Travel month

Birthday candles

October was a month of travel. The last weekend of September, Paul and I took the Eurostar to see the family in the U.K. and to celebrate C's 5th birthday. We got to walk the kids to school and back, and see almost everyone on the Sunday, when we had the first birthday party, family only. I love relaxing when I'm there and don't feel like doing any interesting touring or sightseeing. I just love reading when the kids are at school and then watching them play when they're home. I also like doing a few mother-daughter things. Mostly, though, I laze and watch.
C. is in Reception year. In England, this precedes Year 1, so in age group it's like Kindergarden in the U.S., but it's full day, not half, and like the last year of Maternelle in France. In content, though, it's more like 1st grade (U.S.) or CP (France). S. is in CP in France and both kids are learning to read. I've now had a chance to have each of them read to me and they are about at the same level of sounding out the words. I love it when they read to me. C. is starting gymnastics, continuing swimming, and has decided that she doesn't want to do the "Foundation" class in music but would rather go straight to the piano. That's a pretty full schedule for a 5-year-old.
A. is in Year 4. She hates doing homework and practicing her viola. I don't know that she actually hates doing those things as much as she hates starting. In the time she spends complaining and putting off the start, she could finish the task. Once she gets started, though, she's fine. She's given up the piano and switched from violin to viola. She prefers the deeper tone. She still does gymnastics and Brownies, so she has a pretty full schedule.
We returned home on the 4th, did a laundry, and Paul took me to the airport the next morning so I could catch my flights to Philly, via Dublin. One of the good things about flying via Dublin is that you go through U.S. Immigration and Customs in Dublin. As you get off the plane in Dublin to transfer to the U.S. leg, you are directed separately from passengers transferring to other destinations. You end up in the U.S. sector, in the passport check line. It's a long line, but shorter than what we normally go through at a U.S. airport. Once through that, there's the security check, as at any airport, and then straight to the gate for departure. I had just enough time to grab a sandwich and some water for lunch before we left. Good thing, too, since the food on Aer Lingus was less appealing than on other airlines I've been on recently. I binge-watched half a season of Fargo.
We were late leaving Dublin and late getting into Philly. I took a cab to the hotel, found my roommate, N., for the weekend, gabbed a bit with other reunion attendees in the lobby, but I was pretty tired. I went out to mail my absentee ballot and walk around the neighborhood -- Locust street, then a bit of Spruce St., up to Rittenhouse Square, to Sansom St. and back to the hotel. I was craving a corned beef sandwich, but couldn't find a deli. I did not go south to Panama St. to walk by the house. It was warm and muggy. By the time I got back, my friends had all disappeared and I simply went to bed. N. and I gabbed for a bit when she got in, later. I love sharing my room when I go to these reunions. This time, N. had flown in from Alaska and I had come in from France -- opposing jetlags. We were not really on the same sleep schedule!
The 50th reunion of Girls High class 212 was wonderful afternoon. Just us. No spouses. Several of the band/orchestra group were there and we managed to grab a table for serious catching up. There was lots of table hopping, finding old friends and discovering new ones. J. drove me home with her, so I got to see her husband, E. This was a nice chance for quiet talk. In the evening about 20 of us ventured up to Ambler to see Anita Wise, classmate and stand-up comedian. It was a good show -- a fun evening.
The very next morning, Sunday, I headed over to the Greyhound bus terminal for a 6-hour drive to Pittsburgh. I had hoped I'd catch signs of fall -- red and gold leaves on the trees. Nope. Although I was freezing on the bus, the outside temperature, when we stopped for a break on the turnpike, was in the 80s F° (almost 30°C)! Visible signs of lack water -- dried up ditches and ponds. We got into Pittsburgh exactly on schedule and J. and T. were there to meet me and take me to their house. We had a pleasant few days together, went out to eat, had sandwiches in (I got my corned beef sandwich!) and just caught up. I went to the gym with T. and lasted no more than 15 minutes before caving.
Wednesday, they took me to the airport and I got the first of my flights to San Diego via Chicago on Southwest. Having just barely gotten on schedule on the east coast, I was back in jetlag mode on the west coast. I slept. I got an early shuttle back to the airport the next morning to pick up the car I had reserved. First of all, the off-site car rental garage is really far away. Yes, there are shuttles to go there and you don't have to wait too long for one, but the ride there is long. I went to the Avis counter and got all the way to handing over my card, when the guy said that they couldn't take a debit card. I immediately went outside, loaded my phone with Uber and Lyft, and got a Lyft to visit T&B. I then worked out, mentally, how much it would cost to Lyft for the rest of the stay and it came to less than the car rental would have been even before factoring in parking and gas costs.
T&B are in an elegant independent living residence that has multiple levels of care for when more assistance or convalescence is needed. They have an enormous apartment with two bedrooms and two bathrooms, a big kitchen area, good-sized living room and dining area and even a separate office area. The residence has an art studio, mail room, several dining rooms from small lunch to full meals to fine dining, a movie theater, a pool, a gym, a library, and other activity rooms. All very upscale. We had lunch at the snack/light-lunch room. Then, they had to go off to an appointment and I went back to the hotel and spent some time relaxing by the pool.

Plane landing -- on my walk to the Midway

Navy ship being guided to port -- on my walk to the Midway

The hotel, the Best Western, was at the fisherman's harbor end of  N. Harbor Drive. I had had dinner the previous evening at Mitch's Seafood, so I had fulfilled my seafood craving. The oysters were not great, but I did like the shrimp taco. The second evening, I headed to Rosecrans St. to see what I might find, there, to eat. Nothing attracted me, really, so I went to the supermarket, Ralph's, and got a sandwich. Friday, I had plans to see friends, one, a high school classmate who had not made it to the reunion because it was the weekend of her daughter's wedding and the other, a classmate from the technical communications course at the American University in Paris. For the morning, though, I decided to visit the Midway, the aircraft carrier right in downtown San Diego. I looked at the Google map, which said it was 5 miles away and it was on a bus route not far from the hotel to the Midway. I thought I'd see how far I could walk. I walked the entire way. I did stop to sit down for a little while, near the Coast Guard heliport, where I watched a helicoptor come in to land and the navy ships coming in to port and planes coming in and leaving the airport. When I got to the Midway and opened my phone to present my pre-paid ticket, I saw there was a text from the friend I was going to have dinner with and she had to cancel.
The Midway is well worth visiting. It's not the first time I've visited an aircraft carrier and they are all, basically, the same, but here, the docents actually served on the ship and they give wonderful talks, explaining the procedures for taking off, landing, and more. They have their personal anecdotes. I did not go up to visit the "island", the control tower. I did not feel up to taking the steep stairs. I was feeling a bit wobbly from the long walk.
After the visit, I went to the tourist office to ask about buses and discovered that seniors get a nice discount in San Diego, so I got change to have $1.10 in exact change and crossed the street to sit for a while and wait for the bus that took me back to the supermarket at Nimitz and Rosecrans, where I got some fruit and another sandwich. After walking back to the hotel, I took a well-deserved nap. The second friend and I rescheduled our meeting for the next morning, breakfast.

