On our second last day in Aix en Provence, we accidentally went to a Turner exhibition. ‘Accidentally’ is overstating it. We intentionally walked there, and obediently bought our tickets at the entrance. Happily walked through the lovely rooms full of elegant furniture.

Took an obligatory mirror selfie.

And wound our way up and down a few grand old staircases.

It was only when we walked through rooms full of paintings, and couldn’t find a single painting by Manet or Cezanne. Not one impressionist painting among rooms of black, grey and beige Turners that we realized we had unintentionally intentionally visited completely the wrong gallery. One might have thought the large sign at the entrance with ‘Turner’ written across it in large letters would have given it away.

We really are very silly sometimes.

Naturally, after all that we really need cake. We choose a profiterole cake with chantilly cream and a peach and almond tart. Then we wash it all down with a deliciously chilled, iced black coffee.

I won’t lie to you. I know that profiteroles are round and all, but I did visually find the two balls at the end of my cake just a little bit too… ahem…ball like. It might have looked better if they had used three balls. Or one big one? Maybe not. That aside, I guess you can’t really go that wrong with chantilly cream and choux pastry in the south of France. It was undoubtedly delicious. perfection even. The only challenge eating it, was sharing two balls between three people.

The peach and almond tart was bursting with flavour and I particularly loved the crunchy blackened bits at the top. The peaches were juicy and the pastry crumbled on the tongue.

Turner was a little dull, but all was not lost. The grounds of the house are beautifully kept with a mini Versailles style sculpted garden.

The very elegant cafe is overlooked by trellis climbing greenery and terracotta pots full of hydrangeas. A large tree overlooks it all, offering just the right amount of shade.

I got to sit on a cute little stone fountain. With some rather angry looking fish.

Mum and dad made an art form of looking stylish sitting on a bench.

Then we generally just lounged around full of cake and loving life until it got late and they kicked us out.

It’s worth mentioning that you can pay a smaller entry to just go to the cafe and garden, though if a Turner exhibition were to always offer such fantastic cake and scenery…

I’d be first in the door.