There is no real purpose for the town other than helping visitors indulge themselves in the richness and beauty of the area. Is there even a school in the area? A hospital? The only hospital would be a burn-victim unit from all the unprotected sun exposure these people are getting.
My time spent in St. Tropez helped me master the act of laziness. The town itself isn’t know for having any organized tourist activities, so it’s plain to see how easy it is to be engulfed by laziness and indulgence in a world of sand, sea and hot sun. My days were spent around the pool or by the sea tanning. In the evening, I walked around the area and gawked at the beautiful people. Yet, after only a day, it was too much for me. It’s like eating a whole chocolate cake at once- it’s too rich and creamy for your stomach to handle, so you feel sick. The richness there sickened me. People say that inner beauty is more important than outer beauty, but that statement is a true fact when you see it happening all around you. In Scotland, the beauty is there but it invites people to come experience it with open arms. In St. Tropez, most people hoard all the beauty for themselves. They use it all without knowing a limit. Soon, I fear, there will be nothing left.

When I arranged for the visit, Fuentes had suggested wearing coveralls and rubber boots, the same outfit he and his wife wore. But most of the group wore shorts or jeans and T-shirts and running shoes, which proved adequate. Clothing quickly dried in the hot summer sun once we left the cave. I made do with an old sweat suit but did buy some inexpensive knee-high rubber boots. In the end, I could have done without the boots because inevitably I stepped in a hole in the river and the water poured in over the tops. However, the water was not so cold it numbed my feet and the temperature underground was cool but comfortable

One nearby village, Caunes-Minervois, derives the first part of the name from a corruption of the Latin cavus. But it was not until 1961, when researchers poured dye into the Clamoux river and it flowed out of the Orbiel river 10 miles to the west that speleologists began to appreciate the possible dimensions of the cave. Seven more years passed before the chamber now known as the Gouffre Geant was discovered. This mammoth hole was created about 400 million years ago as an underground branch of the Clamoux river began washing away softer materials and coating the walls of the resulting hollow with deposits of iron-rich calcium. These minerals , drying and oxidizing over the centuries, form the spectacular displays of yellow, white and red and rust and brown. Unlike France’s more famous cave at Lascaux, where the attraction is prehistoric man’s delicate artwork, the Gouffre Geant’s beauty is the product of natural forces. Prehistoric remains of pottery and tools have been found in parts of the cave network, but no manmade masterpieces. The stalactites and stalagmites are not only the icicle-shape commonly associated with limestone caves. Massive, rounded flows looking like a mushroom three or four yards in diameter rest beside delicate, lacy shapes or blunt knobs a couple of inches in diameter and a foot or two long.

Practical Information: The hike is offered on demand throughout the year. It costs roughly EUR40 per person with a minimum four people. However, for individuals or couples, there is the possibility of joining an already scheduled group. Telephone (in France) 67-66-11-11 to make arrangements.

Food and Lodging: Carcassonne, which boasts the largest walled city in Europe, has numerous hotels and restaurants in all price ranges. The village of Villeneuve, at the mouth of the canyon about six miles from the Gouffre Geant, has two hotels and three restaurants, all moderately priced with menus beginning at EUR13.

After three hours underground, the acetylene flame on my friend’s miner’s hardhat guttered down to the size of a pencil tip and he stumbled into the darkness ahead, scraping his cheek on the dark blue marble ledge which overhung the stream we were following.

The cave was the Gouffre Geant or "Giant Hole," near Carcassonne, France. It takes its name from its major attraction and the only part seen by most visitors: A chamber about 800 feet deep and 130 feet across — the largest known in Europe — viewed from a balcony constructed near the top of the hole. But my friend and I were among a dozen persons who had climbed down the wall of the hole and slogged through the stream which had created it during a 5-hour "subterranean safari." The hike — hundreds of feet below the surface of the earth, much of the time wading in the calf-deep stream which continues to carve the colorful cavern through the limestone-rich Montagne Noire — proved an excellent introduction to spelunking, the sport of cave exploration.

The conditions were similar to those any amateur spelunker might encounter underground: Sliding down the loose rock of a steep incline for 50 yards, crawling through narrow passages, wading in the river-all illuminated only by the flame flickering above our foreheads on the miners hardhats we wore. The most difficult part of the hike — descent of a sheer cliff about 100 feet high to the bottom of the mammoth chamber which gives the cave its name-was made via narrow scaffolding. Other steep sections of the trail were strung with heavy rope to which we snapped our safety belts. These advantages made it possible for the an inexperienced person like myself to make the trek, but it was not without danger: the slick, wet rocks presented no easy purchase and while a fall was unlikely to be fatal, there was no guarantee one would avoid a sprained ankle, broken bones or even a concussion. Using the light of my lamp, we caught up with Jose Fuentes, one of our two guides. "No problem," Fuentes said, taking the little wire brush attached to the helmet and scraping carbon from the jet of the lamp. He relit the flame and we continued our trek as if nothing had happened.

Part of the time we were walking in a narrow defile a few yards wide where the ceiling disappeared in darkness two or three stories above our heads. At other places, the cave widened to 10 yards or more and we walked on the gravel shore of the stream, pausing often to look the colorful formations displayed around us. Mounded above the marble ledges were swirls and folds of brown and beige, looking much like petrified chocolate mousse or the rumpled mass of a fringed curtain fallen on some abandoned stage. These masses had dripped from the ceiling or flowed from fissures in the side walls over the centuries in a still-continuing process. In some places hung stalactites no larger than a drinking straw; elsewhere larger ones zig-zagged towards the ground, shaped by air currents which force the slow drips of mineral-rich water in one direction part of the year and to the opposite side for the rest.

