The thunder started around 3am this morning - low growls in the distance for a while and then one ear-splitting thunderbolt right above the house.
Storms often build and then break during the night in Provence. I could see flashes of lightning outside around the edges of the bedroom's closed wooden shutters. The thunder was deafening but in between bolts you could hear rain hammering down on the tiled roof, pine trees and hard dry earth. I knew from experience that the next sound would be the catflap as my cat Coco, who wondered out of the forest and up to the house 4 years ago and never left, hurtled into the house in protest at the rain.
Sure enough - flap flap flap, determined feline shoulder applied to half-closed bedroom door - and I felt him jump on the bed. As I told him to calm down and go to sleep, I felt half-terrified that the roof would fall in or the house would be struck by lightning. It was hit by lightning in 2007 and I was momentarily electrocuted as I tried to disconnect the water pump. The electrics in most rural French houses, as you probably know, are fairly funky and improvised arrangements. In this house, the water pump needs to be disconnected during a thunderstorm or apparently it'll be struck by lightning. The plug that needs to be disconnected hangs on a thick cable half way up a wall. To uncouple plug and socket I have to lie on the tiles with a foot against the wall and tug, using both hands. It works well enough...
Anyway, as well as being half-terrified I was half-thrilled. One of my neighbours, a paysan, Alain Blanc, who has 10 hectares of vines, cherry trees, melons, apricots and almonds just over the hill had told me it would rain during the night and the following morning. I'd been aware that if he was wrong I'd have to lug the hosepipe up to my olive trees to water them. We've had a week of temperatures in the high 30s and though the olive tree flowers have now given way to miniscule olives, they're looking parched and need water.
The lavender round the house and the oleanders look thirsty too so it was great to hear the rain tombant des cordes - "fall in ropes", as the Provencaux say.
This morning the rain fell very lightly and the dawn chorus was beautiful. Little songbirds who've been suffering in the heat must be delighted to find raindrops rolling off every leaf. Even Coco, who could have sat inside in the dry, strolled through the damp garrigue and then settled under an olive tree to survey his land. He doesn't usually try to catch songbirds - he understands that they can take off almost vertically whereas mice can't. He once dragged a beautiful dormouse into the house. Don't know how he got him - they usually stay up in the tree canopy.
There's a beautiful stillness outside just now. Not even a light breeze. Just the revived land, damp and looking much greener after the storm.
I worked with Mr Blanc and a neighbour in his vineyard for 2 days this week. It was sweltering - 37° - and I managed 2 hours in the morning and 2 in the afternoon. It was heavy work in blazing, merciless sunshine. Not a drop of shade either. He'd had a machine uproot the hundreds of vine stumps and needed the field cleared to prepare the earth and plant a new variety of grape. In return for helping him I'd get masses of vine stumps which are a good winter fuel and don't need to be seasoned for two years like other wood. So I can use them this winter. He knew the rain would come today so he needed to clear the field urgently, while the tractor and trailer could move freely on the soil. I asked how he knew it would rain. He'd looked at the meteo in La Provence perhaps? He shrugged. He's been working that land he said since he was nine years old. Sometimes you just know it'll rain in the next 24 to 36 hours.
I just went outside to say hello to a friend riding by on his horse. Wonderful morning isn't it, he said. "Quelle fraicheur!" We talked for a while and then I came back to my desk. I noticed another benefit of the rain while I was outside. My car, perpetually covered in white limestone dust from the chemin de terre, sometimes so heavy that the police have stopped me to tell me the licence plate is invisible, looked like it had been through a carwash. It stood there bright and sparkling and clean, thanks to the rain.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
French health care - great if you can get it
France has a great health system. Everyone says so. Not everyone is entitled to use it freely though. You have to be entitled and in the system - and that means having a social security number. Although I've lived in France for years and have been entitled to a Carte Vitale - the medical insurance/entitlement card - for a year and a half, I've only just succeeded in getting hold of the social security number, or numero secu needed to get one. The reason? France has fiendish administration. Everyone says so.
When I first moved to France I was working for a vast American corporation, spending a lot of my time on planes and in airports. Because I was away from France about as much as I was here I didn't bother too much about the Carte Vitale. I retained UK health insurance and hoped for the best. It was only when I finally registered as an autoentrepreneuse (self-employed) in June 2009, that I decided to apply for a Carte Vitale.
My accountant airily told me it would arrive automatically "in a few weeks" since I was registered as a business and paying taxes.
When it didn't arrive - quelle surprise - he advised me to contact the local tax office in town. The young woman there looked blank and told me to contact URSAFF, the French social security outfit, in Avignon. URSAFF in Avignon sent me to a strange little office in what seemed to be a block of flats where a lone staff member told me to contact RSI in Paris. "You definitely need to deal with RSI," she told me. RSI is the French 'social regime' for independent workers. They ignored me for a year and a half. Or rather, after sending me a registration number, they ignored me for a year and a half.
I emailed RSI in Paris just over 40 times - sad I know, but I started counting after the first half dozen times. I called them countless more times and got personnel who said they couldn't deal with me unless I gave them my numero secu. "That's the problem," I said. "I don't know it." They shrugged, telephonically. I sent them letters. "What do I need to do to obtain my social security number and Carte Vitale?" I asked. I wondered when they would ever reply. The answer, as with the emails, was never.
I lost count of the different numbers and organisations I rang in my efforts to find out that number. "Call this number in Provence," someone in Paris would say. "Call this number in Paris," the person in Provence would say. It was entirely circular. I gave up for weeks at a time.
One number in Provence played an eternal message that the service wasn't available. One had severely restricted opening hours - about 12 a week - and I never got through to anyone there. Another number parrotted the "Contact Paris" mantra. Yet another simply rang out. Always.
After 18 months I finally discovered my secu number. It was by chance really. I spent three solid hours calling everyone in French health administration and eventually someone, somewhere, casually mentioned an organism called RAM-GAMEX. I'd never heard of them. I got their number and called. After half an hour of muzak and the occasional cheery message telling me how much I was being charged for waiting, a woman answered. I asked her, simply, what I had to do to get a social security number. She asked for my RSI number, tapped it into a database and said "Well there's absolutely no problem with it, madame - I can give it to you now. Do you have pen?" A pen? I nearly had a fainting fit. I was euphoric and amazed.
"But I've been trying to get this number for a year and a half," I said. "I haven't been able to get my Carte Vitale..."
She sounded rather insulted. "All you had to do was ask!" she said snippily.
I wrote my number down carefully. Then I wrote it down in six other places. Then I called a friend to say I'd finally succeeded. I'd won! I'd beaten the French administration. They'd tried to beat me down but I'd perservered. I felt like a marathon runner, breasting that flimsy tape and brushing it aside.
