Sainte Victoire Mountain

On Friday I went on a reconnaissance hike to the summit of the Sainte Victoire Mountain. While the Mistral winds were howling at close to 100km/h near Avignon -- at our home base -- the air was perfectly still near Aix en Provence, removed from the Rhône Valley corridor.

The cool winter air offers beautiful vistas while the lighting is perfect for picture taking...

On my way up the mountain I ran into these guys, without their shepherd:

 Turning around and looking at my starting point, a jagged dragon's spine of limestone in an otherwise flat Rhône Valley.  

The clear views extended all the way to the Alps: not a rare sight in the winter:

Above 700m in altitude and towards the summit (1000m) there was a light snow-cover, but not enough to stop my progression:

This is the second last of my reconnaissance hikes for our new self-guided walking holiday through the Calanques of Marseille/Cassis, and here, set beside the town of Aix-en-Provence, the Sainte Victoire Mountain:
Calanques of Marseille and the Sainte Victoire

A winter's walk behind Mont Ventoux.

 A reconnaissance walk took me behind Mont Ventoux, Provence's highest mountain. Below is Mont Ventoux seen from the north, at its steepest.

Beginning in the town of Savoillans: it was a cold one...

Charlotte came with for the reconnaissance: here she shows off her skills as a chamois.

Arriving at the perched village of Brantes, population 25...

the quintessential 2CV...

Yours truly...

The cobbled streets of Brantes...

Marjorie in Thailand

While the rest of us are plugging away at the office, our colleague Marjorie is in Thailand on a well-deserved vacation, and she's just sent us a picture of... what we believe is her... we're publishing it anyway (my apologies to whoever this is if it's not you, Marjorie!)