My Local Bag, with a French touch! With knitting in it.

I love catching up with friends. Cindy has had a very diverse career. Now, she is a craftswoman. She does all sorts of things with a die-cutter and she makes fantastic shopping bags from regular brown paper bags. Visit her Local Bag site! Buy a bag. They are sturdy, beautifully made. The only caveat is to be careful not to get them wet. I remember when she was pregnant with her third child, when I last saw her, in fact, and now he's finishing high school!
After breakfast, T. and R. picked me up to take me back for family lunch with T&B. This time, we had lunch in the main dining room. Again, it was good to catch up.
Sunday morning, I had to catch a 7:20 flight to Dallas before the last leg to Philly. The early flight time was one of the reasons I had chosen the hotel. They have a shuttle. What you don't see until you read the fine print is that the shuttle service doesn't start until 7. I needed to get to the airport much earlier than that, so I got a Lyft. It's a good thing I had read the fine print before. Not having to return the car to that far-away car-rental center was an added advantage to Lyft.
Sunday evening, I stayed near the Philadelphia airport and E. and M. came to have dinner with me in the bar of the hotel. In movies, the bar area always seems a very muted, quiet area. Not so in Philly when they have football playing on the big screen. It was horribly loud. Conversation was difficult as we almost had to shout, but once again, we were able to catch up.

The first start -- before it went haywire

All of this was almost 3 weeks ago! First one thing (jetlag), then another (the Parisian grandchildren visiting), then another (a frustrating start to a fairisle jacket) kept me from the computer. Today, it's the blog that is keeping me, voluntarily, from that frustrating jacket that I think I have to rip back and start -- again!

The almost annual Pierwigian trip

It's become something of a habit. The group of friends from our Pierwige days travel together. Last year, it was to Valencia and this year, to Andalusia. Spain is so lovely in the Spring.
We were a group of four couples, this year. F and C seem to have dropped out. That worked out perfectly, as it happened, because Y. has a friend who is French but whose mother was from Seville and who has spent his life between Spain and France. He volunteered to organize our trip and be our guide and driver. That made us a group of 9, the limit for a van rental with a normal driver's license.
The Parisians (J-P, R, Paul and I) found one another in the baggage drop-off line. We had lunch together at the airport and flew straight to Seville, where A met us. We just had time to introduce ourselves to A. before the others arrived, having connected in Madrid. It was already a bit past 5 pm and by the time we picked up the van and got into the city to the hotel, it was 6.
First thing to do was to explore Seville. The hotel was not the one originally reserved, but no matter, the Ferdinando iii is an excellent hotel, not far from the Cathedral. We walked and walked and walked. The path from the hotel to the Cathedral took us past the Sephardic Jewish Exhibition Center in what was the Jewish quarter. It was close to closing time and reservations are recommended for this. When we came back to Seville at the end of our trip, we were disappointed that it opened at 11 and that we would not have enough time to visit. This is a must for our next trip to Seville, when we will concentrate on the city. We went through the Murillo Gardens and then headed back to the hotel with a stop for tapas on the way. There we were, sitting at an outside table at a street corner, when Paul cried out N...., quickly followed by P-F. Our nephew and his wife were strolling through the streets of Seville, too! You never know who is going to turn up where you just happen to be! After that pleasant encounter and the photo to prove it, we sat back down, finished our tapas and went back to the hotel for a short rest before heading out for the evening. Remember, we didn't get started until after 6 pm and were now getting ready for the evening.

Audience participation

The evening was a taxi to the Triana for a dinner of more tapas at 10:30 followed, after midnight, just around the corner from the restaurant, la Casa Anselma. I understand the frustration of those who queued up for this and then saw some go in ahead of them. A. had reserved for us. Anselma comes out, a little after midnight, and says something in very rapid Spanish that sounds a bit scolding. She then allows people in, one by one. There were a few individuals ahead of us, then a group, then us. We could hear people complaining. As the small room filled up, we could see that many were frequent visitors and they added a lot of animation during the evening. All were dressed in normal attire, not in flamenco costumes. As the entertainment heated up, they would get up and dance, clap the rhythm, sing along. The bad reviews on Trip Advisor are from people who did not get in, and I can understand their feeling after having waited over an hour in the night chill. For us, it was an extraordinary privilege to be there. A. is well-known, there, and spent time chatting with the musicians and with Anselma. We had excellent seats, in the second row. I couldn't understand the language, but the emotions of the songs came through loud and clear: love, anger, humor...

After breakfast we were treated to a carriage ride through Seville before we piled into the van and headed westward towards the rio Tinto. I think we got off the highway to head towards La Palma del Condado and continued on to the southern edge of a reservoir on a tributary of the rio Tinto to the Ctra. El Berrocal.  If you look at a map (I'm looking at the via-Michelin map) and zoom in on road HU-4103, there's a private road off to the right that goes to the southern edge. That's where the 600-hectare (more than 1482 acres) hacienda where we were having lunch is. Before lunch the owner gave us a jeep-tour of the property where he raises bulls. Of course, not all the cattle is bull-fighting material. There are the cows that are selected for breeding at 2 years. There are the bulls that are just not going to make it. It's very hilly territory. While the other half of our group went on their jeep-tour, A. took us on a walking tour. We were hungry for lunch by the time it was served, after 2. First, there were countless tapas, which were all excellent and which we were encouraged by the hostess to finish up. That would have been fine, if it weren't followed by a paella! We staggered up from the table at about 5 and headed towards El Rocio.