But I know I'm still only halfway there. I have since received a Carte Vitale attestation and my numero secu but I don't yet have the actual Carte Vitale. When the woman at RAM-GAMEX told me how to apply for it, she added scarily: "It'll arrive automatically in a few weeks." Yes - I've heard that before.
When I first moved to France I was working for a vast American corporation, spending a lot of my time on planes and in airports. Because I was away from France about as much as I was here I didn't bother too much about the Carte Vitale. I retained UK health insurance and hoped for the best. It was only when I finally registered as an autoentrepreneuse (self-employed) in June 2009, that I decided to apply for a Carte Vitale.
My accountant airily told me it would arrive automatically "in a few weeks" since I was registered as a business and paying taxes.
When it didn't arrive - quelle surprise - he advised me to contact the local tax office in town. The young woman there looked blank and told me to contact URSAFF, the French social security outfit, in Avignon. URSAFF in Avignon sent me to a strange little office in what seemed to be a block of flats where a lone staff member told me to contact RSI in Paris. "You definitely need to deal with RSI," she told me. RSI is the French 'social regime' for independent workers. They ignored me for a year and a half. Or rather, after sending me a registration number, they ignored me for a year and a half.
I emailed RSI in Paris just over 40 times - sad I know, but I started counting after the first half dozen times. I called them countless more times and got personnel who said they couldn't deal with me unless I gave them my numero secu. "That's the problem," I said. "I don't know it." They shrugged, telephonically. I sent them letters. "What do I need to do to obtain my social security number and Carte Vitale?" I asked. I wondered when they would ever reply. The answer, as with the emails, was never.
I lost count of the different numbers and organisations I rang in my efforts to find out that number. "Call this number in Provence," someone in Paris would say. "Call this number in Paris," the person in Provence would say. It was entirely circular. I gave up for weeks at a time.
One number in Provence played an eternal message that the service wasn't available. One had severely restricted opening hours - about 12 a week - and I never got through to anyone there. Another number parrotted the "Contact Paris" mantra. Yet another simply rang out. Always.
After 18 months I finally discovered my secu number. It was by chance really. I spent three solid hours calling everyone in French health administration and eventually someone, somewhere, casually mentioned an organism called RAM-GAMEX. I'd never heard of them. I got their number and called. After half an hour of muzak and the occasional cheery message telling me how much I was being charged for waiting, a woman answered. I asked her, simply, what I had to do to get a social security number. She asked for my RSI number, tapped it into a database and said "Well there's absolutely no problem with it, madame - I can give it to you now. Do you have pen?" A pen? I nearly had a fainting fit. I was euphoric and amazed.
"But I've been trying to get this number for a year and a half," I said. "I haven't been able to get my Carte Vitale..."
She sounded rather insulted. "All you had to do was ask!" she said snippily.
I wrote my number down carefully. Then I wrote it down in six other places. Then I called a friend to say I'd finally succeeded. I'd won! I'd beaten the French administration. They'd tried to beat me down but I'd perservered. I felt like a marathon runner, breasting that flimsy tape and brushing it aside.
But I know I'm still only halfway there. I have since received a Carte Vitale attestation and my numero secu but I don't yet have the actual Carte Vitale. When the woman at RAM-GAMEX told me how to apply for it, she added scarily: "It'll arrive automatically in a few weeks." Yes - I've heard that before.
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Parasols, philosophy and poetry
Although I've lived in Provence for seven years and visited the region for much longer before I came to live here year-round, I'm still often surprised by aspects of the region's culture. Since Provence, like all of France, has such a rich culture there's a feeling that you never stop learning.
One of the interesting aspects of life here is the way people think. Almost everything flows from what goes on in people's heads and Provence has a great intellectual mix of earthy philosophy and subtle poetry. Or, you could just as easily say a mix of earthy poetry and subtle philosophy.
Over and over I see and hear evidence of this. In contrast I guess that the people of Provence, like the French generally, view Anglo-Saxon minds as pretty clod-hopping and overly concerned with practical matters like money and commerce.
Today I had one small example of local thinking, or maybe just French thinking. I was in conversation with a friend and - I can't remember why - parasols were mentioned.
He said he finds parasols quite interesting. My immediate thought was that I don't find them in the least interesting and haven't ever really given them a thought. They're just things you use, aren't they?, and maybe the extent of any interest in them would be what the material, colour and price were.
But he expounded a bit, as Provencal men will, on what he thought interesting. He talked about the way the rigid structure, the frame, worked with a soft, supple covering. Both were dissimilar, opposites really, but they work together. And neither's any use on its own. He talked for a while about that relationship and I can't describe what he said because it sort of slipped away from me - but it was interesting (and didn't involve any reference to sex or the human form, which it might easily have done.)
Whether from my Anglo-Saxon and Celtic heritage, genes or culture, or just through having a rather rusty brain, I tend to see household objects in a rather practical way or maybe in design terms. I can see symbolism in them easily enough - an empty chair, a dusty photo frame... But this conversation had me thinking about everyday objects in a different way.
When he'd finished describing what he meant, or what he saw, I commented that I couldn't decide whether I'd call what he'd just said poetry or philosophy.
He burst out laughing as if a child had said something funny. Then he said "Why should it be one or the other?"
(Just broke off to go and watch Antoine, the young berger, leading a hundred or so sheep along the track, with his two enormous white guard dogs. We chatted for a moment while the sheep tugged at my shrubs and then he led them down into long grass where they'll graze tonight and tomorrow. They ambled lazily along behind him, a bell tinkling here and there in the middle of the flock. It's wonderful to watch them all on the track and then grazing calmly. That's definitely poetry...)
One of the interesting aspects of life here is the way people think. Almost everything flows from what goes on in people's heads and Provence has a great intellectual mix of earthy philosophy and subtle poetry. Or, you could just as easily say a mix of earthy poetry and subtle philosophy.
Over and over I see and hear evidence of this. In contrast I guess that the people of Provence, like the French generally, view Anglo-Saxon minds as pretty clod-hopping and overly concerned with practical matters like money and commerce.
Today I had one small example of local thinking, or maybe just French thinking. I was in conversation with a friend and - I can't remember why - parasols were mentioned.
He said he finds parasols quite interesting. My immediate thought was that I don't find them in the least interesting and haven't ever really given them a thought. They're just things you use, aren't they?, and maybe the extent of any interest in them would be what the material, colour and price were.
But he expounded a bit, as Provencal men will, on what he thought interesting. He talked about the way the rigid structure, the frame, worked with a soft, supple covering. Both were dissimilar, opposites really, but they work together. And neither's any use on its own. He talked for a while about that relationship and I can't describe what he said because it sort of slipped away from me - but it was interesting (and didn't involve any reference to sex or the human form, which it might easily have done.)
