other side of the hills. But still, this was where he painted Starry Night Over the Rhone, still a beautiful piece. We were kind of disappointed by the ugly boats and everything ruining the view. What WAS cool though, was the perfect view we had of the big dipper, which is a predominant image in the painting. 

Was our nighttime stroll to take in the view at the right time worth the hundreds of mosquito bites we walked away with? Still deciding.

Luckily the mosquitos didn't quite make it up as high as our room, so we were able to enjoy the view of that beautiful starry night from our balcony! All I had wanted out of a hotel room here. 

In the morning, we set out for the market. Super hungry. All we wanted was a pain au chocolat, and of course it took us like a half an hour to find one.

The guys at this candy stand were so sneaky, giving us free samples of all their candy. We couldn't resist!

How cute is this?

A lovely little courtyard...

That Van Gogh painted.

We made the long journey over to the ancient history museum, where we promptly sat down and watched this twenty minute video about an ancient barge that they found in the river and had to get out and restore. Pretty interesting, but the best part was that we got to sit down and enjoy the AC!

A cool model of the arena. Do you see how they even had removable shades back then? Crazy.

A floating bridge...

Crazy mosaics. 

See how there is a pattern underneath? It blew my mind.

My favorite picture of the whole day!

Painting of the yellow house where Van Gogh lived while he was here. The house isn't there anymore, but the one behind it (also in the painting) still is. I'm pretty sure people thought he was crazy because he only went out at night. That would explain why all of the buildings in his paintings are more yellow than they actually were--the glow from the gas lamps.

Jacqueline with a little Arlesian. 

A park that Van Gogh painted.

The Café at Night... (this building really was white, but Van Gogh, again, painted it yellow because of the gas lamps. The owners of the café painted it yellow so they could charge more money for drinks.)

The stairs up to the bridge that he painted.

We sat down on this bench (in the full-on burning hot sun) to eat our makeshift lunches. This cathedral is across from the city hall, so between the two we just saw one wedding party after the next. 

Then we cooled off a bit by heading underground into these "cryptoporticos." Basically there used to be a Roman forum here, but the land sloped a bit so they built these little arches to hold up part of it. Well, thousands of years passed and they just kind of got covered up so now they are underground. It's crazy! And it was crazy scary down there, because we were all alone and pretty sure that some psychopath was going to jump out at any second. 

The cathedral. Once again, Rick made us laugh when he pointed out the "chain gang doing a sad bunny-hop over the fires of hell." He sure earned his place as a famous travel guide. 

I missed Jacqueline doing the bull pose. 

At the old Roman theater. This also had to be uncovered and restored. 

During the middle ages, the stones from the theater were quarried and used to build the cathedral, in true crusade-style. Kind of sad that it's more like a rock cemetery now. 

Only two columns remain out of a 3-story stage wall with more than 100 columns. 

At the amphitheater/arena

View from the top of the arena:

I may or may not have had to sneak under a railing to get this picture...

I don't even feel bad. 

Before leaving town, we of course had to stop by the bridge once more.

Overall (do you like how I feel the need to recap on all of these cities. Yeah.), Arles was adorable. We loved all of it, from the enormous market to the Roman relics (especially because everything in the museum was actually found IN Arles--just makes it that much better) and all the Van Gogh "easels." I was glad that we made it one of our overnight trips!