France – Page 3 – From Pyrenees to Pennines

Saudade for Our Little Corner of France

Saudade is a Portuguese word, introduced to us by Egidio, who proposes it for this week’s Lens-Artists Challenge. Here’s what it means:

... an emotional state of melancholic or profoundly nostalgic longing for a beloved yet absent someone or something. It is a recollection of feelings, experiences, places, or events, often elusive, that cause a sense of separation from the exciting, pleasant, or joyous sensations they once caused.

It’s what we both feel so very often about our years in southern France, now some ten years gone. Of course we remember the landscape – the foothills, the Pyrenees themselves, the seasons, the climate , the slower pace of life …

Of course we do. But we remember even more the happy Sundays and Thursdays we had discovering these landscapes with our two local walking groups. We were the only British members, and how different these expeditions were from their English equivalents. After a morning slogging up a mountain, we were rewarded with views, perhaps a stream, a wild-flower strewn meadow. Then Marcel the butcher would produce his own home-cured sausage; Sylvie offered her daughter’s sheep’s milk cheese; someone would bring bread; Yvette and I brought cake; wine was on offer, and an apéro, and after that someone or other would hand out sugar lumps, on which to drip just a little of their grandfather’s special home-confected digestif. After a nice long rest, we’d pack up and find a different path downwards.

Eating was at the heart of so many activities. Here’s another community meal, tables ranged over the town square so everyone could get together and enjoy each other’s company while celebrating some local highlight..

In fact enjoyment came high on everyone’s agenda. Every July, for instance, in a small village a few miles from ours, a group of volunteers spend months devising Le Jardin Extraordinaire. People come from miles around to enjoy strolling through bowers confected from still-growing gourds, and climbing upwards through woodlands with surprises: beautiful, silly, witty – every year was different.

Then there was the annual firework display on the lake at Puivert, which took the concept of fireworks to a whole new level. It reduced the audience of 1000 or more, who’d all come with families, friends and the makings of a fine picnic to astonished silence as the spectacle ended, before simultaneously roaring their tumultuous appeciation of the astonishing creations set before our eyes.

Our French friends taught us about ‘au cas où‘: the need to have with you at all times a bag or similar ‘just in case‘ you found walnuts, wild cherries, sweet chestnuts, mushrooms – all sorts of food-for-free for the thrify householder. I was au cas où–ing only yesterday, finding crab apples, pears, apples, mirabelles all there for the taking, just as our French friends recommended.

I’ll stop there. The feelings of longing, of saudade are strong …

For Egidio’s Lens-Artists Challenge #365: Longing.

Does 1+1+1 = 1 Bench?

Spotted on a roundabout in Brittany. It can’t qualify on its own for Jude’s Bench Challenge, though it’s perfect for Becky’s #SimplyRed. But would three together cut the mustard?

I Spy with my Little Eye …

something beginning with H. That’s what Sarah of Travel with Me wants from us today for Leanne’s Monochrome Madness.

Well, in among all the other acts, Ripon’s Theatre Festival included a few sets of Morris dancers – just as likely to be women as men these days. And they all flaunt terrific Headgear on their Heads. I mean… Hats. Here are a couple: and including two more in the featured photo.

Horses. I won’t show you show-jumpers, or mares with their foals in bucolic meadows. Here’s one waiting patiently for the 159 in Masham one evening as we were on our way to Photo Club. The last bus had left an hour and a half before. In truth, she was on the way to Appleby Horse Fair, an event that. although centuries old, isn’t as long-established as Morris dancing. This horse was one of dozens of horses and vardoes we see making their slow way there in the weeks before.

Let’s continue to be a little Olde Worlde. Here’s a House spotted last year in Vitré in Brittany, a town which boasts almost no other housing style.

Or shall we go for a little Hut in the grounds of Sleningford Old Hall, or a tiny House, fairies-for-the-use-of, in Nidd Hall?

Fairies make me think of other out-of this world creatures, as seen at Hallowe’en.

Not frightened yet? I can sort that out. Here’s the Hideous Head of a Gegant in Premià de Mar , and a Haunting Harridan from the Puppet Museum in Cádiz.

I don’t want to leave you quivering though. Let’s go back to Morris Dancing and Hats of course, and let the Slubbing Billys cheer you up. In black and white, and in Glorious Technicolor With Red Highlights for Becky’s #SimplyRed Squares.

Street lights in Spain

For this week’s Monochrome Madness, This week’s host Brian of Bushboy’s World has asked us to consider Street lights. I assembled a clutch of them, and realised that they all come from Spain.

The featured photo was taken one evening near our hotel in Seville. This next batch all come from Cádiz.

… and one of them is merely a shadow of a streetlight.

Off to Málaga now, just after Christmas.

Another one from Seville …

And the city I know best, Barcelona? Well, not a single night time shot. Instead, here are two taken in broad daylight.

I’m away for a few days, so this post, and the next few are scheduled. So – sorry – I may be slow in commenting, and even slower at reading your posts.