Whether from my Anglo-Saxon and Celtic heritage, genes or culture, or just through having a rather rusty brain, I tend to see household objects in a rather practical way or maybe in design terms. I can see symbolism in them easily enough - an empty chair, a dusty photo frame... But this conversation had me thinking about everyday objects in a different way.
When he'd finished describing what he meant, or what he saw, I commented that I couldn't decide whether I'd call what he'd just said poetry or philosophy.
He burst out laughing as if a child had said something funny. Then he said "Why should it be one or the other?"
(Just broke off to go and watch Antoine, the young berger, leading a hundred or so sheep along the track, with his two enormous white guard dogs. We chatted for a moment while the sheep tugged at my shrubs and then he led them down into long grass where they'll graze tonight and tomorrow. They ambled lazily along behind him, a bell tinkling here and there in the middle of the flock. It's wonderful to watch them all on the track and then grazing calmly. That's definitely poetry...)
Thursday, May 26, 2011
From Provence to the Languedoc: Eating Oysters at Bouzigues
I've mentioned before that one of the great things about living in Provence is that the region is so varied. From the Cote d'Azur and the dazzling Med to the wild Camargue, from the villages perchés of the Luberon and Vaucluse to the rugged Alpilles, and from the laid-back city of Avignon to the chic streets of Aix the region is practically spinning with variety.
But the other aspect of living here is the easy reach you have to other areas, regions and countries - to Italy and Spain, to the Aveyron, the Drome and the Languedoc.
I spent last weekend at Frontignan on the Languedoc coast in a little wooden cabin belonging to friends from Le Thor. They spend August there every year while their main home is rented to Parisians but we all go to Frontignan several times a year for weekends as well. The cabin, one of a kind on the shoreline and just a few paces from the sea, is classé by now I would think. It's surrounded by overgrown and elegantly drooping oliviers de Bohème
. The front of the structure is open wooden lattice-work, criss-crossed and with a tropical feel. Friends from Avignon added a wonky wooden-slatted terrace years ago where we eat outside. At the side of the cabin is an outdoor shower.
It's not chic but it's charming - one of the most relaxing places I know. Although Frontignan plage is stuffed with campsites and can be noisy in August, filled with families on holiday from Montpellier, the cabin is a little oasis of calm and greenery. Frontignan town is quite pretty too, with a nice little bar where you can eat and drink in the square outside the Mairie.
This late-May weekend we opened the cabin up for the summer, sweeping away the olive tree leaves that have fallen and drifted inside along with a little sand from the beach. There were cobwebs everywhere on a Hollywood horror-film scale, drifting from skylights, festooned across doorways. You'd think no-one had been in the place for a decade but we were all there just 8 months ago, when it was warm enough to swim in the Mediterranean in late September.
It took hardly any time though to clear up, and the weekend began.
One of the wonderful things about visiting the area is looking around the interesting town of Sète. Another is visiting the Etang de Thau to eat wonderful (breathtakingly inexpensive)Bouzigues oysters sur place.
Sète is right on the sea and still very much a port and fishing town. It's poor and feels very sinewy. You have these images in your head as you walk round, of muscular arms hauling at ropes on trawlers. Not of tall, broad fishermen but of short, wiry men, strong and used to sailing in the Med.
There's a wonderful open air concert venue high on the hill where you can see opera or hear jazz with the Mediterranean as a glamorous backdrop to the stage.
All through the summer, Sète stages a huge number of concerts and music festivals, well worth going to.
And there's an unmissable fish market in Les Halles. I'd feel deprived if I went to Sète without going to the fish market. It's largely a local affair with fisherman selling straight from their nets - direct du bateau. There's a thrilling mix of rough-and-ready and refinement in the market. The many stands are highly individual - colourful, painted with pictures of jaunty fish or sturdy boats. The names are French, Italian, Spanish - Raphael, Mario, Julien - reflecting geography and centuries of immigration. Stalls practically overflow with rougets, merlu, loup de mer, daurade royale, crevettes, palourdes, limandes, violets, tuna, oysters, mussels, lobster, squid. There are mixes for fish soup, heaps of whitebait, huge halves of swordfish, crabs, sea snails, sea urchins...
Signs announce where produce is "Fished locally", "From the Mediterranée." Trade is brisk, as they say, and there are long discussions about preparing different fish. Bouzigues oysters are sold in their 3 different sizes for as little as 7 euros a dozen.
Around Les Halles there are bars serving shellfish and chilled glasses of the local white wine, Picpoul de Pinet. The bars are filled mostly with men, drinking and gossiping cheerfully.
There's far more than fish and seafood here. There's everything. Fruit and veg, cheeses, oils and vinegars, hams and saucisses, stalls selling exquisite jams and flavoured honey and lots of stalls selling freshly-made pasta.
To me, Sète is an unreconstructed and mostly unmodernised French fishing town with loads of character, very visibly formed by the sea. Temperamentally, it's a thousand miles from the Cote d'Azur even if it's actually not far from St Tropez. With its poor French community and struggling economy, Sète is a bit of a stronghold for the Front National but you get the feeling that reflects weariness and economic fear rather than aggression. This is a port after all that has boats to-ing and fro-ing from North Africa every day. The Sète economy needs its African links.
But the other aspect of living here is the easy reach you have to other areas, regions and countries - to Italy and Spain, to the Aveyron, the Drome and the Languedoc.
I spent last weekend at Frontignan on the Languedoc coast in a little wooden cabin belonging to friends from Le Thor. They spend August there every year while their main home is rented to Parisians but we all go to Frontignan several times a year for weekends as well. The cabin, one of a kind on the shoreline and just a few paces from the sea, is classé by now I would think. It's surrounded by overgrown and elegantly drooping oliviers de Bohème
. The front of the structure is open wooden lattice-work, criss-crossed and with a tropical feel. Friends from Avignon added a wonky wooden-slatted terrace years ago where we eat outside. At the side of the cabin is an outdoor shower.
It's not chic but it's charming - one of the most relaxing places I know. Although Frontignan plage is stuffed with campsites and can be noisy in August, filled with families on holiday from Montpellier, the cabin is a little oasis of calm and greenery. Frontignan town is quite pretty too, with a nice little bar where you can eat and drink in the square outside the Mairie.
This late-May weekend we opened the cabin up for the summer, sweeping away the olive tree leaves that have fallen and drifted inside along with a little sand from the beach. There were cobwebs everywhere on a Hollywood horror-film scale, drifting from skylights, festooned across doorways. You'd think no-one had been in the place for a decade but we were all there just 8 months ago, when it was warm enough to swim in the Mediterranean in late September.
It took hardly any time though to clear up, and the weekend began.
