For no small reason, I felt like “The Incredible Shrinking Woman” and almost ordered a glass of Bordeaux from a 3-inch-tall vintner.
Near the posh French Riviera, I embedded with thousands and thousands of teeny, expressive villagers (hello, puny pistachio nut seller and pig farmer!) who locked unblinking eyes with me in the real, human-sized town of Aubagne. This is the hypnotic “Santon Capital of the World,” a centuries-old epicenter of artisans who handcraft elaborate, much-cherished santon figurines that overtake homes, shops, public buildings, and Christmas markets throughout France’s Provence region.
The peewee population interacted with each other in various settings and included bocce bowlers, bare-bottomed peasants, baguette bakers, blind men, the mustachioed mayor, female fishmongers, dunce hat-wearing schoolboys, snail saleswomen, and gobs more characters.
“I am putting holes in the nose so he can breathe,” santonnier Didier Coulomb explained in French inside his santon-swarming studio. Still sculpting wet clay, he brandished a tiny tool to poke itty-bitty nostrils on a disembodied goateed head.
Of course, I never thought I’d witness the birth of santons (honestly I’d never heard of the things), but then my recent European trip came packed with prized places. My sojourn started with famed architect Antoni Gaudi’s stupendously imaginative House of Bones in Barcelona and ended with the colossally creepy Capuchin friars’ “Bone Church” in Rome. In between, I paid my respects at Princess Grace’s grave in Monaco, tilted with the Leaning Tower of Pisa in Italy, and dawdled down the charming French canals of Sete, where spear-wielding water jousters try to whack opponents off boats.
All of this happened before, after, and during Viking’s 7-night Iconic Western Mediterranean cruise in early December. I’d detail more about the relaxing Viking Star adults-only 930-passenger ship, but the daily ports were so intriguing I was barely on deck. Not even for scones with lemon curd and clotted cream at afternoon tea in the radiant solarium.
You never want to miss a cruise embarkation (done that) so two days before sailing, for extra sightseeing, I checked into the boutique Almanac Barcelona, smack in the heart of the magnificent, mesmerizing Spanish city. (The hotel is a block from the celebrated art nouveau Passeig de Gracia avenue showcasing two Gaudi landmarks, and an easy walk to the medieval Gothic Quarters.)
Honoring Barcelona’s enduring art culture, the Almanac is launching a “Hidden Art” stay which gives guests the chance to sleuth for a concealed painting in their suite and keep it if found. (Hmm, is it behind the minibar?) The stashed canvas is by emerging abstract artist Catherine Parra; you’’ll also be chauffeured to her atelier for a memorably entertaining visit. I met French-born Parra there and she’s a gleeful whirlwind, especially when designing with bubble wrap and curved strips of adhesive tape (“Clack!” she buoyantly exclaimed, ripping tape off a huge painting in progress).
From palette to palate. Back at Almanac’s Virens restaurant, my gastronomic gauge exploded during a seven-course, wine-paired plant-based tasting menu by a Michelin chef whose green haute cuisine included caramelized salsify with wok-fried, creamed chanterelles and fried pumpkin seeds. And at my window seat, I savored a hefty side of people-watching.
Next, bon voyage! After boarding the Viking Star docked in Barcelona, my first excursion brought me inside Gaudi’s Casa Batllo, a UNESCO World Heritage site esteemed for its spectacular, Catalan modernist style. In 1904, Gaudi audaciously redid textile magnate Josep Batllo’s home, locally dubbed the “House of Bones” because the facade’s narrow stone pillars imitate human bones and balconies resemble skulls. Perhaps victims of the scaly dragon-like roof. Inside, Casa Battlo is an exquisite fantasy of stained glass, ceramic tiles, swirling walls, wavy ceilings and amoeba-shaped windows.
Of Gaudi’s seven UNESCO-listed structures in Barcelona, the most jaw-dropping, however, is the massive spired Sagrada Familia Catholic basilica, its ornate stone fruit-festooned Biblical edifices still unfinished 143 years after construction began. Our local guide, Joseph, noted that the once dapper distinguished Gaudi in advanced years became a disheveled hermit living in the church’s workshop.
“He was eccentric. He wouldn’t eat for 10 days at a time. He grew his hair long like Jesus,” Joseph said. In June 1926, Gaudi was crossing the street when he was hit by a tram and knocked unconscious. “He had no ID on him and everyone thought he was a beggar.”
Because he was mistaken for a vagrant, it took awhile for Gaudi to be transported to a hospital. He died three days later at age 73.
Elsewhere, another tragic story loomed. Two ports post-Barcelona, I mingled with the beau monde in glamorous, elite Monaco where another House — not of bones but of Grimaldi — has royally reigned for more than 700 years. Monaco is the world’s second smallest country — it’s only 0.8 square miles — following Vatican City. Citizens of the ritzy tax haven are Monegasque and their traditional language is also Monegasque (although most speak French).
“We are driving on the same road where Grace Kelly drove Cary Grant in ‘To Catch A Thief,’” said Viking escort Malvina as our bus hugged Monaco’s coastal highway. Film fans may remember the 1955 classic movie scene, when Kelly wildly steers her speeding Sunbeam roadster along the route as nervous passenger Grant tries to keep his cool.
