I have just arrived home from my trip to France and Italy. I spent most of my time in France with the last week being a whistle-stop trip to Italy. I spent a week in Paris before spending two weeks in a house in the country in Provence. The time in Provence was the highlight for me. We were in an old farmhouse just outside the little town of Eyguiere. Using this as a base we took trips to Arles, Van Gogh's town, Aix-e-Provence and many neighbouring villages with their open-air cafes, rugged limestone backdrops and local small markets. Aix-en-Provence claims Cezanne as their own. A highlight for me in particular was seeing Cezanne's Mont St Victoire. Mont SV was Monet's haystack being painted by him again and again. The mountain dominates the skyline of Aix where he was born and spent most of his life.