One of the wonderful things about visiting the area is looking around the interesting town of Sète. Another is visiting the Etang de Thau to eat wonderful (breathtakingly inexpensive)Bouzigues oysters sur place.
Sète is right on the sea and still very much a port and fishing town. It's poor and feels very sinewy. You have these images in your head as you walk round, of muscular arms hauling at ropes on trawlers. Not of tall, broad fishermen but of short, wiry men, strong and used to sailing in the Med.
There's a wonderful open air concert venue high on the hill where you can see opera or hear jazz with the Mediterranean as a glamorous backdrop to the stage.
All through the summer, Sète stages a huge number of concerts and music festivals, well worth going to.
And there's an unmissable fish market in Les Halles. I'd feel deprived if I went to Sète without going to the fish market. It's largely a local affair with fisherman selling straight from their nets - direct du bateau. There's a thrilling mix of rough-and-ready and refinement in the market. The many stands are highly individual - colourful, painted with pictures of jaunty fish or sturdy boats. The names are French, Italian, Spanish - Raphael, Mario, Julien - reflecting geography and centuries of immigration. Stalls practically overflow with rougets, merlu, loup de mer, daurade royale, crevettes, palourdes, limandes, violets, tuna, oysters, mussels, lobster, squid. There are mixes for fish soup, heaps of whitebait, huge halves of swordfish, crabs, sea snails, sea urchins...
Signs announce where produce is "Fished locally", "From the Mediterranée." Trade is brisk, as they say, and there are long discussions about preparing different fish. Bouzigues oysters are sold in their 3 different sizes for as little as 7 euros a dozen.
Around Les Halles there are bars serving shellfish and chilled glasses of the local white wine, Picpoul de Pinet. The bars are filled mostly with men, drinking and gossiping cheerfully.
There's far more than fish and seafood here. There's everything. Fruit and veg, cheeses, oils and vinegars, hams and saucisses, stalls selling exquisite jams and flavoured honey and lots of stalls selling freshly-made pasta.
To me, Sète is an unreconstructed and mostly unmodernised French fishing town with loads of character, very visibly formed by the sea. Temperamentally, it's a thousand miles from the Cote d'Azur even if it's actually not far from St Tropez. With its poor French community and struggling economy, Sète is a bit of a stronghold for the Front National but you get the feeling that reflects weariness and economic fear rather than aggression. This is a port after all that has boats to-ing and fro-ing from North Africa every day. The Sète economy needs its African links.
Hosting holidays in your home in Provence
OK, I've had it with people coming to stay in summer.
Let me tell you about the downside of owning a home in Provence. The downside is guests coming to stay. Or rather, unwelcome guests. Every summer, all summer. There are good guests and bad guests and it seems there's no escaping the bad ones.
When I first moved here in 2004 I came across an article in French Property News that said "within a few years you'll be sick and tired of people coming to stay in your house in Provence." How very negative, I thought. My home would always be open to friends and it would be a pleasure to have people visiting me in Provence from other countries.
Seven years on, however, I get the point. There are without a doubt friends I like to see and have staying. But there are many other people who rather ruthlessly, or just unthinkingly, take advantage. It's amazing how many people you haven't seen or been in touch with for years will contact you out of the blue once you live in the south of France and say "We're thinking of coming to stay with you."
Really? You won't wait for an invitation then?
And it's only when you live in a beautiful region like Provence that you face the issue of people wanting to come and stay for a week or two. Normally, you invite friends for dinner, say, and after four or five hours they go home. But imagine friends coming for dinner and then moving in for seven nights.
People will contact you with their schedule and their demands and expect that you'll simply be available and on site when they plan to descend.
Unfailingly each individual, family or group assumes that they're the only ones planning to visit in summer and unfailingly each thinks single-mindedly of their own individual holiday in Provence.
"We're planning to come for seven nights" people say. Or "It'll be expensive to hire a car but you'll be able to pick us up from Avignon/Marseille/Nimes, won't you?" "It won't be a problem that I can't eat bread, pasta, cheese, milk, tomatoes, chick peas, bananas, nuts or meat will it?"
Once people arrive it becomes obvious that they expect a taxi service to and from the station/airport, a catering service, information and a cleaning service. Only the good guests (the invited ones) ever seem to realise that they're part of a long line of holidaymakers trooping in and out all summer. To the others, their holiday is the only one. To me, though, they're the sixth, seventh or eighth bunch who've descended with their luggage, demands to be driven around Provence, inability to put their hands in their wallets and reluctance to buy food or cook a meal.
At the end of each visit, I have to clean the place, launder sheets and towels and prepare rooms for the next lot arriving. This year I've already been horrified to return from dropping a guest at the station to find she'd left a huge carrier bag of rotting rubbish overflowing and falling onto the floor in her room. As I cleaned up after her I found myself muttering that she wouldn't have come to visit for five days if I lived in Wolverhampton....
This year I've already changed my plans to fit in with a very old acquaintance I hadn't been in contact with for years who demanded to come and stay over a weekend, then changed his plans to come during the week, then announced at the last minute that the flight was too expensive and he wasn't coming after all. Thanks! By then I'd missed a weekend on the Cote d'Azur. Then another acquaintance arrived, demanded a lift in from the station, announced she was staying for a week when I'd already told her it wasn't possible, required to be driven around the region to sort out various problems with her laptop, insisted on a lift to Avignon so she could buy clothes for herself and presents for her family and firmly refused to contribute even a few centimes towards a bottle of red wine on her last night.
Today I had three different people requesting that I help them with plans for their holiday in my home or in the nearby village. "It won't take you a minute to check out local gites and recommend one" I was told. "Please check the pools are big and the bedrooms are light and airy. Bear our budget in mind too." "How will I get from Nimes to your place? Can you check train times? Maybe it'll be better if you just pick me up." "What's the best low cost airline from my place to Marseille?"
And the trouble is that whenever I get it together to make a suggestion I risk the person being disappointed in which case I invariably get the blame and the guest gets huffy. "Are you kidding? Their flights leave at 6am." Once they're here it'll be: "I don't know why you suggested that restaurant. It didn't have nearly have enough fish on the menu."
I even get the blame for bad weather. "You didn't warn us that the mistral could blow in summer. We wouldn't have come this week if we'd known."
No-one ever seems to realise that it costs me money and ties up my time to host their holidays. It also disrupts my own plans every summer. Each party or group seems to imagine that it's nothing really, using my home, my electricity, my food, my shower, my car and my petrol for a week or so. And they're right. It's no big deal when it's for one week. But it's not for one week! They may only be staying for a week but there were probably people staying for the six weeks before them and people due to come in the six weeks after. My summer becomes one long round of fetching guests from the airport, ferrying them around the sights, helping them organise their itineraries and onward journeys, getting them medical care when they need it, being on stand-by to bring them back from town when they've done their shopping and of course planning their meals from dawn to dusk.