El Rocío is a small town of 1500 permanent residents. During the pilgrimage, just after our visit, there can be up to 2,000,000! The town is on the border of the Doñana National Park. It's built on sand. During the pilgrimage, cars are not allowed, only horses. Every home and shop has hitching posts in front. Our little hotel had stables on the ground floor, under the rooms. This is not an ancient village. It's got a grid layout, with large avenues in a V formation from the closest asphalt road leading to the church, near the river. The streets are wide and, as said earlier, hitching posts everywhere. Close to the church there are big grassy grazing areas surrounded by restaurants and streets with shops full of flamenco dresses and riding suits. We had a carriage ride that took us through the town and a little bit into the park. There were lots of bird watchers out. There were pink flamingos out on the river. On a walk, we saw a bird watching information center. And storks. As we drove out the next day to go through the park and some standard tourism, we saw stork nests on almost every electric pylon along the road. We arrived with a little time to rest and walk around the town a bit before dinner, but in the short rest at the hotel before going out for dinner, Paul and I decided we'd had too much lunch and went to bed before the others got back. They reported, at breakfast, that they had had a very nice dinner of tapas.
We set out towards Matalascañas where we intended to turn west into the park. We got as far as the roundabout when we encountered a bicycle race. The road we wanted to take was blocked. That meant turning around, going past El Rocío and up to the highway to head towards Huelva. The strawberry pickers were out, but here, the  plants are all in greenhouses, so you don't see fields from the road; you see plastic.

We did a bit of standard sightseeing. There's the monastery Santa Maria de la Rabida that hosted Christopher Columbus and encouraged his discovery trips. The picture shows the patch of original fresco of the cloister with the "restored" painted all around it. The tidal wave from the earthquake that destroyed Lisbon in 1775 hit the monastery! There's a room full of interesting boxes of earth collected from the Spanish colonies in America.  Just down the road is Palos de la Frontera, with the replicas of the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria, a well-done information center on the first expedition. They are really small. The Santa Maria was the admiral ship and it never made it back to Spain. It got grounded in the islands and the crew had be distributed between the two tinier boats (hard to refer to them as ships).
We took the road that we had planned on taking in the morning and stopped at a beach to have lunch -- another great selection of tapas, including fresh sardines. And a stop at a nearby Parador, a luxury hotel overlooking a beach, far below. We went a bit further along and stopped at another beach, but the sandy walk down from the car to the beach was pretty long and steep and when I reached the cliff edge and saw how small the people on the beach still appeared, I stopped and did not go all the way down. It was still quite a hike uphill getting back to the van.
Sunday, we left El Rocío after lunch. Cars and horses were pouring into the town. The road leading in was jammed while our way out was empty. The cars, from Sunday evening, would be banned and parked out in the fields to make way for the horses and carriages for the pilgrimage.

The road ended at El Esparragal, a ranch in American terms: 40 km²! It's a beautiful place. Once a private home, now a luxury hotel that hosts weddings and communions. As we arrived, a wedding party from the ceremony on Saturday was leaving, a lovely couple: he, American from Boston; she, Spanish. They now live in New York. The parents stayed on and were the only other guests at the place with us. A. had negotiated a remarkably low price for us. Walking around the estate, we picked sweet grapefruits and oranges from the trees and had our afternoon snack. There were storks in their nests and more storks flying around. A. told us that up to about 15 years ago it was an active farm; the stables still held horses and there were carriages. He used to take a horse and just go riding around. There are Roman ruins on the property and a chapel, site of an annual pilgrimage from the nearby village. There's a road that divides the property, vertically. There was a small group of cows just outside our window, and orchards along the road, but not much sign of farm activity, much to A.'s regret.

On our way out the next morning, we drove up to the chapel, just for a quick view, and then continued on to a hacienda that raises bulls for bullfighting in the traditional manner. The herd manager is French, from Nimes, a connaîsseur and traditionalist. He's also an author: Fabrice Torrito with a blog. I'm not much of a fan of bull fighting, but I understood his point of view and we saw how the bulls, cows, and calves are handled. It wasn't completely new to us, since we'd had our lessons last year at the féria in Camargue, but more intense. The animals have a much nicer life than those destined for their meat from birth. As a traditionalist, Fabrice does not do artificial insemination; he has large areas set aside for groups of 30 cows and a bull and lets nature take its course. We visited a field with a 3-year-old bull and plenty of cows and calves. The breeding cows are selected at age two and the ones who don't make the grade are sent to the slaughter house. The breeding cows can live a long life until they die a natural death. The cowboy was sent off, after our ride around the grounds, to look for a missing 20-year-old cow that had probably gone off to be alone to die. The bulls have a nice, quiet life, with some fighting among themselves for dominance, but they won't go to a bull fight until they are 5 or 6. 6 is the limit. These are the bulls we visited! Once a bull has seen a cape, a single bullfight, he's done. Even if the president of the corrida graces him, he'll go to the slaughter house afterwards. (Very rarely, a graced bull gets to go home and breed and live out his natural life.) It's not pleasant, but really is it worse than the cattle that go straight to the slaughter house?

Gardens at the Palace

Fabrice sent us into the nearby village of Gerena for lunch. Again, only local people, friendly, warm, and stuffing us with good food. Then, back to Seville for a walk around town, again. Starting from a different hotel, it was a different walk. We tried to reserve to see the Alcazar on Tuesday, but with the size of our group, it wasn't possible until after our departure for the airport. In Seville, that is not a problem. We visited the Casa de Pilatos, which has nothing to do with Pilate other than the builder of the house was fascinated with Roman history. It was built in three distinct styles, starting with a heavy, moor influence, then Italian Renaissance, and another addition, later. It's well worth the wait for the guided tour of the upstairs. The house was still lived in two years ago!
More walking, lunch, and back to the airport. A fine time was had by all and we were already discussing where to go, next.

