La Ciotat

La Ciotat it was - at last. Sunny and not windy so off we went. Two hours more or less down the various Autoroutes to the South and we were there. First stop was the famous Gare immortalised by the Lumière Brothers. Adam wanted to see it, so did I. Others were less keen. And it proved somewhat elusive too - miles out of town almost in St Cyr. Once bagged we were back on course and came to rest in the vast marina carpark which by great good fortune was free (payment starts on Friday).












The port was busy and colourful with all manner of craft from picturesque latines to huge white yachts, and photo opportunities abounded.

 The town is charming with painted houses on narrow streets opening onto the port, historic chapels and grand facades. It is also the home of pétanque, but once again we failed to find the original pitch despite getting so far as the carpark named in its honour! Nothing there so far as we could see.
A reminder... pétanque is boules, but the version where you stand with your feet together as you throw rather than taking a run at it.

The former shipyard has been partially converted into a retail and heritaged area with sculptures and restaurants and a museum. There is a great view of the old town across the water. That is until this monster bore down on us and moored alongside blocking the light! The Hampshire is its name and we deduced it had been out for some sort of sea trials.

 One of the reasons we'd delayed our visit was so that we could drive the Route des Crêtes again. It has to be a fairly calm day or they close it. Today was perfect and we got the full benefit of the glorious scenery and views, not to mention the hillsides covered in lovely flowers. Many of these are precious garden favourites in England but here they are wild and prolific.

Cistus, lavender stoechys (the one with little ears), lemon yellow dandelion type one
















and again the mysterious white spike that we saw in the Alpilles. These now were also sporting large berry like seeds on the stems. No idea what it is.

We almost ended up driving both ways on the route. At the other end lies Cassis and Cassis has a lighthouse - a small one admittedly, but it had to be scored. However, Cassis is what Adrian calls, A Honeypot. And today the bees were swarming. Not a parking space to be had and, frankly, it all looked a bit trippery. So much so that the authorities had seen fit to put up notices to the effect that Proper Dress was to be Worn - the mind boggles. So we drove back up to a viewpoint above the town and the photo was taken from there! NB this pic is NOT Cassis but La Ciotat.

Vent...ooh

Today we had planned a trip to La Ciotat and a ride along the route des crêtes. But this road is closed in times of vent violent and the forecast was for gusts of 90kph. So what to do? We were up and dressed at 7.30 ready to go so the day loomed before us somewhat. Adam and I walked to Séguret pondering. Adrian picked us up. The decision was made to go to Brantes for a coffee and view of Ventoux's rugged side.












So far so good. However, once at Brantes (lovely perched village with meandering cobbled streets and views) it became apparent that things were not open.















Not the café on the edge, not even the Bistrot de Pays. Bummer!
We drove on into the hinterland of le géant, via Savoillans (bistrot de p open but a bit dear despite there being a rabbit dish of the day) , and eventually to Sault. That good old stalwart.

Adrian and Adam insisted we eat on the terrace of the Panorama Caff even though the wind was howling across the valley. Adam's salad sailed off his plate onto a nearby chair! We held off having pud as there is a really really fab ice-cream place in town. We had a half hour to wait until they reopened so I spent this fruitfully documenting the gross street names.


We have, dung street, fly squasher street and arse -breaker street. Nice! Then blow me down, wretched pâtisserie was not yet selling its fabled ices! Had to make do with CAKE.




The return to base was via the Mountain himself. We'd watched the clouds come and go from our lunch spot and it was too irresistable.






On the way, rounding a bend,we were stopped in our tracks by what seemed to be a giant stag staring at us. In fact a most realistic sculpture made of old metal bits and pieces. And behind him in the forest a hind and fawn...aah.








But the wind was strong, the car was struggling to make headway and there was a sign saying the Col was Fermé. Undeterred we pressed on, rocking and swaying. The snow poles appeared, crusted with haw frost, banks of snow still clung to the roadside. We parked up and Oates-like stepped into the unknown. Five mins of snapping was enough. We huddled back in the car.The onboard thermometer read zero.











 On the summit the barrier was well and truly across the road-  no one could go down the Malaucène direction.











But Beloved Bench had to be visited, if only to check it hadn't been blown away. It lives on.

later that afternoon

 It was supposed to clear up but in fact the rain set in on and off. Adam and I went to Gigondas to view the annual sculptures. But first we came upon this wonderful exhibition in the espace culturel. A complete recreation of a 1950s primary classsroom with everything from desks, satchels, exercise books to teacher's gown, text books, schemes of work... Brill. Pity we don't teach like this these days - the facts ma'am, give me the facts! French kids certainly learned all the details of hist and geog as well as grammar and science.