And then there are the breakages. I've rarely had guests who don't break things. It's normal, I know, because they're not in their own surroundings. So they tend to yank at door handles, wrench the shower attachment off the wall, knock furniture against windows as they move things around to suit themselves, break plates and glasses and crack the toilet seat. Invariably, they blame the things they've broken. "Something wrong with that kettle" they'll say sternly. "I just touched it and the handle fell off."
I gloomily add the kettle to the list of broken things I need to replace.
And then there are gifts.
Mysteriously, I have hardly ever had a guest arrive with a gift or leave a gift on parting. Guests can stay night after night, make full use of my unpaid taxi service, help themselves to my rosé wine, elbow their way to my laptop so they can check their email, shower twice a day till all the hot water's gone and leave their sheets and towels in a heap for me to deal with when they leave - and yet hardly one of them has ever thought to arrive with a bottle of wine or leave so much as a bar of lavender soap when their stay's over. In contrast, almost every guest takes great pleasure in showing me the gifts they've bought for their child/mother/husband/boyfriend/self. "I got these terrific sunglasses for Bob" they'll say. "And I thought I'd take this champagne home for dad." "Clothes are cheap here" they say. "I bought myself these jeans, this hat, this shirt and these boots. Bit extravagant but I thought - well - I'm on my holiday!"
Great. Meanwhile I'm standing there cooking the food I shopped for and paid for after they called to say they wouldn't be able to get to the supermarket because they were having so much fun spending money on themselves.
So there you are. That's a snapshot of summer when you own a house in Provence. You can easily end up running a free hotel and working as a full-time, unpaid holiday organiser. I'm not kidding. If I accepted every request for accommodation, advice and help with holiday organisation I would literally be working full-time, for free, all through the summer. And subsidising dozens of holidays out of my own pocket.
I've called a halt to it this summer. I had to. I don't have a 3 to 4000 euro fund spare with which to subsidise other people's holidays. I fear some friends and acquaintances will take offence but, as the French say, tant pis. I've done it for 5 years and I'm not doing it any more. There are certain friends who are still very welcome and they know who they are. The others will have to manage their holidays by themselves because this hotel in Provence is closed!
Let me tell you about the downside of owning a home in Provence. The downside is guests coming to stay. Or rather, unwelcome guests. Every summer, all summer. There are good guests and bad guests and it seems there's no escaping the bad ones.
When I first moved here in 2004 I came across an article in French Property News that said "within a few years you'll be sick and tired of people coming to stay in your house in Provence." How very negative, I thought. My home would always be open to friends and it would be a pleasure to have people visiting me in Provence from other countries.
Seven years on, however, I get the point. There are without a doubt friends I like to see and have staying. But there are many other people who rather ruthlessly, or just unthinkingly, take advantage. It's amazing how many people you haven't seen or been in touch with for years will contact you out of the blue once you live in the south of France and say "We're thinking of coming to stay with you."
Really? You won't wait for an invitation then?
And it's only when you live in a beautiful region like Provence that you face the issue of people wanting to come and stay for a week or two. Normally, you invite friends for dinner, say, and after four or five hours they go home. But imagine friends coming for dinner and then moving in for seven nights.
People will contact you with their schedule and their demands and expect that you'll simply be available and on site when they plan to descend.
Unfailingly each individual, family or group assumes that they're the only ones planning to visit in summer and unfailingly each thinks single-mindedly of their own individual holiday in Provence.
"We're planning to come for seven nights" people say. Or "It'll be expensive to hire a car but you'll be able to pick us up from Avignon/Marseille/Nimes, won't you?" "It won't be a problem that I can't eat bread, pasta, cheese, milk, tomatoes, chick peas, bananas, nuts or meat will it?"
Once people arrive it becomes obvious that they expect a taxi service to and from the station/airport, a catering service, information and a cleaning service. Only the good guests (the invited ones) ever seem to realise that they're part of a long line of holidaymakers trooping in and out all summer. To the others, their holiday is the only one. To me, though, they're the sixth, seventh or eighth bunch who've descended with their luggage, demands to be driven around Provence, inability to put their hands in their wallets and reluctance to buy food or cook a meal.
At the end of each visit, I have to clean the place, launder sheets and towels and prepare rooms for the next lot arriving. This year I've already been horrified to return from dropping a guest at the station to find she'd left a huge carrier bag of rotting rubbish overflowing and falling onto the floor in her room. As I cleaned up after her I found myself muttering that she wouldn't have come to visit for five days if I lived in Wolverhampton....
This year I've already changed my plans to fit in with a very old acquaintance I hadn't been in contact with for years who demanded to come and stay over a weekend, then changed his plans to come during the week, then announced at the last minute that the flight was too expensive and he wasn't coming after all. Thanks! By then I'd missed a weekend on the Cote d'Azur. Then another acquaintance arrived, demanded a lift in from the station, announced she was staying for a week when I'd already told her it wasn't possible, required to be driven around the region to sort out various problems with her laptop, insisted on a lift to Avignon so she could buy clothes for herself and presents for her family and firmly refused to contribute even a few centimes towards a bottle of red wine on her last night.
Today I had three different people requesting that I help them with plans for their holiday in my home or in the nearby village. "It won't take you a minute to check out local gites and recommend one" I was told. "Please check the pools are big and the bedrooms are light and airy. Bear our budget in mind too." "How will I get from Nimes to your place? Can you check train times? Maybe it'll be better if you just pick me up." "What's the best low cost airline from my place to Marseille?"
And the trouble is that whenever I get it together to make a suggestion I risk the person being disappointed in which case I invariably get the blame and the guest gets huffy. "Are you kidding? Their flights leave at 6am." Once they're here it'll be: "I don't know why you suggested that restaurant. It didn't have nearly have enough fish on the menu."
I even get the blame for bad weather. "You didn't warn us that the mistral could blow in summer. We wouldn't have come this week if we'd known."
No-one ever seems to realise that it costs me money and ties up my time to host their holidays. It also disrupts my own plans every summer. Each party or group seems to imagine that it's nothing really, using my home, my electricity, my food, my shower, my car and my petrol for a week or so. And they're right. It's no big deal when it's for one week. But it's not for one week! They may only be staying for a week but there were probably people staying for the six weeks before them and people due to come in the six weeks after. My summer becomes one long round of fetching guests from the airport, ferrying them around the sights, helping them organise their itineraries and onward journeys, getting them medical care when they need it, being on stand-by to bring them back from town when they've done their shopping and of course planning their meals from dawn to dusk.