“She didn’t catch a thief, she caught a prince. People loved her here,” Malvina added.
American Oscar-winner Kelly married Monaco’s Prince Rainier III in 1956 and relished her regal role until the fairytale ended in 1982 after she suffered a stroke at the wheel and plunged off a steep cliff.
During my saunter through Monaco’s colorful old town, I gazed at the Grimaldi princely palace and multi-million-dollar yachts gleaming in the harbor below; learned that seafront Avenue Princess Grace is among the planet’s priciest streets (a three-bedroom furnished high-rise apartment was asking nearly $120,000 monthly rent); and admired the life-sized bronze statue of a stoic-faced, gown-cloaked Her Serene Highness in a city park.
Then, inside the pin-drop quiet, 19th-century Cathedral of Monaco, I hovered over Princess Grace’s simple grave, a bouquet of yellow roses atop the inscription. She and Rainier lavishly wed in the church; now he’s buried next to her.
Earlier, I bumped into a yellow submarine piloted by former Monaco inhabitant Jacques Cousteau and parked outside the Oceanographic Museum. Speaking of aquatic encounters, in a previous Viking stopover — the picturesque French canal city of Sete — I skipped the local speciality tielle, which is sliced octopus pie.
Segueing back to santons. Originally the “little saints” were Holy Family figures in church nativity displays, but when the French Revolution banned religious practices in the 18th century, santon makers in Provence began creating them for homes at Christmastime. Eventually, diminutive everyday people were added, complete with villages and buildings from boulangeries to pigeon-homing barns.
On the outskirts of Marseille, I embarked on a Viking jaunt to Santons Maryse Di Landro, a workshop where terra cotta torsos, legs, shepherds, elephants, camels and whatnot waited to be fired in a kiln that holds 2,500 bodies at a time. Hand-painted santons range in size from 1.5 inches to just under 3, 5 and 12 inches; the bigger ones are meticulously clothed in hand-sewn garments, down to pantaloons. To court controversy, the studio also produced a modern santon dressed in a white lab coat — meet disgraced Marseille-born microbiologist Didier Raoult, who suggested COVID be treated with anti-malaria drugs. I’m envisioning him being chased by santon mobs wearing surgical masks.
Soon, “au revoir, France” and “ciao, Italy.” As long-nosed wood puppets smirked from souvenir stands, our guide announced, “Pinocchio was born here in Tuscany!” We next turned a corner to behold the astounding Leaning Tower of Pisa, slanting since being built on soft soil in the 12th century. Pisa scientist Galileo Galilei supposedly threw round objects off the eight-story bell tower in the late 1500s to prove his theory of gravity. Just know engineers who finished stabilizing the marble campanile in 2001 say it won’t fall over like a drunk for at least 200 years.
Another day in Tuscany, we hoofed about the walled, medieval hill town of San Gimignano, which boasts 14 stunning fortress towers and, as impressively, the “World Champion of Gelato.” Seriously, the shop Gelateria Dondoli is an international titleholder for glacial inventions, such as pink grapefruit/sparking wine sorbet. Later, at a vineyard in the idyllic Tuscan countryside, a flat-coated retriever named Merlot exuberantly jumped on us before we sipped a vegan Vernaccia di San Gimignano, pressed from local white grapes.
The following morning, with the cruise over, voyagers disembarked about an hour outside Rome and I headed to my next land lair, the history-laden Westin Excelsior in the Eternal City. ( Although I booked it on my own, Viking’s post-cruise extension uses the same hotel.) A bevy of glitterati — including Elizabeth Taylor, Joan Crawford, Frank Sinatra, Burt Lancaster, the cast of 1959’s “Ben-Hur” and the Rolling Stones — have been guests of the grandiose Excelsior, founded in 1906. Once vigorously prowled by paparazzi, the hotel is situated on illustrious Via Veneto avenue, where Federico Fellini’s indelible “La Dolce Vita” was shot (the Excelsior had a part in that 1960 movie, and in the more recent Lady Gaga film “House of Gucci”). Also, if you get into trouble, the palatial, heavily guarded U.S. Embassy is right next door.
Just a 10-minute walk on the same upscale boulevard is the must-see (except if you’re squeamish), fascinating, macabre “Bone Church.” Hidden underground, the Crypts of the Capuchin Friars are five chapels intricately decorated by brethren in the mid-17th century with bones, skulls and skeletons of 3,700 departed friars. Robed mummified monks pose among hundreds of stacked empty-eyed heads and complex patterns: rosettes of shoulder blades, arches of ribs, crosses of femurs. Trust me, the touristy Colosseum can’t compare with the Crypt of Pelvises.
After that odd ossuary, I took a breather. Returning to the Excelsior, I plopped on an antique sofa near a pianist serenely tinkling in the spacious Baroque lobby that shimmered under crystal chandeliers. In one more day, this trippy trip would end and I’d be at Rome’s airport — with that 3-inch-tall vintner and dinky new friends happily tucked in my carry-on.
If you go
- Viking Iconic Western Mediterranean cruise, from $2,599; vikingcruises.com
- Almanac Barcelona, from $336 nightly; almanachotels.com
- The Westin Excelsior, Rome, nightly from 278 Euros (about $287); marriott.com