Verbs taking être in the perfect tense... Mind you we were asked to fill in the visitors' book with nib pen and ink. Something that A had never come across. And I had to ask teacher whether dommage que took the subjunctive !  9/20 for us.

The sculptures this year were mostly metal. Some better than others. We liked this strange reflective metal spoon-like effort though. No vampires here.

This one in front of the church reminds me of the red quill pen attached to the church tower in Grignan. It rocked to and fro in the wind with a strange groaning sound. Thinks... is it stable in Mistral?

Power Gen

 Raining today so here are more pictures of the white heat of technology from yesterday.

Overlooking Tricastin Nuclear from the troglodyte settlement.

Donzère Mondragon multi-site. Dedicated to one André Blondel, Who he? Read on...

André-Eugène Blondel (28 August 1863 – 15 November 1938) was a French engineer andphysicist. He is the inventor of the electromechanical oscillograph and a system of photometricunits of measurement.

Old and new

 It was all set to be a scorchio day as we headed to the Rhône once more. This time to visit the troglodyte village high above Bollène. The ruins of the village are supposedly off limits BY LAW but no one seems to take any notice and we were able to wander about at will. There were notices of dire peril because of the risk of rock falls but it all seemed fairly stable! However the village was abandoned at the end of the 19th century because of serious rockfalls and many deaths.
The view are pretty good over the Donzère Mondragon canal and Tricastin Nuclear power station. Kites circling above. I almost got lost on the descent by taking a wrong turn in the forest but fortunately two joggers came by and gave me directions. Phew,








 Having regained sea level we detoured via another power generating facility on the river. This one run by the Compagnie Nationale du Rhône who have landscaped their car park and positively encourage visitors to gaze up at the magnificent edifice above the purring turbines.
















 There is even one on display. And they do all sorts of Green generation including solar array and wind turbines. Not to mention the aforementioned nuclear job up the road.

















We spent the afternoon by the banks of the Rhône proper at the spot we'd visited last week by the TGV line near Mornas. Today there were men working under the bridge on the rough track. And they were having a lunchtime game of boules (as you do) as we approached. Think they were a little surprised to see an English car trundling up!
The little nature reserve was a lovely as ever. There was a heron hunting frogs and I was looking at the interpretation panel I heard footsteps rapidly approaching. I thought it was probably a jogger but when I turned round there was a hare zooming up the bank and along the levée. My two favourite creatures in one go.


Lots more TGVs at close quarters were observed and snapped. Then we drove farther along the river track with the magnificent fortress of Mornas in the background. It was very warm!

 There are many bridges to walk to and capture on digital but I turned to these rather elegant high tension pylons just for a bit of variety. The air was thick with nightingales singing and every time the trains thundered by they turned up their volume to maximum in competition. Appropriate, as today is Rossignol day in the French Revolutionary calendar.

The Baronnies

 Off into the big hills north of Nyons on a Vulture Safari today. The road winds up through impressive gorges either side of the Eygues (or Aygues or Aigues depending on where you are). Then there is a vertiginous twisty single track up to the Rocher du Caire where Vultures various make their home. And a lovely 20 minute or so walk from the parking area to the very edge of the cliff. It's a smashing place with lavender fields mixed with pines and pasture and all manner of birds, including a cuckoo.

 There are vultures in these pictures but my camera is feeble and this is at full zoom. There were serious twitchers up there with tripods and massive telephotos on motor drive. Better just to look at the wonderful creatures really. They are fabulous and we had a most enjoyable couple of hours.

The pines are full of these weird cocoon-like nests. Over the years we have pondered what makes them and there is some dispute as to whether it is spiders or caterpillars. Hard to tell from just peering into them.

After a bowl of chips in the café at the bottom of the cliff we ventured a little farther to Rosans. A sweet little perched village off the road to Serres and just into the Hautes Alpes. It's a far more open landscape here with great views. The village is a bit fey in some respects with all this wrought iron signage! It has some good old buildings though. And there's a notice on the church saying that the day after the funeral mass for De Gaulle the nave collapsed! Too much hearty singing perhaps.

 Another strange sign. Do they all have to park together?

A nice bit of metal sculpture in front of the old café. Crane or heron? I think the former.

arrivals

Monday - the arrival of Young Lordship. But not until the evening. We decided to spend the waiting hours down in the Montagnette - a lovely little range of hills south of Avignon. Sort of mini Alpilles. There are a couple of really nice villages there, Barbentane and Boulbon. We'd been to the former last year so meandered our way to Boulbon via the other side of the Rhône, arriving fortuitously in time for lunch! There was a table of Chinese people next to us tucking into the entrecôte and chips - or rather into the entrecôte. None of them so much as touched a chip! Do they not eat them in China?




