France - Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur - 04 Alpes-de-Haute-Provence - Mapcard

A map of Les Hautes Alpes or Alpes-de-Haute-Provence.

Sent by Aubert, a postcrosser from France.

This is from Wikipedia : Alpes-de-Haute-Provence (French pronunciation: [alp.də.ot.pʁɔ.vɑ̃s]; Occitan: Aups d'Auta Provença) is a French department in the south of France, it was formerly part of the province of Provence.

Nord-de-Provence was one of the 83 original departments created during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790. It was renamed Haute-Provence and Basses-Alpes.

On 12 August 1793, the department of Vaucluse was created from parts of the departments of Bouches-du-Rhône, Drôme, and Basses-Alpes. Basses-Alpes lost the canton of Sault to Vaucluse at this point. Seventeen years later, in 1810, the canton of Barcillonnette was transferred over to Hautes-Alpes.

On 13 April 1970, the department of Basses-Alpes was renamed Alpes-de-Haute-Provence.

Alpes-de-Haute-Provence is a mountainous region with peaks over 10,000 feet (3,000 m) close to the Italian border. The climate is very dry and arid but irrigation allows for a prosperous fruit-growing industry.

It is surrounded by the French departments of Hautes-Alpes, Alpes-Maritimes, Var, Vaucluse, and Drôme, as well as Italy.

Rivers include: Durance, Verdon, Bléone, Ubaye, Var, Buëch, Jabron, Largue.

France - Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur - 84 Vaucluse - Avignon

FRANCE
View of Avignon.

Sent by Thérèse, a postcrosser from France.

This is from Wikipedia : Avignon (French pronunciation: [aviɲɔ̃]; Provençal: Avinhon in classical norm or Avignoun in Mistralian norm) is a commune in the Vaucluse department in southeastern France.

The city is well known for its Palais des Papes (Palace of the Popes), where several popes and antipopes lived from the early 14th to early 15th centuries.

Avignon is situated on the left bank of the Rhône, a few kilometres above its confluence with the Durance, about 580 km (360.4 mi) south-east of Paris, 229 km (142.3 mi) south of Lyon and 85 km (52.8 mi) north-north-west of Marseille. Its coordinates are 43°57′N 4°50′E / 43.95°N 4.833°E / 43.95; 4.833. Avignon occupies a large oval-shaped area, not fully populated and covered in great part by parks and gardens.

Avignon has a Mediterranean climate characterised by relatively dry summers and cool, damp winters. The city is often subject to windy weather; the strongest wind is the mistral. The popular proverb is, however, somewhat exaggerated, Avenie ventosa, sine vento venenosa, cum vento fastidiosa (windy Avignon, pest-ridden when there is no wind, wind-pestered when there is)

France - Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur - Luberon

Tourisme en Luberon
Ansouis, Bonnieux - Lacoste - Saignon - Oppède Le Vieux - Apt - Ménerbes - Mirabeau - Lourmarin - Cucuron - Pertuis - La Tour d'Aigues

Sent by Louise, a postcrosser from the south of France.

This is from Wikipedia : The Luberon or Luberon Massif (Provençal Occitan: Leberon in classical norm or Leberoun in Mistralian norm) has a maximum altitude of 1,256 m and an area of about 600 km². It is composed of three mountain ranges: (from west to east) the Little Luberon, the Big Luberon and the Oriental Luberon, lying in the middle of Provence in the far south of France. The valley between them contains a number of towns and villages as well as agricultural land.

The total number of inhabitants varies greatly between winter and summer, due to a massive influx of tourists during the warm season.

It is a favourite destination for French high society and British and American visitors because of the pleasant and picturesque towns and villages, comfortable way of life, agricultural wealth, historical and cultural associations (e.g. Samuel Beckett lived in Roussillon during World War II), and hiking trails.

In the 1970s, people came from all over France to "Le Luberon" in search of a communitarian ideal.

The Force de frappe or French strategic nuclear arsenal used to be nearby, underground, on "Le plateau d'Albion" before being dismantled in the late 1980s. Now, the underground site, where the control of the missiles was, is a public multidisciplinary laboratory of the University of Nice Sophia Antipolis, the Low-Noise Underground Laboratory of Rustrel - Pays d'Apt (http://lsbb.unice.fr).

In the last two decades the Luberon has become known in the English-speaking world especially through a series of books by British author Peter Mayle chronicling his life as an expatriate settled in the Luberon village of Ménerbes. One of Mayle's books was made into a film A Good Year (2006) directed by Ridley Scott, starring Russell Crowe and filmed in the region.

France - Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur - 13 Bouches-du-Rhône - Saint Sauveur Cathedral

Saint Sauveur Cathedral.

Sent by Guillaume, a postcrosser from Le Puy-Sainte-Réparade in France.

This is from Wikipedia : Aix Cathedral (Cathédrale Saint-Sauveur d'Aix) in Aix-en-Provence in southern France is a Roman Catholic cathedral and the seat of the Archbishop of Aix. It is built on the site of the 1st century Roman forum of Aix. Built and re-built from the 12th until the 19th century, it includes Romanesque, Gothic and Neo-Gothic elements, as well as Roman columns and parts of the baptistery from a 6th century Christian church. It is a national monument of France.