The Norths in Lunel

Visit to Cerbère

2011-09-17T18:44:00.000+02:00

A few weeks ago I took the train to Montpellier and saw that it went daily to a place called Cerbère. Where? A tiny seaside village on the Spanish border, 3 hours' direct train ride down the coast from Lunel. So, accompanied by Mary's cousin (on a visit from Costa Rica!) we set out on Tuesday and trundled our way past Sète, Agde, Béziers, Narbonne, Perpignan, Collioure and more besides, between étangs and the sea, to the terminus. The line goes on to Spain, but we alighted in this last French outpost. The station shows signs of its former importance as a border crossing with disused customs areas, and from it we made our way steeply down towards the centre ville. Not far, and the sea was almost instantly in front of us.

We had about 6 hours until our evening trip back to Lunel, time for a stroll round the village and its 5-stall market, a great fish lunch, some time on the little beach and a slow climb back up to the station in the hot afternoon. The modern town relies on concrete for its cantilevered roads, elevated pavements and the huge railway viaduct high above the harbour. It was pleasant, unpretentious and obviously popular with walkers.

This extraordinary and now derelict hotel by the railway is the belvédère du Rayon vert, a listed building designed by the architect Baille. It is a relic of the heyday of Cerbère as a customs town and rail centre. It has a grand staircase, and was once a casino with theatre, cinema, its "Bar Bleu"and its terrace complete with tennis court. Beneath the roof is an ingenious early system of ventilation based on a 'bees nest' or honeycomb system. The external staircase is Florentine.

It's hard to believe that this sleepy little village was once such an important frontier town with a population of over 1300!

A musical summer

2011-08-10T19:59:00.000+02:00

Over the past week we have been away from home in the Ain département, in the east of France. Here a gifted musician Stephane Fauth and his wife have a house, a huge converted barn, which they have turned into a centre for chamber music courses with guest rooms and a lovely music room complete with grand piano. The place is called the Val du Séran after the little river that flows past the bottom of the garden.

Stephane's passion, and much of his life's work, is and has been around chamber music. He himself plays violin, viola, double bass, piano and guitar, but he also composes. He taught for many years in Belgium. Now, each year, he assembles groups of musicians who come together for a week of intensive playing, pieces he carefully selects for each group. He occasionally plays during the week but his principal function is to coach the groups and encourage better ensemble playing.

We have learnt over many years that performing music well together in groups is as much about listening to the others as about playing or singing your own part. When you learn a piece to start with you're often buried in your own line and unless everyone counts perfectly things will quickly come unstuck. Once you start to listen you can play together and the pleasure of musical ensemble begins.

In France we've discovered frequently that this not something people learn as a matter of course – frequently, even quite good musicians will work hard to perfect their own line, alone before a rehearsal, but find difficulty in joining it with the others. So this week it has been interesting to mix 3 of us English musicians with three French people and to learn to make music together, to listen more. The English tradition of sight-reading is also quite different from the French habit of thorough learning in advance. I certainly could give more time to learning!

In any case, music is an exercise in tolerance and give-and-take. Everyone makes a mistake from time to time, and if you lose your place you need to find your way back in. And it is far less forgiving than spoken conversation. Even with my often poor French I can make myself understood, but a line of music played even a fraction of a beat too early or too late makes nonsense of the whole piece – the language of printed music is precise and exacting. So even if we're sometimes exasperated by our friends' failure to come in on time or play the right notes, we feel full of admiration that they are prepared to have a go!

This was Mary's third year at Val du Séran. As a 'cellist she was as busy as ever, with often 6 sessions a day of very varied musical styles. The first summer she went alone; last year I went with her and listened during the day although I sang Schubert with the pianist from the group after supper. As a result of that, Stephane suggested I came to work with the group this year, and proposed some folk song arrangements by Beethoven and by Haydn as well as a song with obbligato violin from an opera by Saint-Saëns.

One great pleasure for me was that he also wrote a piece especially for our group – flute, violin, viola, 'cello and high voice. It is a fantasy on 6 songs by the American composer Stephen Foster, arranged with great style and contrasts of mood. Stephen Foster was a very interesting man who, like many composers, died young and in poverty. He wrote all his own music although at first hearing the songs seem to be from popular and folk traditions, and most of his own words. Some seem controversial, even racist to modern ears, but he was anti-slavery at the time of its abolition and wanted to project positive images of black people. I'm very much hoping to perform it again with friends in the future.

The house is in a beautiful and remote valley near Annecy and not far from the Swiss border and Geneva. Travelling there you pass stretches of the upper Rhône or the Ain, both already splendid rivers winding their way towards their junction near Lyon. The local wines and cheeses are great, and it is a great pleasure to visit this remote rural area of France. The welcome at Val du Séran is also splendid, with lovely meals and comfortable rooms.

It was a pleasure to make music with Mary in some of the groups and also to find my singing voice standign up to more intensive work than I'm used to. 2 years ago I though I might have to stop singing altogether. Now I'm looking forward to more music in Montpellier and in Uzès over the next few weeks. A real feast all in all!