And then there are the breakages. I've rarely had guests who don't break things. It's normal, I know, because they're not in their own surroundings. So they tend to yank at door handles, wrench the shower attachment off the wall, knock furniture against windows as they move things around to suit themselves, break plates and glasses and crack the toilet seat. Invariably, they blame the things they've broken. "Something wrong with that kettle" they'll say sternly. "I just touched it and the handle fell off."
I gloomily add the kettle to the list of broken things I need to replace.
And then there are gifts.
Mysteriously, I have hardly ever had a guest arrive with a gift or leave a gift on parting. Guests can stay night after night, make full use of my unpaid taxi service, help themselves to my rosé wine, elbow their way to my laptop so they can check their email, shower twice a day till all the hot water's gone and leave their sheets and towels in a heap for me to deal with when they leave - and yet hardly one of them has ever thought to arrive with a bottle of wine or leave so much as a bar of lavender soap when their stay's over. In contrast, almost every guest takes great pleasure in showing me the gifts they've bought for their child/mother/husband/boyfriend/self. "I got these terrific sunglasses for Bob" they'll say. "And I thought I'd take this champagne home for dad." "Clothes are cheap here" they say. "I bought myself these jeans, this hat, this shirt and these boots. Bit extravagant but I thought - well - I'm on my holiday!"
Great. Meanwhile I'm standing there cooking the food I shopped for and paid for after they called to say they wouldn't be able to get to the supermarket because they were having so much fun spending money on themselves.
So there you are. That's a snapshot of summer when you own a house in Provence. You can easily end up running a free hotel and working as a full-time, unpaid holiday organiser. I'm not kidding. If I accepted every request for accommodation, advice and help with holiday organisation I would literally be working full-time, for free, all through the summer. And subsidising dozens of holidays out of my own pocket.
I've called a halt to it this summer. I had to. I don't have a 3 to 4000 euro fund spare with which to subsidise other people's holidays. I fear some friends and acquaintances will take offence but, as the French say, tant pis. I've done it for 5 years and I'm not doing it any more. There are certain friends who are still very welcome and they know who they are. The others will have to manage their holidays by themselves because this hotel in Provence is closed!
Monday, May 9, 2011
Cooking classes in Provence - L'Auberge de la Camarette at Pernes les Fontaines
The Auberge de la Camarette is a bit of a hidden treasure in Provence. In open countryside just on the edge of the pretty village Pernes les Fontaines, it's set in its own vineyard with a panoramic view of Mont Ventoux, the 'Giant of Provence'. A former 17th century magnanerie, or silk farm, it's a restaurant and chambres d'hotes full of character where you dine selon le marché - that is, you get what the chef decides to make on the day, according to the best local produce available.
The talented young chef, Hugues Marrec, also gives cooking classes on 8 Saturdays each year and this year, for the first time ever, I took a Provençal cooking class. It was on the 7th of May, my birthday, and a friend offered me the class as a birthday present. Three of us went in the end and it was just one of the best ways to spend a birthday or any Saturday morning.
The idea is that you work under Hugues' expert guidance between 9am and 1pm to create a 3-course meal and then you sit and enjoy it with a bottle of the Camarette vineyard wine. (I don't know how much it cost as it was a present, but around 75 euros I think.)
Now, I've lived in France for 11 years and have picked up some principles of French and Provençale cuisine from friends but I wouldn't claim to be any kind of chef. Nevertheless, Hugues proposed that the eight of us (there were 5 locals as well as me and my two girl friends) would produce the following menu:
Duo de petit pois et l'asperge: soupe froide de petits pois et menthe fraiche avec un flan de petits pois
La caille farcie avec une mousse d'asperge et asperges blanches frites
Un gratin de fraises de Pernes les Fontaines
The first thing we had to do in this well-organised but somehow relaxed restaurant kitchen, was debone the quails. Hugues made it look supremely simple. You plonk the deplumed quail on its stomach and remove the wings. Then you cut a fine line along its back. You hold the knife near the point and follow the bone down to the leg joint. Once you cut that, you turn the bird and do the same on the other side. A nip here and a tuck there and, with the chef's supervision, you have your quail ready to stuff. We made the farce and stuffed the birds, covered them with crépine (a delicate ivory-coloured film of sheep intestine which disappears in cooking), trussed them with string and then set them aside.
We turned our attention to the flan, the soup and the mousse. As we worked, Hugues gave us tips and explained various general principles about working with poultry, cutting vegetables, making meat and vegetable stock. I was pleased to see he worked in a very natural way - no fussy hairnets, no hygiene hysteria. We all washed our hands at every stage of cooking and Hugues washed the work surfaces down as we went along.
It was a hot sunny day, as the 7th of May often is, and a bunch of small kids were playing in the courtyard, peeking in through the kitchen window and giggling every so often.
We made so many lovely sauces and jus for the entrées, main course and dessert that my head was spinning after three hours. The last touch, the sabayon for the gratin de fraises, was simple given the wonderful effect in terms of taste. Throughout, our chef/teacher was relaxed, unhurried and supremely in control of processes and timing.
As it got near to one o'clock, I was a bit stunned to see customers coming in through the heavy old door, heading into the restaurant for lunch. The chef had spent 4 hours teaching us and timing our dishes and he had a restaurant full of customers to deal with too. We took our seats for an aperitif and were called back to the kitchen for the finition, or garnish, of each course.
Among us 'students' there was a local couple who were planning to replicate the entire meal for 6 friends that evening. Rather them than me!
There were a number of Americans lunching as ordinary customers and they asked why our table was different. They had waitress service. We kept vanishing into the kitchen and reappearing with our plates five minutes later. We explained the cooking course and Hugues, who has worked in England and America and speaks English, told them a bit about the preparation of each course.
It added so much interest to our meal, the fact that we'd prepared it ourselves (with quite a lot of guidance...) Foolish perhaps, but I think we all felt quite proud of our work. It gave a different perspective, too, to understand just how much talent, skill and hard work a chef puts into the preparation of a good 3 course meal. Somehow it made a very good lunch taste even better.
L'Auberge de la Camarette has space for just 30 diners and seems to rely on reputation and word of mouth locally for its business. The week before this cooking course I'd never heard of it. The owners do very little advertising and the vineyard is simply signed on the route out of Pernes by a tiny signpost.
It's a blissful spot though and well worth visiting whether you want to stay, dine there, take a cooking course, or all three. The website is: www.domaine-camarette.com
The nearest towns are Pernes les Fontaines, Isle sur Sorgue and Carpentras. I'd really highly recommend the place.
The talented young chef, Hugues Marrec, also gives cooking classes on 8 Saturdays each year and this year, for the first time ever, I took a Provençal cooking class. It was on the 7th of May, my birthday, and a friend offered me the class as a birthday present. Three of us went in the end and it was just one of the best ways to spend a birthday or any Saturday morning.
