This part of France, (which is north of Montpellier), has tiny medieval villages where all the houses are built of stone.  There was a choice of several roads to take, one was a high road and one was a low road and we thought we were taking the low road but it turned out to be the high road.  But in the end they met together.  Our choice must have been the remotest of roads because we encountered no more than 10 vehicles in a 4 hour drive.  Most of the time we couldn’t go over 15-20 miles an hour because we were crossing the Cevenne mountain range on a narrow and winding road.  Towards the end of the drive it was pouring buckets.  It felt like we climbed much more than when we crossed the Alps from Italy into France.  We keep saying that we have to stop doing these hard drives and then it just happens anyway.

This is Anduze and just a short distance along the road on the right is La Bambouseraie de Prafrance, a huge exotic garden with the largest bamboo forest in Europe plus many other unique features.  We could not find a place to park in the small parking lot and definitely couldn’t park out on the narrow road.  Not seeing this garden is going to be one of my main regrets of this trip.

This was the largest town we passed through and I didn’t get the name other than it started with Saint. 

We saw quite a few villages high on the hillsides and you can’t imagine the even tinier roads that go to them.

It’s interesting that the houses, which would otherwise be so drab, have only their shutters painted (usually lavender, light blue or light pastel green).  This and the flowers add so much appeal.