Nimes: Foie gras fried miles flowers and his glass of softness

We took an overnight train to Arles, hoping to save money by not having to get a hotel room. The seats weren't bad, since they were "super-reclining" and reasonably comfortable. But one of the guys behind us kept talking on his cellphone, and his cellphone kept ringing, and it had the most annoying ring tone ever, and people with the train kept coming to talk to him. They spoke in French, but Rowan told me that he was upset because he had rented a sleeper car and didn't get one.

He also had his little kid with him, and the kid was as annoying as his dad. He cried for about an hour when he got on a train, yowling in inhuman tones. Since he is a child, I can forgive this behavior. But he also kept playing with his Leapfrog® learning device at loud volume, even at one in the morning when all human children should be sleeping.

Also, one of the women behind us was one of the loudest snorers ever. I would say her snore resembled a train, but it even drowned out the sounds of the train.

We arrived in Arles at about five in the morning, thoroughly unrested. We quickly found out that the station was so small it did not have baggage storage lockers. We really wanted to see the town--workplace of Van Gogh and home to much Roman-style architecture--but we didn't know what to do with our stuff.

We decided to wait until the ticket counter opened to ask for advice. While we waited, we were joined by the friendliest, healthiest-looking stray dog I have ever met.When the counter opened, Rowan asked the girl in the ticket office if any place in town could store our bags. She said no. We decided to skip Arles and head to Nimes. I asked the girl at the counter for tickets: "Prochaine...a Nimes...por deux." She was very friendly, probably because I am so ruggedly handsome. She turned her screen so I could double check the train and price, and all was good.

Our hotel in Nimes was okay. It was in an excellent location, and the room was fine, but it had a somewhat terrifying elevator.

We checked out some of the sights, most of which are Roman architectural curiosities. One of the main attractions is a small coliseum, which they refer to as the Arena.
Another sight is a structure with a bunch of pillars. In its lifetime, the structure has been used as a courthouse, a monastery, a horse stable, and a place to store grain. It is now a museum and protected landmark.We also visited a large garden. While we were there, a gigantic boccie ball tournament was taking place. We watched a little bit of the tournament, but neither of us are boccie aficionados. Here is the park:
And here is Rowan at the top of a hill with the park behind her:While wandering around town, we stopped occasionally to look at the menus of some restaurants; almost every place has its menu posted outside so you can make an informed decision about where to eat.

One restaurant had the worst English translations I have ever seen. In addition to the one I've given in the title of this post, other dishes included:

• Plate freshness with believed ham of country, tomatoes mozzarella accompanied by its sorbet to the basil
• Salad of early product
• Plate surprised tasting of the Pallet
• Caquelon of melted with goat’s milk cheese, salad of the moment and its brioche bread with olives (they didn’t even bother translating some of the words, such as caquelon, which is, from what I can determine, a heavy saucepan)
• Small blank of brandade and its greedy salad with the balsamic vinegar (sometimes, they just put blank instead of translating; in this case, it was quite ironic since they blanked flan, which translates as flan, or custard; I have no idea what brandade is)
• Roulade of net of plate on its bed of tapenade
• Nut skewer of Jacques Saint marinated house minute
• Suggestion fish of the leader of Friday evening according to load
• Roulade of poultry to spinaches poelee with the aromatized calf juice
• Small stopper of the pallet to the rum furnished with the fruits with season

After much walking around, we had a restful night of sleep, and woke up rather late. We had a leisurely breakfast of crepes, and then headed to the train station.