"Vous tournez a droite," said Madame Olivier, "Vous tournez a droite," said Madame Olivier, and we turned right. "Continuez jusqu’a la pharmacie," and we went as far as the pharmacy.

Caroline, Claudia and I settled into chairs at La Creperie, a modest sidewalk cafe run by a plump, friendly woman. While we compared notes on our respective host families, the proprietress strode past us to the street and swung a metal basket in a wide arc, like a baseball pitcher winding up. Intrigued, I ordered a salade just to watch the woman‘s time-honored technique for shaking excess moisture from the greens.

In one eye-opening exercise, Sylvie asked us to characterize our own nationality. By this time another American had joined me in the class, but it didn‘t matter our classmates happily contributed their own observations. "Americans like things fast and easy," Franco declared. "But they‘re really friendly and nice," added Caroline.

In place of textbooks we used authentic materials: newspapers, magazines, posters, boxes of cookies. Yes, cookies. One inspired afternoon, Sylvie brought a different box of cookies for each group of four students. My group tasted our Delice Fruits, pronounced them barely edible, and set about designing a television commercial for this unlikely French product. Fifteen minutes of brainstorming produced a skit worthy of network T.V., complete with sappy slogan. ("Delices Fruits, notre favorites…").

Cultural and recreational activities offered by the school ranged from free French movies to excursions into the surrounding countryside. Most weeknights I chatted with my family, labored over my homework, then fell into bed. But on Saturday I joined a busload of students bound for the Massif Central in the heart of France. We stopped at pretty Lac d‘Aydat, visited a diminutive Twelfth-Century church at Saint Nectaire and a chateau at Cordes, then lunched in the village of Orcival, where a joyous wedding party paraded through the streets to the church.

Vichy itself, all but ignored in American guidebooks, attracts European vacationers to the giant sports complex lining the Allier River. In summer the population swells with elderly curistes come to take the waters at Vichy‘s famous springs.

Though my hostess spoke glowingly of the legacies of Napoleon III elegant mansions, flower-filled parks, the Grand Casino she never once mentioned the World War II skeletons rattling around in Vichy‘s closets. So one afternoon I followed a young historian on a walking tour called "Vichy: Capitale 1940-1944." Skirting the Parc du Source, he pointed out the buildings that housed the Gestapo and the foreign embassies when Vichy was the capital of occupied France.

My two weeks in Vichy flew by. At the end I headed south to show off my newly-won fluency to friends in Avignon. They wasted no time testing my understanding of French. As we gathered around the swimming pool, they called to one another playfully, "Jetez Joyce dans l‘eau!" At one time, I would have smiled uncomprehendingly. But no longer. "No! You‘re not throwing me in the water!"

Immersion has its limits.

In the suburbs, Edith and Jack are sipping champagne with Bernard and his family. It’s not that we haven’t been invited. We just need to be on our own, to forget for the moment where we’ve been these past three weeks, where we’re going and with whom. We want to float, tread water, waste time. What better place than Rochefort? I hope the guidebooks never find it.

In Fouras, when the tide is out it’s far out, and the wide stretch of sand hosts sun-tanning women often topless and children sometimes topless and bottomless. Everyone puts on boots, however, to dig in the peninsula’s oyster beds for those delicate pale-green mollusks prized in the local cuisine. According to a tourist handout, the old fort at the far end of Fouras is loaded with history; Napoleon may have slept here. But one night in unpretentious Rochefort and we’re already backing off from history. Not that Rochefort doesn’t have its historical attractions, like the Royal Ropeworks. "The longest building in France," LaLanne tells us. "There one can learn something everything about rope-making." An opportunity missed.

Our room is not. Every two minutes motorcycles zoom past like contestants in a Grand Prix. what’s going on here? A call to the desk assures us all traffic will cease at 11, and it does. Sunday morning over large cups of coffee we study the brochure of the local spa: mud baths, Jacuzzis, three thermal pools, massages in and out of water, a whirlpool for every limb, treatment for rheumatism, phlebitis, dermatitis none of which any of us suffers from. But the spa is closed Sunday anyway.

Getting There By Road: A-10 auto route from Paris; change to N-11, then D-911. 490km from Paris; 4 hours. 146km from Bordeaux; 1 hour, 20 minutes. By train: Paris / La Rochelle / Rochefort; 5 hours. Several trains daily.

Not too far away is Rouen, with its famous Cathedral, painted by Monet 20 times, in variations from a misty dawn in summer to a winter sunset brilliant in color, paintings that demonstrate beautifully how light does change the appearance of objects.

The house also reflects the great Japanese influence on artists and intellectuals of the period. The era marked the opening of the East to the West. Well-travelled, Monet had become friendly with Japanese diplomats in Paris, inviting many of them to spend the day or weekend with him at Giverny. His large collection of Japanese prints, many of them gifts from his visitors, is impressive, particularly when some of them are studied against his own style.

IF YOU GO:

From the Gare St.Lazare, Paris, trains depart several times a day for Vernon. A bus meets the trains to transport visitors the seven kilometres to Giverny, the site of Monet’s house and garden. The trip makes a fine day’s outing from Paris or Rouen