The next time you’re driving your Motorhome down to the South of France, and if you haven’t already seen it, please take a detour to visit the Pont du Gard; you won’t be disappointed I can assure you.

Directions

The Pont du Gard is situated just west of Remoulins off the D981 to Uzes and if you’re travelling down the A9/E15 then leave at junction 23.  It’s very easy to find from there, well signposted and it has 2 very large car parks on the east and west banks of the River Gardon.  Of course, because we’re in France, Motorhomes are very well catered for in the car parks and these open from 7 am to 1 am, no overnight parking I’m afraid though.  Once you’ve parked your Motorhome you collect a ticket from the machine and then you pay on leaving at a pre pay machine. The cost when we were there was 5 euros.

Amenities

The Pont du Gard is featured on the World Heritage list and has given rise to the Site du Pont du Gard where you can spend the best part of a day looking in awe at the Pont, learning all about the history of the place, walking, sitting by the river and being fed and watered.  Some of the facilities on offer include:

• The restaurants serve traditional Mediterranean food at the ‘Les Cuisiniers Vignerons’ on the right bank and a quick service of sandwiches, savoury tarts and salads is available on the left bank

• The left bank is a large pedestrian area with shops, toilets, cafeteria, car park payment machines, ice cream salon etc

• Also on the left bank is a museum, a media library, a Cinemascope film showing the finest views of the Pont du Gard, a children’s discovery area and a Mediterranean landscape walk

• On both banks are viewing points with a guided walk up to them

The whole area is exceptionally interesting and very well organised with lots to do and makes for a full day out.  You can also swim/paddle in the river and canoe if you happen to have one with you.

History

The Pont du Gard is an excellent example of Roman building and technical skills and is quite stunning to look at and admire.  It is the finest and best preserved part of the aqueduct built to convey water from the Fontaines d’Eure spring at Uzes to the major Roman town of Nimes.  The water crosses the River Gardon at a stunning height of 48 metres.  The work was started in AD38 and was completed in AD52 and a thousand men worked on the project using more than 50,000 tonnes of stone.  Apart from the Pont itself most of the route no longer exists but there are some parts that are still visible and you can go and see these at your leisure.

Here are some stunning facts about the aqueduct:

• It is 50 kilometres or 31 miles long

• It is the tallest aqueduct that the Romans ever built

• There is only a 17 metre or 56 feet drop between the spring at Uzes and Nimes which means that the incline of the aqueduct had to average 0.35mm per metre length and it had a gradient of 0.4%

• The Pont itself is 300 metres long

• The aqueduct was capable of carrying 5 million gallons of water daily and this water is carried at the top level of the Pont in a gully that is 6 feet high and 4 feet wide

• The water flowed at a slow and constant rate so that limestone deposits, which would affect the flow, would not build up

• No mortar was used in the construction and each stone weighed up to 6 tonnes and was made to fit precisely on top and against the surrounding stones

• The aqueduct provided the waterflow between Uzes and Nimes for 900 years