Our first stop on a walking tour of Arles was the Roman arena of nearly 2,000 years ago. Through medieval times and until the 1800's, the arches were bricked up and the stadium became a fortified town with 200 homes crammed within its defenses.

It is still used today for bullfighting.

The walls are still impressive...

... as are the buttresses which support it.

A panoramic view of the city and the river from the tower of the arena.

The facade of the St. Trophime Church.

The arch shows Christ at Judgment Day, surrounded by the four evangelists: Matthew-the winged man, Mark-the winged lion, Luke-the ox and John-the eagle. The 12 apostles are lined up below Jesus.

      

At the top left we see the redeemed going to heaven, while at the right we see the condemned in chains. Another small story is illustrated at the left of the right photo, where the martyr Stephen is being stoned by Roman soldiers and his soul is being received by angels.

Part of the old city wall of Arles.

There was free time to visit other sites of Arles, such as the the Place du Forum with what survived of a temple there.

      

In that square is the cafe which was the subject of one of Van Gogh's works . (Photo taken on a previous visit.)

One of the most popular places to visit was the Musee de L'Arles Antique (Ancient History Museum), which had models of the arena and the theatre.

There was also an interesting model of the course where chariot races were held and of the boat bridge the Romans had built across the Rhone, a difficult feat. Throughout the trip we were amazed by the engineering ability of the Romans.

In this museum were also excellent mosaics.

To demonstrate the difficulty in reconstructing some of these mosaics, the museum showed one partially restored.

They also had a copy of the statue of Venus of Arles.



We were to remain docked here in Arles and go to Les Baux the next morning.