Jean-Pierre Cassely

Let Secret Provence guide you around the unusual and unfamiliar. Step off the beaten track with this fascinating Provence guide book, now in its 3rd edition, and let our local experts show you the well-hidden treasures of this amazing region. Ideal for local inhabitants and curious travellers alike.The places included in our guides are unusual and unfamiliar, allowing one to step off the beaten track. Secret Provence features 230 secret and unusual locations. Discover a statue of a pregnant Virgin Mary, an astronomical observatory in a former nuclear missile silo, a hotel room in a tree or a gypsy caravan, primitive Provencal artists, the mark of Christ''s knee, a fountain that flows with wine, a caiman dedicated to the Virgin Mary, a church in a theatre, an erotic medieval bas relief, a countess who returned to life, a Provencal Villa Medicis, a false volcano at La Roquebrussane, a ''sheep bridge'' at Arles, a rain-making saint, an alchemist''s garden, a magic palindrome at Oppede.Far from the crowds and the usual clichés, Provence offers countless off-beat experiences and is home to any number of well-hidden treasures that are revealed only to residents and travellers who find their way off the beaten track. An indispensable guide for those who thought they knew Provence well or would like to discover the other face of the region.

A game of pétanque played with square boules, an astonishing aerial well, stained-plastic windows, a marble bench built in memory of the Queen of England’s haemophiliac son, the instruments oft he Passion of Christ, a cannon that fires cherry stones, a good-luck pig, a mysterious pyramid, a monument to secret agents, an entire village that ‘moved house’, a gas mask for horses, a statue sculpted by Saint Luke, a chapel showing the dead rising from their tombs, a trapdoor in the nave of a church that opens onto a rushing torrent, a restaurant in an Orient Express railway car, Babar’s beach, Tintin’s Black Island, and Sleeping Beauty’s chateau, a chance to admire the Riviera’s first pair of naked breasts, or spend the night sleeping in a tree …