A Week in Portugal

This post got delayed because of the big family visit almost as soon as we got back from the trip.
Last year, in October, we went to Malta with friends, four other couples and us, the husbands of which all lived at the Pierwige when they were in engineering school. I lived at the Pierwige when I spent my first semester abroad in the Spring of 1970. This year, one of the couples was unable to join the rest of us, so there were only four couples all together, two from Paris and two from Biarritz. There wasn't so much catching up to do, since we did a lot of that last year. We only had one year to go over, which was enough to keep the conversation going for the whole week.
The Parisians arrived in Porto in time for lunch, which was excellent. The bonus was warm sunshine. (I had spend a month in and out of a really bad cold -- maybe it was two very similar colds close together. I ended up with a touch of pneumonia symptoms and the doctor had me come into the office the day before departure to check that the medication was working and the lungs were clear, so that I could go. We had already cancelled our trip to England at the beginning of the month for Constance's birthday.) Anyway, I enjoyed my fish and Paul had his first cod dish. Portugal is known for cooking salt-cured codfish in every possible way and he was determined to have his dose of cod. After lunch and a rest, we all set out to discover the city a bit.

There was a tram right in front of the hotel, so we jumped on and did a little tour. Porto is a hilly city. The streets are narrow. The tram, which is small, does not leave much room for people on the tiny sidewalk, and forget about cars parked wherever they can find a space. There are churches everywhere and they are all decorated with azulejos, the tiles that cover most buildings, but on churches they are blue, generally, and tell a story. This gave us an overview of the city before the others' flight arrived. They got the to the hotel just as we were settling in for a cup of coffee. Once they got registered and the baggage was up in their rooms, we set out on foot. (A word about the hotel -- the Hotel Infante Sagres -- we were all happy with it. I forgot to mention, in my review, that if you opened the windows, it was noisy at night because of the clubs nearby, but if you used the air conditioning, it was OK.)

Because we were going to take the train to Lisbon, we headed towards the train station, which looks like any other major train station until you see the tiles inside! We wanted to get information and see about getting tickets. It was a well-advised stop, since the trains to Lisbon leave from a different station. It was good to find that out sooner, rather than too late. From there, we continued up hill to the Cathedral, where there is a terrace with a magnificent view of the city below. The inside of the Cathedral was our first glimpse of the golden opulence of Portuguese baroque. Not my cup of tea. We had a beautiful sunset view from the terrace, though.
After the visit inside the church, we headed downhill into the city and we ended up going down and down and down until getting back to the hotel meant a climb back up. Dinner at the restaurant next to the hotel with our 10% discount coupons -- even with the discount, this was the most disappointing and expensive meal of the trip.
Wednesday and Thursday, we spent walking around Porto and more sightseeing. Friday, we took taxis to the right train station for our trip to Lisbon.

Rainy day in Belem

Lisbon is much bigger than Porto, more majestic, which is logical, since it's the capital. It also has more hills, and, in my mind at least, steeper hills. It was completely rebuilt after the terrible 1755 earthquake and, we learned, the new buildings were built with seismic tolerance in mind, the first such building code. Since the country was very rich in the 18th century, the rebuilding was quick and majestic. We visited Belem, the convent, the cathedral, the tower... We walked around, took trams, buses, and walked some more. We went up to the Castle St. George, where there is a wonderful view of the modern city below. The castle itself, what's left of it, is a big, 11th century castle, much like the Norman castles in France and England, but maybe with a bigger floor plan. From there, we walked back down to the modern city and ended up walking all the way back to the hotel after a late lunch! I haven't calculated the kilometers, but my feet felt them.
We had good meals. Unfortunately, we missed the art museum, just steps from the hotel, because when we decided to do a little museum visiting, Monday, it was the day they were shut, so we finally took the "hop on, hop off" tour that gave us a better overview of the city.
It seems to me that there was so much in Lisbon, that I have less to say than for Porto. I think I enjoyed Porto more. I need to go back and take a real look.

To Najac and Back, part 2

It was just an hour to go from Cordes-sur-Ciel to Najac. We crossed the 13th century bridge, St. Blaise and watched a group of kids who had stopped for a swim and a few kayakers trying to get the feel of the kayaks as they fought the current. (Very little current and the river is very low in spite of the recent rain. In fact, they were going with the current and still had trouble.)
This bridge is already part of Najac. The hotel is just the next bridge upstream, within walking distance. We got to the hotel early enough to just rest. Having spent three days driving, we were ready to just settle a bit and have dinner at the hotel. This was our third stay at the Belle Rive and this time we were treated to a big room. Well, two rooms since we had our friends with us: a double and a triple. Each room also had a sofa and a desk or coffee table and plenty of closed space. This was nice for a four-day stay. We had dinner there the first evening and two other dinners -- the menu doesn't change enough for a really long stay. Everything was well-prepared and well-served, but a longer stay would have been monotonous, I think. The asparagus omelet from April has become a mushroom omelet in summer. I've posted a view of the fortress from the hotel before, so here is one of the hotel from the fortress. Click on the photo to enlarge it. You can see the hotel, the swimming pool and the tennis court. Since it had rained, the pool was a bit too chilly. We had another day of relaxation our last day there and I dipped, but didn't swim.

On Sunday, we went to Saint-Antonin-Noble-Val after a brief walk in Najac, up on the crest of the hill. The whole idea of going to St. Antonin on a Sunday was to see the town on a market day, except we couldn't see the market or the town (medieval) for all the people! The place has become more and more popular as they exploit the filming of The Hundred Foot Journey (La Recette du Bonheur) a couple of years ago. It was released in 2014. I had asked Emma to reserve a table at La Festin de Babette for an excellent lunch and meeting up with them. It was a long, leisurely, Sunday lunch along the river. After lunch, we went up to Le Pède to see the new kittens and show off the site.

We spent the rest of the afternoon in conversation, walking around, admiring the views, the work done, the work still coming up, the kittens, the vegetable garden, the kittens. There are three, but I only dared put up a photo of one. I'm a sucker for kittens and I'm not alone.
We got back to Najac just in time to see the austere church and climb up to the fortress for one of the last tours of the day. It's really very interesting. The site was inhabited before the 10th century because the area was rich in copper, silver, iron and more. All those trees we see around were not there; it was almost entirely vineyard.

By the 10th century, there was a château. The difference between a château, a château-fort, and a fortress is a château is inhabited by the lord; a château-fort is a fortified château, and a fortress is occupied by troops, only. Najac was in the Comte de Toulouse's territory, with a strong Cathare population. It was also the administrative capital of the Rouergue region. After the victory of Alphonse de Poitiers, King Louis IX (St. Louis)'s brother, in 1229, the city of 6000 lost it's status. Alphonse de Poitiers created the new town of Villefranche-de-Rouergue, upstream on the river, tempted the population with a tax-free incentive and that was the end of Najac's wealth. The château was mostly destroyed (there's still a square tower) and replaced by the military fortress, with a drawbridge, an offset main door, the longest archer slots in the world (where have we heard that before?) and more.
In spite of the climb up to there, we were still stuffed from our lunch and picked up something for dinner from the bakery in Najac.

