Roussillon

The whole village of Roussillon stands on a ridge of ochre in the Luberon, and the old quarries around it range in colour from yellow to deep red. Ochre mining employed up to a thousand people here until 1930; today the pigment is protected and tourism has taken over. Samuel Beckett hid in the village from the Nazis between 1942 and 1945 and wrote his novel Watt here.

Highlights

• Sentier des Ocres, a 30- or 60-minute walk through old ochre workings
• Conservatoire des Ocres in the former Usine Mathieu ochre factory
• Thursday-morning Provençal market on Place du Pasquier
• Red, rosé and white Ventoux AOC wines from local estates
• Samuel Beckett's wartime refuge, where he wrote the novel Watt

Summary based on Wikipedia and Wikivoyage (CC BY-SA), written with AI assistance.