Boulbon is a charming place - all paved streets and solid stone houses, one of which has its very own Monument Historique attached to the wall. Wonder if it goes with the house when sold? At the top there is a huge ruined fort, not currently accessible. On the way up past it I noticed a large dark chestnut coloured goat standing on the very edge and for a moment thought it was one of those metal sculptures. Then it moved.

A fine sight. And there are walks going into the hills from the top. We had plenty of time so embarked on one that lead up through limestone paths and aromatic shrubs.There were some lovely flowers along the way and birdsong and it were all reet graidley.

Typical French sign. Extolling the loveliness of nature and the dear little partridges. Then underneath -  the hunting days!














We passed the remaining hours getting lost round Maillane (birthplace of Mistral) and eventually got to Vallabrègues - holder of the annual basketmaking festival. Then we parked up alongside the Rhône with a view of the TGV bridge to await the arrival. Blessed thing was 30 mins late due to slow running at Pierrelatte. We'd noticed the slow moving TGVs from the heights of La Garde Adhémar a few weeks ago as we looked down on the line from the ramparts.

Tuesday - it's hot! Just had sandwiches at the bar en famille which is great. Then a lazy afternoon on the terrace.

rain stops play

as predicted... vide grenier put off to next Sunday.
So here are some flowers.












Wondrous Wisteria !

end of the week

Not very exciting for you le...blog watchers! Yesterday was a visit to the hilltop village of Villedieu - haunt of Alistair Campbell et al in season. Nice walk round the outer limits with views to Ventoux and down the valley back to Sablet, then a tarte at the olde worlde café in the square...















...overlooked by this warning to all lion tamers. Noli irritare leonem. Pre walk we went to the local wine Coop and sampled the wares. Shock Horror, they do a perfectly delicious Chardonnay! I told girl this tipple was a bit of a joke in Angleterre and we concluded that it was probably because what the WAGS drink is not French!

Then in the evening we went to the late matinée at Le Florian. The Second best exotic Marigold Hotel. Don't bother! Even worse than the original one. Only held together by good actors.

Back to Sablet. Dire going on at the Boulangerie the other night. Poor Julian the young baker (son of delightful Nathalie) was held up AT GUN POINT in the early hours and his brand new car was stolen. Dreadful - he is most shaken up, unsurprisingly, and a petition of solidarity is being signed in the Vival. Gendarmes on the scene again today

But we have a new Plane tree outside Vival. The previous one took sick and died last year and some municipal expense has been incurred for the replacement mature specimen.

Vide Grenier tomorrow...watch this space. Unless, of course it is rained off. Forecast not brilliant.
Tonight we have a soirée here with four other expats of mixed race (Welsh, British, German). Alas, the terrace looks less and less probable.

Rain and train

Thursday already. The weather has been hot and sunny up to today, but the skies were definitely sultry and grey this morning. Having waited in for the builder chappie who is going to rerender our north wall, it was 11 before we got going. And by then the worst had happened- rain.

Today's destination - Mornas. A village above the Rhône with a huge ruined fortress perched on a steep rock. It has a mega curtain wall and various towers and to get to it involves a 600 metre walk practically vertical! Hence the comedy knight with the message Courage! as you near the top. Thankfully the rain petered out towards midday so at least we could see the view across the roads and railways way below. The fortress was the scene of some evilness way back. For some reason one of the Counts thought it a jolly jape to make the inhabitants of the village leap to their deaths from the summit.

Down in the mediaeval village are some quaint shop signs like this one for the charcutier!

After lunch in the local Bar we headed across autoroute and N7 into the cultivated hidden land by the river. Here, if you follow rough tracks marked Service Vehicles only (take no notice!), you come to the digue road along the river. And the TGV line. Joy! Trainspotter Heaven... We are amazed you can get that close. But they must expect people to come here because it is also a conservation wetland area with explanation boards. Between the tracks and the river is a channel/canal. Not wide, but full of frogs, heron, dragonflies, mallard, flag iris and reeds. Quite delightful  - it seems to run for kilometres.

Across the river is St Etienne des Sorts where we went a few weeks ago when it was windy and the river had breakers on almost big enough to surf. Today was flat calm.

Today's arty farty!

TGV heading South. Not easy to snap as they are past you in a trice.