I had promised M that we'd see dolmens. Monday, we went looking for dolmens near Martiel and finally found them. I had printed out the map and we only did a little of the walk, points 1to 5.
At the end, 5, there was a depression, maybe the quarry where they got the stones in about 1500 BC. There was also a cave. Paul and I did not go into the cave; we left to go back to the car thinking the others were just behind us. After telling us they'd follow, they went into the cave and explored and took pictures. They lost track of time and when they came out they lost track of the track. We were worried, having waited an hour by the car. They had the keys, so we couldn't go for help and there was no phone reception. Big, big sigh of relief when they came down the trail, at last.
It was already past noon and we sped to Villefranche for lunch, followed by a short visit of the town and then on to the potter in Saint-André-de-Najac. Since our very first visit, when we noticed his window display in Najac, we'd been wanting to go to his place.
The original plan was to go to Toulouse on Tuesday, but we were all spent and decided on a day of rest before heading back to Nogent on Wednesday.

To Pechmerle, Albi, Najac and back

There's quite a lot of catching up to do.We are home from a vacation in the southwest and last month we went to England and before that I think I've already forgotten what we did. This and the following couple of posts are not in chronological order of events

When we go home, a bunch of high school friends, 16 counting spouses and accompanying friends, came to Paris for a mini-reunion. This is similar to what we did in the Catskills, except there were only 8 in the party. We did it at Barnegat Light five years ago and there were 16 of us. There was a major reunion in Philly three years ago and at that time, some said how much they'd like to come to Paris.So, they are coming! Not everyone who wanted to – it was impossible to fit everyone's scheduling needs or finances, but enough to call it a mini-reunion, of sorts. But, before we get to the reunion, we (Paul and I) had a week with Er... and Ga.. and Er's husband, Mor...

They arrived on Wednesday morning and Paul accompanied them to pick up the rental in the afternoon. It's a Nissan van. I've never seen such a poorly designed van. Supposedly, it corresponds to a « grand Espace », which is what was described on the rental site. I know that in a grand Espace, there are real seats in the back and room for baggage. This thing is a short van. The middle seat in the middle is a hump, for a kid.The seats in the back have no legroom – also for kids. We managed. Since we didn't need both back seats, we folded one to the side for baggage room and folded the short part of the middle seat forward to give the person in the back some legroom. We were traveling light, so we found room for the baggage.

We left on Thursday morning and spent all day on the road – a long drive down to La-Tour-De-Faure, across the river from Saint-Cirq-Lapopie, a "must see" village in the region. By the time we checked into the hotel, found a gas station and then headed into the village it had started to rain. By the time we found a parking spot in a lot at the high end of the village it was pouring. There was a mass exodus from the parking lot, which means we found a parking space easily and it also meant that, in this very touristy spot, we were able to walk easily in the streets. So, we walked. Like so many of these villages, there's a castle at the very top of a hill (in this case, it's just a ruin of a castle) and the town grew around the castle. St. Cirq has several streets, so it's not just along the crest, but they are all narrow, steep streets with 12th and 13th century half-timbered buildings and then later stone houses. You can see the shop window/workshop architecture of the period. As I said, it was pouring, so we did not do as much browsing as we might have done otherwise. We retreated into the first little restaurant that looked open at such an early hour (6 pm) and got ourselves a table. We had very low expectations; all we wanted to do was get out of the rain. Big surprise! The fish, the cassoulet, the confit de canard – everything was good, very good at Lou Faoure

The hotel in La-Tour-De-Faure, Hotel des Gabarres, was comfortable and I had chosen it because it is not far to Cabrerets, where the cro-magnon Pech Merle is. Paul and I had visited Pech Merle 14 years ago and I knew this was not to be missed. Our visit on Friday morning was reserved for 11:15, so we had plenty of time to spend in the museum. It's a tiny museum, but worth spending time in. It rained most of the morning, but that's not a problem when visiting a cave. Our tour was in English, very well done by a young man who took his time, kept making sure we all understood him and making sure that everyone got to see what he was highlighting with his laser pointer. This is the cave with handprints and spotted horses, lots of mammouth and bison. Geologically, it is a very big cave with high and wide chambers and narrow passages, but beautiful calcite « marbles » in one place, multicolored discs elsewhere, fountain-like stalagtites and stalagmites. It's got bear claw marks and human footprints that go back to the cave painting period from 20,000 to 40,000 years ago. Because there is so little charcoal used in these paintings, they can't date them precisely. All they can figure out is that there were several periods. Some paintings are superimposed on others – there's a fish, in red, that you can make out beneath one of the spotted horses. The panel of spotted horses was done in black with the spitting technique – the painter put the pigment in his or her mouth and spat the outline of the animals, the spots, the handprints. The pigments were manganese oxide for black and ferrous oxide for red. There's a tiny bit of charcoal filling in the mane of one of the horses, which is how they can date that, but was that added later or is it contemporary to the horses? I just love this stuff!

We had lunch – a good lunch – in Cabrerets and headed for Albi.The car's GPS does not let us see the itinerary or choose an itinerary, but I had the map in hand. On a Michelin map, red is a major road, a former national road; yellow is a bit less major, a departmental road; and white is a local road, often just an unmarked lane barely wide enough for two-way traffic. The shortest route took us on lots of white roads and that's what the GPS wanted us to follow, but they were bumpy and uncomfortable, so in spite of the temptation to go on the road past Emma's, we ignored the GPS and took the road via Villefranche-de-Rouergue. The GPS's pleas that we turn around got on our nerves, but we persevered and arrived at Albi at exactly the time it had originally said we would. We found our hotel and set out almost immediately to wander around the city. It was too late for the Toulouse-Lautrec museum and the cathedral was too dark to see anything really well, but we meandered and found ourselves at a very nice little restaurant for another excellent dinner.