The idea is that you work under Hugues' expert guidance between 9am and 1pm to create a 3-course meal and then you sit and enjoy it with a bottle of the Camarette vineyard wine. (I don't know how much it cost as it was a present, but around 75 euros I think.)
Now, I've lived in France for 11 years and have picked up some principles of French and Provençale cuisine from friends but I wouldn't claim to be any kind of chef. Nevertheless, Hugues proposed that the eight of us (there were 5 locals as well as me and my two girl friends) would produce the following menu:
Duo de petit pois et l'asperge: soupe froide de petits pois et menthe fraiche avec un flan de petits pois
La caille farcie avec une mousse d'asperge et asperges blanches frites
Un gratin de fraises de Pernes les Fontaines
The first thing we had to do in this well-organised but somehow relaxed restaurant kitchen, was debone the quails. Hugues made it look supremely simple. You plonk the deplumed quail on its stomach and remove the wings. Then you cut a fine line along its back. You hold the knife near the point and follow the bone down to the leg joint. Once you cut that, you turn the bird and do the same on the other side. A nip here and a tuck there and, with the chef's supervision, you have your quail ready to stuff. We made the farce and stuffed the birds, covered them with crépine (a delicate ivory-coloured film of sheep intestine which disappears in cooking), trussed them with string and then set them aside.
We turned our attention to the flan, the soup and the mousse. As we worked, Hugues gave us tips and explained various general principles about working with poultry, cutting vegetables, making meat and vegetable stock. I was pleased to see he worked in a very natural way - no fussy hairnets, no hygiene hysteria. We all washed our hands at every stage of cooking and Hugues washed the work surfaces down as we went along.
It was a hot sunny day, as the 7th of May often is, and a bunch of small kids were playing in the courtyard, peeking in through the kitchen window and giggling every so often.
We made so many lovely sauces and jus for the entrées, main course and dessert that my head was spinning after three hours. The last touch, the sabayon for the gratin de fraises, was simple given the wonderful effect in terms of taste. Throughout, our chef/teacher was relaxed, unhurried and supremely in control of processes and timing.
As it got near to one o'clock, I was a bit stunned to see customers coming in through the heavy old door, heading into the restaurant for lunch. The chef had spent 4 hours teaching us and timing our dishes and he had a restaurant full of customers to deal with too. We took our seats for an aperitif and were called back to the kitchen for the finition, or garnish, of each course.
Among us 'students' there was a local couple who were planning to replicate the entire meal for 6 friends that evening. Rather them than me!
There were a number of Americans lunching as ordinary customers and they asked why our table was different. They had waitress service. We kept vanishing into the kitchen and reappearing with our plates five minutes later. We explained the cooking course and Hugues, who has worked in England and America and speaks English, told them a bit about the preparation of each course.
It added so much interest to our meal, the fact that we'd prepared it ourselves (with quite a lot of guidance...) Foolish perhaps, but I think we all felt quite proud of our work. It gave a different perspective, too, to understand just how much talent, skill and hard work a chef puts into the preparation of a good 3 course meal. Somehow it made a very good lunch taste even better.
L'Auberge de la Camarette has space for just 30 diners and seems to rely on reputation and word of mouth locally for its business. The week before this cooking course I'd never heard of it. The owners do very little advertising and the vineyard is simply signed on the route out of Pernes by a tiny signpost.
It's a blissful spot though and well worth visiting whether you want to stay, dine there, take a cooking course, or all three. The website is: www.domaine-camarette.com
The nearest towns are Pernes les Fontaines, Isle sur Sorgue and Carpentras. I'd really highly recommend the place.
Friday, May 6, 2011
The sheep who make Roquefort cheese: From Provence to the Aveyron
One of the many good things about living in Provence is that so many other places are also easily accessible. Fancy a weekend in Spain or Italy? They're in easy reach. Or a quick trip to Paris by TGV? Equally, the Cote d'Azur, Chateauneuf-du-Pape, the Dentelles, the Alps, the Drome and the Cevennes are all close to home.
One region I didn't know until recently is the Aveyron, which lies about two and a half hours away from here (Isle-sur-Sorgue, near Avignon). I took a trip at Easter to see friends who have bought an old ruin over there, under the foolish illusion that it won't turn into the Money Pit of Tom Hanks film fame.
François and Christie have a thing about restoring old ruins. They first bought a property near my home, back in the 80s. It was part of the local hamlet, an old plaster factory with homes for the workers, and François restored his property stone by stone and beam by beam.
The couple then sold to a couple of charming American Provenceophiles and bought a 12th century chapel in Avignon, the Chapel of the Miracle. I won't go into the 'miracle' here which involves sodomy, a young priest, burning at the stake and a dramatic escape but you can find it online (with apartments to rent if you're not troubled by gay young ghosts.)
Having made a fantastic job of restoring the ruined chapel, they've now bought their small ruin in the Aveyron for what the Provençaux call a poignée de figues and what English speakers call peanuts. Just 9000 peanuts to be precise.
With a chambre d'hote quickly booked online, I set off to Viala in the Aveyron. The region is quite different from Provence. There's far more in the way of empty rolling countryside, forest, and sheep dotted about on lonely hills. I was astounded to find the chambre d'hote - Le Tondut - which turned out to be a huge farmhouse on the scale of a chateau.
It sits alone in wonderful farmland and features 400 sheep who supply milk, daily, for the locally-made Roquefort cheese. When I arrived the flock was drifting peacefully across the hillside in the sun, nibbling the grass to within a centimetre of its life.
The owners, Nadine and Dédé Malaval, were instantly welcoming, relaxed and friendly. It was like arriving to see friends. We went into the old farm kitchen to chat and have coffee. My room was huge and light and airy with fantastic views of the countryside. The 400 sheep were right below the window.
That evening Nadine showed me la traite - the milking. I don't know if you've ever watched a traite but I found it pretty fascinating. We stood in a space around which an old wooden carousel turned. The sheep rattled up onto the platform, a door shut them into a little stall, they promptly stuck their heads over the door into a bucket of grain and there they stood, feeding, as the carousel turned. Nadine attached the milking apparatus to each sheep as it passed her and, 3 minutes later, the grain was finished, the milk was taken, the door nearest the exit would open and the sheep in that particular stall would rattle back down and off into the barn to eat hay.
