Gordes

Towns and Villages - by Provence Beyond

Villages > Gordes

Nearby:  | Avignon 35 km | Bonnieux 14 km | Carpentras 35 km | Cavaillon 17 km | Fontaine-de-Vaucluse 15 km | Goult 7 km | Lagnes 12 km | Lourmarin 26 km | Murs 9 km | Roussillon 10 km | Saumane-de-Vaucluse 16 km | Senanque Abbey 6 km | Ventoux Mountain |

Below: | Bories | Museums | History | O.T. | Dates | Wine | Transportation | Sports | Hiking | Lodging Hotels |

Gordes is classed as one of the Plus Beaux Villages de France.

Behind the village (to the north), small roads lead into the rocks and valleys and forests of the Plateau de Vaucluse, with the picturesque Abbaye de Sénanque only 4 km away, yet isolated in its little valley.

Beauty is a Pain. Take a trip to Gordes in the winter or early spring and you'll see the beautiful village, the amazing views and the lovely, rocky and forested countryside. You'll also see several large hotels, neat and discreet, but indicative of the disadvantage of any beautiful site: the summer crowds are thick here with a very large number of tourists.

Gordes is also a popular summer residence for artists and media and film people from Paris. Victor Vasarely has a Didactic Museum here as an extention to the Vasarely Foundation in Aix-en-Provence. The painter André Lhote also lived in Gordes, from 1939-1948.

Bories

Gordes is in a region of the Vaucluse with many of the interesting dry-stone buildings called bories. There are several in the countryside in the immediate vicinity of the village, including this famous trois soldats (left), and the large one in our [Photo 4].

Just beside Gordes is the Village de Bories, an ancient hamlet of all dry-stone buildings: an incredible collection of houses, walls, barns and a variety of other enclosures, including a period silk-making shop.
* Village des Bories: open 09:00-17:30; about 5 euros per adult

Museums & Sites

Histoire du Verre et du Vitrail (Glass Making)

Open: Feb-Oct, groups to Nov

Le Moulin des Bouillons (Olive-Oil Mill)

Located in a typical provencal "bastide" on a Roman site, this is the oldest intact olive-oil mill.

Open: Feb-Oct, groups to Nov

History

Name
First record, 4th century: Vorda (from the name of the early inhabitants: Vordensès)
1031: Castrum Gordone

Prehistoric: nearby neolithic remains were found at Grande-Côte and Roques.

Gallo-Roman: Numerous Roman and pre-Roman artifacts found here and nearby include amphors, columns, thermal baths, furniture and tombes carved in solid rock and even skeletons.

Medieval: Gordes was a Simiane fief, eventially passing to the fiefs of Soubise and then Condé (in the 18th century). During the Wars of Religion, Gordes successfully withstood a siege by the Baron of Adrets. Gordes was a center of wool and leather industries in the 17th and 18th centuries, including weaving, carding and tanning. In 1886, part of the village was destroyed by an earthquake, which tended to hasten the already declining local industries.

Office de Tourisme

Tel: 04 90 72 02 75; Fax: 04 90 72 02 26
Email: office.gordes@wanadoo.fr

Dates

Market day: Tuesday
Every July - Festival provençal- théâtre, jazz, musique classique
Every Aug - Soirées d'été- Théâtre, jazz, musique classique
Fête St. Firmin: Sunday following 11 Oct
Fête de Vin (Côtes du Ventoux): 13-14 July
Fête votive Imberts: 3rd Sunday Sept
Light shows and concerts at the château or abbey: end May to early Sept

Wine

Apt is in the region of the Rhône Valley Côtes de Ventoux wines.

Transportation

Bus.
Gordes is connected with the outside world via the Cavaillion-Gordes bus line, with three buses a day and 30 minutes for the trip.

Sports

Camping

Hiking

Maps:

IGN (1/25,000) #3142 OT "Cavaillon, Fontaine-de-Vaucluse"

Didier Richard (1/50,000) #27 "Ventoux"

The Grandes Randonnées GR6 and GR97 pass through Gordes.
To the east, the GR97-6 trail goes along the valley to Roussillon, St. Saturnin-lès-Apt, Rustrel and Viens. (There's camping just past Roussillon and a Gîte d'etape at Rustrel.)
To the north and west, a myriad of GR and other well-marked trails wind through the forests and hills of the Plateau de Vaucluse, passing the villages of Joucas and Murs.
The GR also goes directly past the Abbey de Sénanque 4 km to the north

Lodging - Hotels