The next morning, we opened the Toulouse-Lautrec museum and had the museum to ourselves for most of the visit. I like this museum; it is made up of work rejected by the Paris museums after his death in 1901. It's full of sketches and early renditions of paintings and posters we know well. There are plenty of drawings and watercolors from when he was only 11 years old. You can see how his art evolved. It's housed in the former bishop's quarters, next to the cathedral, so just the building merits a visit. You can see the medieval paving blocks that made the floors look like cartpets, the painted ceiling beams and painted ceilings. It was a palace. In the 16th century, the then bishop turned the farmyard into an elegant garden.

The cathedral has been restored inside and they are in the process of cleaning up the stonework on the outside at the entrance. We were too late to get tickets to see the most interesting section, the inner sanctum and we needed to leave before mass at 11. It was Assomption, a major holiday in France. That gave us time to finish up the visit at the museum and see more of the gardens.

Before leaving Albi we stopped at the market and got ourselves the wherewithal to make a nice picnic lunch, which we ate on the way to Cordes-sur-Ciel at a turn in the road with a wonderful view of Albi in the distance.

Cordes-sur-Ciel is a planned town. In the 12th century, during the Cathare heresy, the count of Toulouse was in a power struggle with the king of France. He created this town at the top of a hill, of course. There was no castle already there and he did not build one. Instead, he created a walled town and invited farmers and merchants to live in the town and farm the fields below – tax-free. In exchange, they were to protect the town, which was on the border of the king's territory. The center of the town at the very top of the hill was the market place not the church. The town was Cathare and resisted the inquisition and the imposed return to Catholicism (from Albi) until 1321. Once there was no religious or power struggle to worry about, the town florished and the early Renaissance homes along the main street are magnificent. The town has become a bit more touristy than it was 14 years ago, the last time we were there.

We allowed the GPS to direct us to Najac along the white roads that wind through the countryside – again a stone's throw from Emma's. Next installment.

La Réunion photos

Here are some photos from the trip to La Réunion.
Family, there are more personal photos in another album. Email me if I haven't already shared it with you.

La Réunion - a full two weeks

My apologies. I was sleepy and sloppy in my first post from La Réunion and got the days of the week mixed up: arrived on Thursday, Hell-Bourg and Ste. Suzanne on Friday (east), St. Philippe and the southern coast on Saturday.
Sunday, we needed our rest and the Thomas clan arrived early in the afternoon. They needed their rest, too.

Cirque de Mafate

Monday morning, Paul, Anne, and I had our helicoptor tour of the island. It's splendid. Our tour took off from behind St. Paul. The company is Helilagon. There is another company based closer to us at l'Ermitage, Corail, and they seem to be just as good. We had scheduled the 7:00 tour because we had been told that one must do it very early so as not have the view obscured by clouds. It turned out that they rescheduled us for 8, which we only found out because we also discovered they would pick us up at our hotel at no extra charge and I phoned to arrange that. The pick-up was at 7:20 and when we arrived at the héliport, we discovered the 7:00 people and the 8:00 all still waiting for the all clear signal.

Take off for our group of 6 was at about 8:30 and the sky was wonderfully clear. We flew over St. Paul and picked up altitude to enter the Cirque de Mafate via the Maïdo peak. From there, we dipped into the Cirque. The cirque is one of the three caved-in calderas of the Piton des Neiges volcano, the one that has been dormant for long enough for people to feel safe living in the cirques. The Cirque de Mafate is only accessible on foot or by helicopter. There are villages on the plateaus that are separated from one another by deep gorges and the cirque is surrounded by almost vertical walls. The inhabitants voted against having a road built along the canyon entrance and against having electricity brought in. As far as electricity is concerned, they were right, because now, they all have solar panels and do not need the heavy installations. Mafate was originally settled by run away slaves. Apparently one was called Mafate and in Malgache, that means either "qui pue" (who stinks) or "qui tue" (who kills). Once the run aways made it into the cirque, no one really bothered trying to capture them. They were followed, later, by the poor second or third sons of planter families, and by Chinese shop keepers.
From Mafate, we went over to the Cirque de Salazie, which we had driven through the week before. It's so much greener! It's canyon entrance is on the eastern side of the island, where all the rain comes from. Still, in spite of being on the rainy side, the waterfalls are just trickles this year.

Turning south we flew over the Piton de la Fournaise, the active volcano, although there's no activity right now. There's a valley, a plain between the two volcanos and we could see the large farms.
And then over les trois Salazes into the Cirque de Cilaos, not quite as confined as Mafate, because there is a road and electricity, but still signs of rugged living.

Les Trois Salazes 

Tuesday, we (quite a group, now) made our way back to Ste. Philippe to visit the Jardin des Parfums et Epices. That was a beautiful visit. I recommend it. The guidebooks say you need to reserve for the guided tour, and you do. That said, they accept too big a crowd on a tour, so you kind of wonder if they do have a limit. Our tour was the 10:30, but by the time they got us all rounded up it was getting closer to 11 and they had opened a tour for 11, so, since there seemed to be fewer people on the 11:00 tour, we switched. It was well worth the wait; our tour guide was the owner! Of course, there's vanilla, curcuma, ginger, mangoes, papayas, bananas, and more. There's so much more, if you go, take notes in order to remember it all. The tour is an hour and a half, but ours seemed to go on a bit longer. The parents of small children dropped out a bit half way through because it's just too much information and stationary pauses. For those of us unhindered by babies, it was an enlightening tour.

 This hole in the ground is what is left when the lava cools around a hardwood tree. The tree burns slowly enough for the lava to cool around it. Once the tree has burned away, the hole is left. This is useful to determine the depth of the lava flow. It is also useful as a natural toilet. The people would choose to build their houses near two such holes, so that when one filled up, they could use the second, until the first had composted, and so on.

Notre Dame des Laves

NWhen we left the garden, we drove past the Grande Coulée, to the east coast. At Sainte Rose, there is this church, now called Notre Dame des Laves. In 1977, a new caldera formed outside the Piton de la Fournaise enclosure and its lava flowed into Sainte Rose, stopping just in front of the church (and a little around the sides). It scalded the building but that was all the damage done! A miracle! The rest of the town was pretty much destroyed and has been rebuilt on top of the lava flow. They've cut steps in the flow for access to the church. 