Night Time

Night photography isn’t really my thing, so Elke, this week’s host for Monochrome Madness, provided me with a real challenge when she proposed Night time as her theme.

Unsurprisingly, towns and cities provided me with a few ideas. Let’s go on a quick tour. Let’s visit Albania, England, Spain, France, South Korea and Poland…

Really though, Country Mouse prefers to dodge big cities. My featured photo is of the moon as darkness fell recently, while the photo below was taken just at the end of the road.

Exactly a Year Ago Today, We Were in …

Laon, as we made our way down eastern France towards our daughter’s family in Spain. This is a lovely place. We zig-zagged our way up the steep slopes of a hill straight out of a children’s picture book and found ourselves in a perfect mediaeval town. It used to be quite a place. Important in Roman times; a hub of the Carolingian Empire, it was capital city of this part of France – until 987 CE, when the baton passed to Paris. The 12th century cathedral testifies to the fact that the city remained a religious hub for long after that. These days it’s an administrative centre and modestly-sized industrial hub, and well worth a day of your time as a tourist.

I’m focussing, for today’s Monochrome Madness on some of the more quirky recent features of the town – the mediaeval-style signs above the shops announcing their trade, some street art – some formal, and other more idiosyncratic items. The cathedral barely gets a look in – we weren’t allowed to visit much of it it inside, and it was raining outside. But I’ve given you a glance at it.

A final image from an unloved corner, where ancient buildings had been deserted before they tumbled down an eroding cliff-face.

Euskal Herria meets the Yorkshire Dales – Revisited

I was sorry, when we left France, that we hadn’t made more than a couple of visits to its Basque Country. It’s such a different part of France, for all kinds of reasons, some of which may become apparent in this post I wrote – gosh – fourteen years ago.

Euskal Herria meets the Yorkshire Dales

March 10th 2011

This week was a first for us, when we made a quick visit to the Basque country (Euskal Herria), way over to the west . When we got there, there were no frontier posts, but we knew immediately that we’d arrived. Suddenly, houses, instead of being colour-washed in creams and beiges and ochres, or not at all, were all tidily painted white, every single one, with ox-blood coloured shutters and paintwork. Place names were in French and Basque, and quite a lot of other signage too.

Not a Yorkshire view. A vulture wheeling overhead.

But the thing is, despite all that, we thought we’d arrived in Yorkshire, or Lancashire, or somewhere in England at any rate. Softly rambling ranges of hills, so very green, and studded with sheep. Roads which preferred to ramble gently round the contours instead of going straight in the French style. Take away the Pyrénées in the background, their jagged peaks still white with fresh snow, add in a few drystone walls, and – voilà! – the Yorkshire Dales.

After all the hard work back at the house, we needed the peace of the countryside, so we’d chosen to stay at an Accueil Paysan farm. We knew that meant that we’d be welcomed into simple comfortable accommodation at the farmer’s house, and share a family meal with them in the evening. Always good value in all sorts of ways.

The welcoming committee in this case turned out to be six cheerily noisy pigs, a gang of chickens, and a sheep dog. The humans were no less friendly, and we settled in by exploring the small farm with its 30 or so cattle, and about 300 sheep. Sheep’s cheese is the big thing round here, and throughout the autumn and spring, when there’s plenty of milk, this family makes cheese every morning (far too early for us to be there, it turned out: all over by 7 o’clock) in their fine new cheese-production shed.

Our hosts are Basque speakers. Their children only learnt French when they went to school. Now that one of these children has a son of his own, he and his wife (who’s not a Basque speaker) have chosen to have the boy educated at one of the many Basque-medium schools, so that he will be among the 30% of Basques who are comfortable using their language. It’s an impenetrable and complex one. Its roots are a bit of a mystery, and certainly it’s not Indo-European. With French, Italian and Latin at our disposal, we can make a good stab at understanding Occitan, the language of our region, but Basque remains impenetrable to anyone who hasn’t been immersed in it.

The next day, we explored St. Jean Pied de Port. From before the time of the Romans, it’s been a market town, an important jumping off point for Spain. It’s been a garrison too, and an important stop-over for pilgrims on their way to Compostella. Now it’s a tourist centre too, for walkers in the region. It’s an attractive town, surrounded by ramparts. We pottered around, enjoying views from the ramparts, pilgrim-spotting, ancient doorways, and watching the river, before setting off for a leisurely journey home.

And next time we stay, we’ll make it much longer than 36 hours.

The featured photo is a view of St. Jean Pied de Port.

Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread & Voilà! Revisited

Here’s a post which I wrote fifteen years ago, when we lived in France. At the time, it pointed up the difference between bread-buying in England, where bread had too often become an industrial product, and the more home-spun approach we appreciated in our small French town. Now however, artisan bakers in England are two a penny. Their stuff is good, but when we want to frighten ourselves to death, we comment to eack other ‘What WOULD our mothers have said at handing over just shy of £5 for a loaf of bread?’ That’s was Malcolm’s dad’s entire weekly earnings. No wonder I’ve taken to making my own.

Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread

25th February 2010

How could they? I mean, what ARE they playing at? All last week, and most of this, the baker’s shop down the road has been closed. Instead of rising at 2.00 a.m. to get busy making baguettes, flutes, ficelles, baguettes a l’ancienne, flutes tradition, pain noir, chocolatines, croissants and so on and so on, our bakers have chosen to lie in till – ooh, 7 o’clock perhaps – and then spend the day catching up with their families – the children are on half term.

It’s a family business, our baker’s shop. M & Mme Fonquernie owned it, and now, although officially they’ve retired, they help out all the time. M. Fonquernie is the one who drives his little white van round the local villages which have no shops, delivering bread. Their two sons have now taken over the day-to-day baking. One is responsible for all those loaves, while the other specialises in patisserie. Their wives divide the work of running the shop between them with Mme Fonquernie Senior’s help.

Mme. Fonquernie presides over the shop on most days.

So our morning routine has been disrupted. First thing each day, one of us usually walks down the road to get our favourite pain noir, hot and crisp still from the oven. The other day, the baker forgot the salt. The bread wasn’t half so nice, but I rather liked this very human error. It proved that our loaves are still ‘artisanale’, rather than being churned out by some computer-assisted machine. There’s generally someone in the shop to chat to, or to walk back along the street with, and so neither of us looks on getting the bread in as a chore.

We’re lucky, I suppose, that there are three bakers in town. Last week, we went to the shops at Castellanes to the baker there. No pain noir at this shop, so we chose their unbleached white. The small one’s a slender baguette shape – an Ariegeoise (female) – but buy the larger butch version, and you must ask for an Ariegeois (male).

But then what happened? A notice appeared in the shop: from Sunday, they too would be closed for a holiday. So for a few days this week, we have to patronise shop number three. Everybody moans ‘C’est pain industriel ça’. It’s true. It comes all the way from Lavelanet, from a bakery which has three shops. That’s mass production, and it shows. Roll on Thursday, when the Fonquernie family re-opens its shop doors.

And here’s a short scene from the baker’s about 18 months later, exposing the use of the most useful word there is in French …

Voilà!

7th September 2011

Here’s what happened at the baker’s this morning. Translations appear in brackets.

Me: Oh! Isn’t the pain bio ready yet?

Madame: Voilà! (Nope. Quite right)

Me: So if I call in after 9, you’ll have some? Could you please save me a loaf?

Madame: Voilà! (Yes, and yes). Would you like to pay now, then it’ll be all done and dusted?

Me: Voilà! (Makes sense. I’ll do that)

By the way, I was all grottily dressed in my oldest paint-spattered, holes-in-the-knee-ready-to-face-a-morning’s-tiling gear. This is Laroque after all: no shame in working clothes here.

Madame: You’re looking very chic today, if I may say so.

Me: Voilà! (And don’t I know it).

Why bother to learn more French? Voilà donc!

Only the photo of Mme Fonquernie is my own. The rest come courtesy of Unsplash, and are (reading from top to bottom) by Sergio Artze; Wesual and Markus Spiske.

Geometry in Saint-Malo

I feel a little sad. This month’s Squares, cheerfully and positively initiated and choreographed by Becky is drawing to a close. For me, it’s been a great chance to record a whole special month of family time in Spain, and travels in France. The downside to my travels has been I’ve had less chance than I would have liked to explore everyone else’s contributions.

But we’ve reached the last day. I showed you shots of Vitré yesterday, so now it’s time to show you a few of Saint-Malo, our point of departure from France. We arrived in time to sightsee: but heavy rain, falling more-or-less horizontally because of the high wind rather put a stop to that. Here are a few shots I took during odd minutes when the rain stopped, and I scuttled out with my phone to try my luck..

Ships rely a great deal on geometry, so here’s a large and well used fishing vessel …

And here are breakwater poles, parallel-parked in the sea. Which was rough enough to worry this reluctant matelot. Inexplicably, though the night of our journey to England was turbulent, I survived intact.

I can’t leave you though, without sharing an image I snapped as we drove round a roundabout not too far from Angers. Is it geometry? Is it art? Or is it simply … a chair?

GeometricJanuary.

Geometry in Vitré

We arrived back home yesterday afternoon – and by gum, it’s cold. Brrrr. A house in January, unlived in for a month, is Not The Place To Be. So I’ll warm myself up by showing you some pictures of a town we enjoyed visiting for just a couple of hours on our last day.

It’s Vitré, a town in Brittany that still has not only an impressive castle, but a preserved town centre dating from mediaeval times. It was both a prosperous trading centre for wool and woollen goods, and a bit of a military hotspot. That castle, commanding from its hilltop site views all over the Vilaine valley below saw frequent military action.

Today, the town is charming, picturesque – and wonkily geometric. Just enjoy a quick stroll round its narrow streets with me:

Do you think Rapunzel lived in the dwelling below?

A couple more streets, and a charming decorative detail beneath a window …

…. and finally, the castle.

We didn’t visit the castle or the museum housed there – they were both closed. A good enough excuse to go back another time and explore a little longer.

GeometricJanuary.