A Day in Marseille 10-6-15

Today's visit in Marseille has us changing gears a bit, originally we had planned to visit a museum called MUCEM.  The museum of the history of the mediterranean civilizations, but of course since our entire trip was based on our visit with Mel and Mar then with Julia and Jose, the days we would be in Marseille were pretty well predetermined.  So it turned out that the day we would be here was the day of the week on which the museum was closed, bad luck!  So we punted and headed for the Museum Cantini, when we got there we looked at the opening hours and it said that it was open everyday, so we went to find a little snack as it was about lunchtime.
 When we returned we rang the bell as instructed and were met with a voice asking what we needed, so we said we wanted to enter and see the collection.   The response was that they had closed last Thursday and would now be closed for a few weeks for some renovation, Waaa!   But we had a bit of an ace in the hole and went to the third museum, the Museum of the History of Marseille, which we knew to be open since we had checked as we walked by on the way to Cantini.
What a wonderful experience this turned out to be, how fortunate for us.  It follows the history of Marseille from prehistory up through the 20th century, focusing more on the time period beginning about 6000 BC.  They have a plethora of artifacts beginning with the Greeks who settled here about 500 BC and continuing on to the Romans about 49 BC when Julius Caesar conquered the city up to the 20th century.
We especially enjoyed the outdoor portion of the museum which are the ruins of the head of the port as it existed during Greek and Roman times.  One can see the walls and foundations of the eastern gate of the city during Greek occupation.  There are also foundations and low walls from after the Roman conquest and dating up to about 500 CE.  The Roman road into the city is paved with flat stones that have been intentionally grooved to add traction for horses hooves and it sits 2 meters above the original Greek road.  One of the two towers for the original gateway still has an outer wall standing while a second tower has 3 partial walls standing, very interesting.
 The wharf area is still outlined with low walls with some sea steps up to the quai.
Inside the museum there are the remains of 4 early sailing vessels, one a Greek trading boat and two other ones much larger Roman trading boats, all found within the city when old buildings were razed in order to build new commercial buildings.  The archeologists were given a limited time to recover them, and the results are very interesting.  Along with the boats there are all manner artifacts, both architectural and  decorative, and a reconstruction of a 5th century graveyard.   Interestingly the city fathers were quite ruthless in destroying medieval buildings in the 18th and 19th century in order to redevelop the city so that period is the least prevalent.   It was also fun to see travel posters from the 19th century when Marseille became a major port for steamships going all over the world.
After our museum visit we took a little time to sit at an outdoor table of a cafe for a post visit drink before heading back down to the vieux port for dinner.  We were a little skittish after the fiasco last night but we decided to go back to the restaurant where we had eaten six years ago.  La Dourade sits just opposite our disappointing
restaurant, but as soon as we got in we knew we were in for a special experience.  I ordered Soupe de Poisson while Deb ordered beignets of diverse shellfish for appetisers which were delicious.  Deb ordered a Loup (sea bass) Mariniere with seafood garnish and I had Lotte medallions and Moules in a saffron cream sauce, both were superb.  We had a Cote de Aix en Provence rose that matched perfectly.  During the dinner we ended up having a very nice conversation with two couples at the next table who were very charming and quite welcoming.  All this and over 20 euros less than last night had us quite giddy for our walk home.