We continued up the east coast, to Sainte Anne, where we cut across to the road that cuts through the plain between the volcanoes. The "plaine des palmistes" is not as flat as its name sounds. The road winds up and down between the pitons. It's agricultural country. Towards the southern end, it's much more urban and less interesting. As the road descends to St. Pierre, the villages are named for the number of kilometers to St. Pierre: Dix-neuvième, Quatorzième, Onzième. I must say that in the metropolis, there are not so many pharmacies and medical centers or service stations. The roads here are in excellent condition.

On Thursday, we drove up to the top of Maïdo to the viewing rampart for the view into the Cirque de Mafate. It's a beautiful drive. And there are some magnificent views. I envy the hikers that go into the Cirque. There are places to eat and even spend the night. We are no longer up to such hiking. I hope that some of my friends who do hike and who read this blog will consider it as a future destination!

We came back via St. Paul. This is the first capital of La Réunion. It's a big town, but not as big as St. Pierre, and certainly no as big as St. Denis. There are only a couple of shopping streets. There's also a market on Fridays and Saturdays, but this was on Thursday. We did stop for lunch. And we stopped along the coastal road on the way to St. Gilles. In fact, it turned out to be where we stopped on our return from the wedding on Saturday, at Cap La Houssaye.
Friday, Saturday, and Sunday were taken up with the wedding activities. Monday was Anne's last day with us. We did not feel like doing very much. It wasn't really a nice day for the beach, either. We has lunch at Salines-les-Bains and then spent the latter part of the afternoon with Louis, Gwen, and Sacha, who came over to our hotel for a dip in the pool. We then took Anne to the airport..

Le Marché Couvert at Célaos

Tuesday was a nice morning, so we headed south, along the coast, to St. Louis, where we turned and went into the Cirque de Cilaos. It's a beautiful drive, but there are too many S curves to count. You don't have the impression you are going up a mountain because you keep going up and down, following the meander of the river. There are villages here and there, not along the road, but always a little distance off. There are staircases carved into the rock along the road that lead to paths to get to the isolated farms. There are hiking paths to take hikers into the Cirque de Mafate and the Cirque de Salazie.
At the town of Cilaos, there is a little covered market with local produce: melons, lentils, mangoes, peaches, wine, ... and some local crafts, like the embroidery. Further along the road, at the end, is the Ilet à Cordes, on the opposite side of the cirque.

Célaos embroidery

Wednesday was another rather lazy day, spent pleasantly with the Thomas clan. It rained during lunch.
There was a big storm during the night but we woke up to a beautiful morning and decided to take one last drive. We went back to St. Louis to see the Museum of Decorative Art of the Indian Ocean. What a disappointment! The site is an old coffee plantation, Maison Rouge, and they've started cultivating the rare café bourbon again. A small tin of the coffee, 125gr., costs €22! We would have loved to taste a cup of coffee (€2) but the snack bar was closed. The museum exhibit was of Chinese furniture and porcelain that the locals imported -- very beautiful, but nothing made locally. We didn't stay long. We read the posters describing the particularity of Boubon coffee and the life and death of the coffee market in La Réunion. After this very brief visit we got back into the car and decided to see where the little road ended. That was a drive on a little road cut through the fields -- fields of sugar cane, bananas, a bit of pineapple, and more. Some banana plots were empty of fruit; others had fruit already in bags, but still hanging from the plant; and others had tiny fruit just starting. Some of the cane has already been cut, but there is plenty left. We saw four workers in one field cutting. These hillside fields are not good for mechanical harvesting. This agricultural path led to the Department road 3, slightly wider. Beautiful. There's a break in the road, though, where we had to go down the mountain to cross the ravine and then go back up to the D3, which is marked in green from this point on to indicate it is picturesque. Well, the preceding portion was very picturesque, but this bit, which runs parallel to the main highway, but at about 800m. altitude, all the way to St. Paul, has house on each side. We could imagine that there must be nice views of the coast from time to time, but since we were caught in a cloud, we couldn't see. Tired of all the twisting and turning, we called it a day and returned to l'Ermitage.
Tomorrow, we hope to go to the St. Paul market. It's a big tourist attraction. Almost all the Réunion souvenirs are made in Madagascar, though. I hope it's not a tourist trap. We also want to see the Sailors' cemetery. We've passed by it several times and this time we want to stop.

On to La Réunion

Louis and Gwen are getting married! In La Réunion! Not many of the Lebelle side are going to be here. In fact, it's just Paul, Anne, and me. Claire just gave birth to Constance, and besides, Aurelia just started school and can't really be taken out outside school holidays. Emma is just getting down to work on her house and taking time for a trip to La Réunion. It's a long way and merits a long stay. (wikipedia article in English, in French)
Today, Sunday, is a day of rest. At least, the morning is supposed to be. The rest of the family, Louis, Gwen, Sacha and the whole Thomas side, arrive later this morning.
It's a night flight. Taking any flight from Orly suggests an exotic destination, much more so than leaving from CDG. There are no lines; there are crowds. We got to the airport a full three hours before the scheduled departure and the crowd in front of our check-in zone was so big that we didn't see there was a sign for a line for people who had their boarding passes already. We just got into the crowd that slowly became a line for check-in and in over an hour, we were checked-in. I wonder what time the first people in the check-in line got there. We went straight through to the security check and came out at the other end in about half an hour. Our flight was already announced with a delay, so we had time to get a little something to eat. It was already 8:30 and who knew when we'd get our flight dinner! Our Corsair flight was on a recently refurbished 747. It looked and felt new, very comfortable, but we didn't really leave the gate until after 10:30 and it was past midnight by the time dinner came, so it was a good thing we had had a bite beforehand. There's a two hour time difference with La Réunion, so it was about 10:00 a.m. when we arrived on Wednesday morning.
For some odd reason, the local travel agency did not have our voucher for the car, but apparently that happens a lot; our car was indeed reserved and waiting for us, but it was almost noon by the time we got it.
Needless to say, we were a bit tired on arriving at l'Ermitage, just south of St. Gilles, on the west coast of the island. We walked over to the beach, had lunch, and then collapsed for a few hours.
We walked over to the shops and got some breakfast things and some pasta for an eventual dinner in. There is a bit of sticker shock when in the supermarket; almost everything is imported from metropolitan France, but even local produce seemed expensive. Back to the beach for the sunset and back to the studio for a light dinner and plan for our first real day.

