Cézanne's Favorite Mountain, Sainte-Victoire

Yesterday we took a little hike up Sainte-Victoire, a mountain nearby Aix.  Cézanne lived here and he painted this mountain.

This is Alexis, my second cousin, before we left. No, we didn't go on the scooter...

This is Sainte-Victoire, our goal for the afternoon. 

We wanted to reach the cross at the top!

We had to cross this dam first before hiking up to the mountain. (See it in the background?) I was told that if this dam broke, all of Aix would be flooded.

There were two dams with the big one above and then a small pool with another one following it.

The lake behind the dam was an exquisite blue color.  Sainte-Victoire is in the distance to the right.

My traveling companions, Alexis and Yann, stopped to put on extra jackets to keep them warm in the driving wind. There is a wind here in the south called the Mistral, which is strong and cold and comes from the north. It was 100 km/hr yesterday!

It seemed so far away, but it took less than an hour to get most of the way there.

Is we walked, I had to keep running to keep up with Alexis and Yann since I stopped again and again to take one more photo of the beautiful view.

I love the little plants that grow in the rocky soil here.

There is a smaller mountain range that connects with Sainte-Victoire.  The easiest way to get up to the cross was to reach the top of the small mountain range and work our way over to the peak.  Yann and I finally reached the crest of the range, but we were forced to turn around and climb back down since the wind was so strong. I literally thought that I was going to be picked up and thrown off the mountain if I went any further.  To my surprise, it was a little difficult to even descend because the wind was pushing as back so strongly. That's my first experience with the Mistral in the south!

Before we descended I was able to take a picture of the lake on the other side of the mountain.

Here's proof that I made it up there. We'll be going back another time hopefully to actually go all the way to the cross.

Here you can see that we were not significantly lower in elevation than the cross. Without the wind, it wouldn't have been to hard to get over there.

On our way back down.

I wouldn't have minded sitting on that little bench to enjoy the view.

Me with Alexis....

...and me with Yann.

One last look at the lake before leaving. Until we meet again!