The sheep all knew the drill and did just what they were meant to. They weren't the slightest bit bothered by the presence of the huge Le Tondut family hound, watching proceedings closely, one large ear up and one large ear down. In the huge barn on the other side of the milking room, Dédé was forking hay into troughs. Having given up their milk, the sheep were onto their next course. The milk meanwhile was filling a large tank, ready to be collected by the food company, Papillon, which makes Roquefort cheese. Roquefort is strictly controlled, has its own AOC and is aged in local caves. Personally, I find it too salty. I asked Dédé why the makers put so much salt in it. He laughed and said: "Weight." What? "Roquefort's sold by the kilo. Salt's heavier than milk. And it's cheap."
He and Nadine don't over-salt the products they make with the milk they retain though. At breakfast the next day, we had a wonderful farm-baked flan and home-made yoghurt straight from the sheep I now knew personally! It was lovely to sit watching the flock, eating breakfast made with milk they'd produced from that rich green Aveyron grass.
Le Tondut also features ducks, geese, dogs, donkeys, cows, calves, an immense glowering bull - and rabbits. I'm a sucker for rabbits (the soft eyes, the floppy ears...) and this lot included a couple of dozen day-old rabbits. They were nestling in luxurious rabbit-fur nests made by their mothers generously pulling out bits of their own fur. You could barely see their little pink heads. One litter was a few weeks old though and they were well into the hopping-around-looking-pretty stage.
I can thoroughly recommend Le Tondut. It's just outside Viala du Tarn in sublime countryside.
In the evening François and Christie arrived in what they call their camping car. It must be one of the first camping cars ever produced. Full of character is the best way to describe it. We ate at a terrific restaurant, La Vigne Gourmande, which is perched all alone on the side of a hill at Candas.
The views were stunning. The husband and wife owners were welcoming and relaxed. There was meat cooking on a huge open fire for a table of ten locals. The food was ridiculously cheap and really good.
All that remained was to see the newly-bought ruin the next morning. It's tiny, has no roof, no electricity, no water, but it has character and potential. It's in a tiny mostly-abandonded hamlet situated in beautiful countryside. The sun was shining, birds were singing and we set up a table and sat down to eat salad and drink a bottle of celebratory champagne.
This was my first visit to the Aveyron and I feel it's well worth returning to for its beautiful countryside and warm and welcoming people. Having a look at local farming was a bonus. So were the rabbits.
One region I didn't know until recently is the Aveyron, which lies about two and a half hours away from here (Isle-sur-Sorgue, near Avignon). I took a trip at Easter to see friends who have bought an old ruin over there, under the foolish illusion that it won't turn into the Money Pit of Tom Hanks film fame.
François and Christie have a thing about restoring old ruins. They first bought a property near my home, back in the 80s. It was part of the local hamlet, an old plaster factory with homes for the workers, and François restored his property stone by stone and beam by beam.
The couple then sold to a couple of charming American Provenceophiles and bought a 12th century chapel in Avignon, the Chapel of the Miracle. I won't go into the 'miracle' here which involves sodomy, a young priest, burning at the stake and a dramatic escape but you can find it online (with apartments to rent if you're not troubled by gay young ghosts.)
Having made a fantastic job of restoring the ruined chapel, they've now bought their small ruin in the Aveyron for what the Provençaux call a poignée de figues and what English speakers call peanuts. Just 9000 peanuts to be precise.
With a chambre d'hote quickly booked online, I set off to Viala in the Aveyron. The region is quite different from Provence. There's far more in the way of empty rolling countryside, forest, and sheep dotted about on lonely hills. I was astounded to find the chambre d'hote - Le Tondut - which turned out to be a huge farmhouse on the scale of a chateau.
It sits alone in wonderful farmland and features 400 sheep who supply milk, daily, for the locally-made Roquefort cheese. When I arrived the flock was drifting peacefully across the hillside in the sun, nibbling the grass to within a centimetre of its life.
The owners, Nadine and Dédé Malaval, were instantly welcoming, relaxed and friendly. It was like arriving to see friends. We went into the old farm kitchen to chat and have coffee. My room was huge and light and airy with fantastic views of the countryside. The 400 sheep were right below the window.
That evening Nadine showed me la traite - the milking. I don't know if you've ever watched a traite but I found it pretty fascinating. We stood in a space around which an old wooden carousel turned. The sheep rattled up onto the platform, a door shut them into a little stall, they promptly stuck their heads over the door into a bucket of grain and there they stood, feeding, as the carousel turned. Nadine attached the milking apparatus to each sheep as it passed her and, 3 minutes later, the grain was finished, the milk was taken, the door nearest the exit would open and the sheep in that particular stall would rattle back down and off into the barn to eat hay.
The sheep all knew the drill and did just what they were meant to. They weren't the slightest bit bothered by the presence of the huge Le Tondut family hound, watching proceedings closely, one large ear up and one large ear down. In the huge barn on the other side of the milking room, Dédé was forking hay into troughs. Having given up their milk, the sheep were onto their next course. The milk meanwhile was filling a large tank, ready to be collected by the food company, Papillon, which makes Roquefort cheese. Roquefort is strictly controlled, has its own AOC and is aged in local caves. Personally, I find it too salty. I asked Dédé why the makers put so much salt in it. He laughed and said: "Weight." What? "Roquefort's sold by the kilo. Salt's heavier than milk. And it's cheap."
He and Nadine don't over-salt the products they make with the milk they retain though. At breakfast the next day, we had a wonderful farm-baked flan and home-made yoghurt straight from the sheep I now knew personally! It was lovely to sit watching the flock, eating breakfast made with milk they'd produced from that rich green Aveyron grass.
Le Tondut also features ducks, geese, dogs, donkeys, cows, calves, an immense glowering bull - and rabbits. I'm a sucker for rabbits (the soft eyes, the floppy ears...) and this lot included a couple of dozen day-old rabbits. They were nestling in luxurious rabbit-fur nests made by their mothers generously pulling out bits of their own fur. You could barely see their little pink heads. One litter was a few weeks old though and they were well into the hopping-around-looking-pretty stage.
I can thoroughly recommend Le Tondut. It's just outside Viala du Tarn in sublime countryside.
In the evening François and Christie arrived in what they call their camping car. It must be one of the first camping cars ever produced. Full of character is the best way to describe it. We ate at a terrific restaurant, La Vigne Gourmande, which is perched all alone on the side of a hill at Candas.
The views were stunning. The husband and wife owners were welcoming and relaxed. There was meat cooking on a huge open fire for a table of ten locals. The food was ridiculously cheap and really good.
All that remained was to see the newly-bought ruin the next morning. It's tiny, has no roof, no electricity, no water, but it has character and potential. It's in a tiny mostly-abandonded hamlet situated in beautiful countryside. The sun was shining, birds were singing and we set up a table and sat down to eat salad and drink a bottle of celebratory champagne.
This was my first visit to the Aveyron and I feel it's well worth returning to for its beautiful countryside and warm and welcoming people. Having a look at local farming was a bonus. So were the rabbits.
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