Thursday morning, we headed to the west coast and inland from St. André to Salazie and on to Hell Bourg on the rim of the Cirque de Salazie. (photo) The cirques here are really the calderas of extinct volcanoes. This volcano is the Piton des Neiges, which has been sleeping several thousand years. The other one, the Piton de la Fournaise is still very active, almost annually! The landscape changes dramatically as you drive up the dry west coast, past St. Denis, and down the lush east coast. The rain comes from the east. All the towns along the coast around the island seem to be Saint something or other. They were founded by the French. Other towns, inland, have more picturesque names. Something that is striking about this island is that it is rather big, but was totally uninhabited when the French arrived in the 17th century. It, along with Mauritius, Rodrigues, and the Seychelles, are far enough west of Madagascar and east of Australia or southeast of India, that no one had ever settled there. So, the French didn't take it from anyone. No previous civilization was extinguished. The French Compagnie des Indes created the first outposts and then planters and slaves from Africa and Madagascar, followed by low-paid workers from India and China, brought in when the slaves ran off into the cirques -- a rather typical colonization for the period. In addition to the runaway slaves, many second sons, who would not get a piece of the plantation, also went up into the cirques. A few generations along and everyone was a beautiful mix of colors and religions and they had their own créole language.

Hell Bourg was developed in the 19th century as a spa, up in the highlands, away from malaria. It is a pretty little village that has maintained the houses (cases) from the 19th to early 20th century. We visited the Case Folio. It's an interesting guided tour. Isabelle "non-stop" (because you pick up the tour as you arrive and she just keeps going) told us the uses for all the local products: bamboo, different trees, plants, etc. Almost every plant can be used entirely from the leaves to the fruit to the roots, and when no longer productive, the wood.

On our drive back, we stopped in Ste. Suzanne, to visit a vanilla plantation. This is a recent plantation and actually it's a sugar plantation with a vanilla production showcase. The vanilla is grown in the forests. What we saw, here, was just for demonstration purposes. Vanilla is an orchid plant. The flowers, though, only last one day. So the flower has to be pollinated during that day, or there's no vanilla pod. Now, October, is the flowering season, so we got to see how they do it. The technique was invented by a 12-year-old slave, Edmond Albius, in the mid-1800s. He got no compensation other than his master, a botanist, did give him the credit for the invention. Since slavery was finally abolished in 1848, I suppose he didn't have to wait long. It's an interesting visit and a long process for good quality vanilla. The vanilla grows in the forest. It has to be detached from the tree trunk and so that the workers can reach the flowers and then the pods. They have to manually pollinate the flowers (The bees that can do this work are Mexican bees that did not adapt to La Réunion. Vanilla is originally from Mexico.) The pods must be hand harvested as they ripen, just at the right time, 9 months later. The crop is put into baskets and plunged into hot water, not boiling water for 3 minutes. Then, the pods are put into wood trunks and covered with blankets to steam. When they come out of steaming, they have turned brown. They are sun-dried for 6 hours a day, 10 days, and then continue drying in the shade. When they are dry enough (and we were shown how to determine this), they are put into wood trunks to age for a year. During that year, they are inspected regularly in order to throw out any pods that show mildew. After the year, they are sorted by size and tied into bundles and stored away again in wood trunks for further ageing. In all, the process is 2 years. We were cautioned against "fresh" vanilla that hasn't been dried. It looks nicer, but won't last. And the vanilla from Madagascar is sun-dried too long and not aged, so it becomes brittle and doesn't last, either. By this time, one is no longer shocked at the price they are selling their vanilla and is prepared to pay.

Yesterday, we headed south, to St. Pierre and beyond. La Réunion is not yet fully tourist-friendly. There are not many signs to the attractions and it's hard to find street names. St. Pierre is a bustling town with a couple of main shopping streets that measure up to any you would find in any sous-préfecture or préfecture in France. The city hall is located in an old warehouse that belonged to the Compagnie des Indes. We tried to find the market and there was an old colonial house to look at, but the house gates were closed, so we couldn't see it, and the market was on a street we didn't find. We left to visit the rum distillery.
Finding the rum distillery was another adventure because the guidebook did not say which exit to get off the highway and as we were in town, we didn't know from which direction they were giving the little instruction they did. It's a good thing we had a real map and managed to find our way to the main road and finally found signs for the distillery. There, too, is an interesting story about the difference between rum agricole, made directly from sugar cane juice and is more common in the Antilles, and rum traditionnel, made from molasses, which is already a by-product after the juice is separated to make sugar. The bagasse, the fiber, is used to fuel the electricity plants, thus supplying the sugar plants with whatever energy they need and a bit extra for the local grid. They also claim that the sugar cane consumes the entire CO2 production from cars on the island. The guide took us through the distillation process, distillation, condensation, ageing... to tasting and, of course, buying. The specialty on La Réunion is rum "arrangé", with fruit. It's really quite good.

From there, we continued along the southern coast to St. Philippe, where we saw our first lava coastline. The village has been here quite some time, so whatever flow created the beautiful hillside and coast, it was a long time ago. We had a very good lunch at La Bicyclette Gourmande. I had a "sauté vanille" -- a mix of lots of vegetables with shrimp (but I could have chosen meat or chicken) in a vanilla sauce, with rice and lentils. Then we had ice cream for dessert, from a local ice cream maker -- a scoop of ginger and honey and another of pralines. Excellent lunch.

After lunch, we continued all the way to the Grande Coulée, the 2007 flow. Plants are just starting to come up. We stopped, on the way, at le Vieux Port, where the forest has grown considerably since the 1986 flow. The floor of the forest is all fern and then there is a variety of trees and other shrubs. It's very tropical, virgin forest -- but young. Anne and I walked all the way down to the ocean. There are some spectacular sights and, a bit further on, a volcanic beach. We didn't go that far.

Finally we got to the Grande Coulée, but we couldn't see the Piton the Fournaise, because, like so many volcanoes, it was shrouded in fog.
On the way back, we stopped at Le Puit des Anglais, a volcanic swimming pool for safe swimming. Looks like fun! And another stop at Le Cap Méchant, more volcanic seaside.

It might sound as if we covered great distances, but really, no, we didn't. We left in the morning at 8:30 and would have been back at 5:30 if we hadn't got caught in a traffic jam at St. Gilles. We quickly turned around and came back to l'Ermitage for our third sunset.