Marseille, France

After seeing Carcassonne, we continued to drive along the Mediterranean Sea to a small town near Marseille, which was called Bouc Bel Air.  Our hotel was pretty nice.  It looked like it was at an old estate.

We liked the set up of the rooms too.  We had a hard time finding the bathroom at first...

We again had a hard time finding a place to eat since it was getting late in the evening, but we did find a place.  We tried some pizza with a fried egg on it...?

The next morning, Tuesday April 30th, we drove out to Marseille, stopping of course at a patisserie for breakfast. : D  Our first stop was at a beautiful Byzantine church in the old town.

 The floor had so many beautiful mosaics!

 A model of the church

 Glenn's favorite part was the pigeons.  He loved chasing them wherever they were.  A sweet man was sitting near the entrance, feeding the birds with little crumbs of bread.  We enjoyed this moment with our "new friend" in France.

Here's our rental car...

 ...and here it is again driving through the narrow, narrow streets of Marseille.  We actually got somewhat stuck at one point.  We were trying to get out of the old town to get down to the dock.  Every turn we took brought us to a narrower street and only one way streets.  We got to one turn that was so sharp that we couldn't make it.  Instead of it being a regular turn, it turned into a 40-point turn. : D  We even got the help of some French ladies who told us to keep cranking the wheel one way and then the next.  After 5 minutes of so, we were finally out.

 We then parked in a parking garage near the docks and walked through a square with some painted animals.  Kind of random, but kind of fun too.

We then bought tickets to go on a boat ride out to see the the Bay of Marseille, the Frioul Islands, le Chateau d'If, and the National Park Calanques.  It was a bit chilly already and then with the water and the wind, it was kind of cold.  But it was a great way to see everything. 

It was so picturesque!  

The old fortress

 Chateau d'If--the French version of Alcatraz, and probably most remembered in The Count of Monte Cristo.  Pretty cool to see that!

 These cliffs were amazing.  They just came right out of the water.  It was incredible!

We passed several villages in each of the inlets-quaint little fishing villages.

We could see people all over, hiking on the cliffs.

 And coming back into the bay and the dock.

We really enjoyed the boat ride, the view and Marseille.  

The boat ride was longer than expected so we didn't have much time for anything else there.  We then continued on our way to Nice, France.