Yes, within the space of a few days, we have gone from deep snow, marooned at the house unable to get the car out on the road, to 19 degrees, stripping off to T-shirts! Long may it last...we are hoping the worst of the winter is now over and we can look forward to a long European summer.
Our main event this week was preparing for the arrival of the Russians! No, not an invasion, but a viewing of the house...or was it the same thing in the end?!. The property has been for sale for about 18 months, and this was the first time we have had people through the house. So, much time was spent trying to get the place looking presentable after all the snow. All was looking good the night before, when we received a call from Ludmilla, the Russian estate agent who was bringing the Russian family the next morning. Just one small thing: "the Russians will not find it acceptable to enter the front door, as it goes straight into the kitchen. Please will you create a new front door to enter?" A new front door. Well, lets see now. In New Zealand, no problem, just a quick whip round with the chain saw and a new front door could be opened up in a jiffy. But here we are in a 14th Century stone farmhouse. The front door has been in place for over 600 years with no complaints so far. But hey, if the Russians want a new front door, who are we to argue? So, it was all hands on deck - which means Lew and I: the cat flatly refuses to do any manual labour, and the chickens, although enthusiastic, can't be relied on to lift their end of the the sofa without dropping it. A bit of creative manouvering of furniture outside, rearranging furniture inside, severe pruning of greenery, and we had our "new front door" through the French doors opening out to the pool! Russians duly arrive in large black car, accompanied by Ludmilla and her husband in large silver car. Mum and Dad, three teenage children, and one unidentified other. Then followed the fastest house viewing I have ever experienced. Bearing in mind we are in a 7 bedroom 6 bathroom property spread over 4 levels and two interconnecting residences, I would say they were in and out within 3 minutes flat. None of your opening and closing of drawers here, no examination of cupboard sizes, crawling under the house to check the foundations, or measuring the room to see if your super-king size bed will fit. Just breeze through, barely glancing left and right, muttering in Russian throughout. Surprisingly, they were more interested in the grounds, and walked all the way round the river path, carefully wiping the smallest speck of dirt off their shoes as they went (and there's a lot of mud our there at the moment - it wasn't a quick walk!) Then off they swept in the aforementioned black and silver cars. So that was that. Sorry, no photos - didn't think it would go down well!
On to much more exciting events: my birthday on Saturday! Naturally, the day was all about me! In fact, maybe the whole weekend! So, after the usual start to the day with feeding chickens and cat, we set off for Carces. This is a village quite near us, about 20 minutes away, but this was the first time we had visited, and we loved it. It was market day, and a beautiful sunny warm day, so of course anywhere is going to look good on a day like that, but even so. Things got off to a good start when we found 3 patisseries within 20 metres of each other. Croissants and pain au raisin in hand, we found a cafe in the sun, packed with locals, and did our best to blend in with the French.
 |
| Am I looking suitably French yet? |
Carces has a very interesting mix of people. There were quite a few well dressed, almost trendy people around, then some down to earth farming types, plus the sound of English voices every now and then. These three chaps were sitting outside a cafe off the main square, enjoying the peace and sunshine. Lew "made me" go and talk to them, and they were just delightful, quite happy to pose for a photo for the bizarre New Zealanders!
There are two main interesting features in Carces, firstly the "trompe l'oeil" which roughly translates as "deceiving the eye" - large pictures usually painted on the side of buildings to make you think you are looking at another scene. The ones in Carces depict life as it was in the village in past years, and they are very impressive.
There are quite a few others around the village that we didn't have time to search out - we'll leave them for next time.
The other, slightly stranger feature in Carces are the "fish scale" tiles on the side of a few of the buildings.
Quite difficult to photograph effectively, and there's no real reason for their presence as far as we could find out, but they provide a bit of colour and variety.
So, the morning has passed by and we're now off to Cotignac. Not wishing to sound repetitive to those of you who are reading about our village visits regularly, but it's another medieval village, just not quite a hill-top one this time. However, like Villecroze, it does have a backdrop of troglodyte caves once again. And, once again, they were closed so we couldn't explore too far without coming across gates barring the way. Seems like a lot of places don't get going until Easter at the earliest.
Luckily the troglodytes had impressive forethought, and kindly constructed garages in the caves, for future car driving generations...
Cotignac has a lovely central main street, lined with cafes and restaurants on each side. The big plane trees will provide great shade when the leaves appear in spring, so you find these trees in all the villages in Provence.
Of course birthdays are all about food, especially in France. By now the croissants and coffee were a distant memory, so we sat down outside a creperie and had savoury crepes for lunch, mine filled with goats cheese, tomatoes and mesclun, and Lew's with ham, cheese and mushrooms. For those of you in Nelson who haven't yet experienced La Gourmandise French restaurant, you should give it a go, their savoury crepes are spot on.
A wander through the streets provides more opportunity for photos, both traditional....
and not so traditional...
French graveyards are functional and easy-care! No grass to mow, paths to tend, flowers to rot, just a lot of concrete, stone and plastic flowers galore!
The drive home provided two examples of French attitude to rules and regulations. As you know, the French love to make rules, and the more trees they can consume in the process of filing paperwork, the better. However, when it comes to complying with these rules, there is sometimes a "subtle" display of resistance, and the wish to "make a point"....
 |
| Dear home owner, trees must be trimmed clear of power lines at all times |
 |
| Just need to add the shutters then we're all done. |
On the way home, we stopped off at the local vineyard so Lew could pick up a bottle of wine to go with dinner. However, they didn't provide a wheelbarrow to get it to the car, so we saved ourselves 600 euros and settled for our usual 3 euro bottle instead.
Continuing the eating-for-France challenge that we have gamely taken on, dinner finished with the unveiling of the Birthday Cake. Lew had, of course, spent hours slaving over a hot oven, baking, glazing, decorating.....I was particularly impressed with his knife skills slicing the apple!
And so ends my first French Birthday, with the puzzling question: with all this food and drink, how do the French stay so slim.....?!?
No comments:
Post a Comment