Music in the Cevennes

2011-06-26T22:13:00.003+02:00

Summer in the south of France is always magical for music, whichever kind you enjoy. Jazz, chamber music, many other styles have their own festivals in different localities. We are early music fans, and already there has been plenty to tempt us - the Maguelone Festival in the coastal mediaeval cathedral just south of Lunel took place at the beginning of the month and we were lucky to hear two concerts there. http://www.musiqueancienneamaguelone.com/

Then this week has been the Festival des Cordes Sensibles www.festivalcordessensibles.com in the rural area north of Alès. We were attracted to the concert in St Jean de Valériscles because our friend Evelyn Tubb, accompanied by the equally well-known lutenist Anthony Rooley, were performing there yesterday. So we drove into the Cevennes to find this village with a mediaeval centre which can be approached literally only through archways and tunnels! We arrived early and had a chance to look round and walk along the river bank before it was time to go up to the church, where we met Evelyn and Tony .

They were glad to see us because they needed help in translating part of their introduction into French. Mary obliged and helped tell the story of this multi-faceted programme - Islamic/ Christian/ Jewish/ secular, which sprang from a visit to Jerusalem in the late 1990s. It aimed to identify common and positive features of the three religions and of secular life - love and the worship of God - which are uniting rather than dividing factors in a situation of strife.

The small church was quite full. There is a little gallery at the back, and the acoustics were excellent - Evelyn sang as she walked round the church a few times, and we could hear well. The music was sublime - ranging from the middle ages to the baroque, performed with passion and intensity, and the kaleidoscopic colour and range for which Ev has become so well-known. The songs were acted out with elegant genstures and movements. Several pieces we knew well, including Purcell's Blessed Virgin's expostulation, Monteverdi's Nigra sum from the 1610 Vespers (the text 'I am black but comely' is from the Song of Songs) and two Dowland songs which took us right back to the time when we met Evelyn in the 1970s. In all we felt excited, privileged and moved to be part of this concert which contained so much that we knew and also pieces we were hearing for the first time, performed by such complete artists and at the same time by friends.

Road Safety

2011-06-15T09:17:00.001+02:00

This is an update of something I wrote 2 years ago. British people often say it must be hard to drive on the other side of the road, but of course when you move to another country you get used to it after a bit. But there are certainly differences between French driving and British - motorways/Autoroutes less crowded, more hair-raising overtaking, even less reliable signalling on or near roundabouts for example. You need to pay a lot of attention to overtaking - one French person told me it happens because French drivers always want to be in front. And a recent survey shows increasing neglect of the blinking indicators (to coin a phrase).

A couple of years ago in The Connexion, an English-language monthly for ex-pats, someone wrote to suggest the paper did an article about bad French driving. The editor rather weakly replied that it was not their job to offend the French. Well, I don't want to do that either, but I did wonder whether there was any substance in the the idea that things were worse here. So I looked up road accident stats (not straightforward, but official websites yielded the answers in the end) and this graph showing road deaths is the result. 2009 deaths in France are virtually the same as 2008.

In 2002 before President Chirac started government initiatives against drink driving and speeding, in countries of almost identical populations, well over twice as many people were killed on French roads each year; even now British road deaths are over 40% lower than here. Injuries seem to follow the relative figures. Official publications say the problems are still mainly too much speed and too much drink, as well, increasinly, as talking on mobile phones while driving. They take very seriously the target of reducing accidents - blood alcohol limits are being reduced still further. There has been an interesting muddle over advertising radar speed traps recently - the govt said it would remove warning panels, but has now done a u-turn (!) in face of political protests. France is not the worst country in Europe - Ireland is about the same and Portugal much worse, for example - but as French residents now we shall certainly take extra care, and try not to resent the increase in speed cameras (2 fines for minor speeding offences so far in 4+ years!)

When we arrived here I decided I should know what the equivalent of our Highway Code said. The Code de la route turns out to be a clear, thorough and I think impressive document, well-illustrated and informative: I don't think the British counterpart has for example a description and explanation of ABS brakes. There are some interesting differences - for example single yellow lines in France mean you can neither unload nor park, dotted that you can unload but not park. In a country addicted to fresh bread there are numerous 'arrêt minute' areas where you can hop out to get your baguette at the boulangerie but otherwise, the Code says, dashing into the bakers is parking (stationnement) and not a simple arrêt. While I'm on about French road rules, a very useful one to remember is that 50 km/h (roughly 30 mph) speed limits start automatically when you see the town or village sign (black on white edged in red). That is one reason for the often useful 'you are now leaving such and such a place' signs (no red and with a diagonal line through the place name) - it also signals the cancellation of the town speed limit. For dozy drivers and map readers it's also a handy revision tool - as in 'where the hell are we now - never mind I'll check on the way out'.

So despite my wish for scrupulous fairness I think there is some reason to be wary of other drivers on French roads, and particularly never to try and guess which way they will head on roundabouts (something my French friends also complain about a lot). And it does really seem as if, however fast you are driving, there's always someone behind you wanting to go faster. Never mind, it could be worse - according to a French govt publication it's far more dangerous on the roads almost anywhere in eastern Europe or even in Portugal!

To Spain and back - part 2, travelling north

2011-05-20T17:07:00.001+02:00

We left Granada as we arrived, in the rain, but the weather quickly brightened until we neared our destination in the mountainous Castellón province, in the mountain-top village of Morella. This photo was taken the following day but, as we approached in rain and fog we saw this mountain disappearing in the clouds and asked weakly 'do we have to go up there?' Indeed we did, and having found our hotel in the pouring rain and parked some distance away the skies really opened as we carried our bags back through the rivers now filling the steep streets . So we were glad of a comfortable room, a nice bar with tapas on tap and tennis on the telly!. We awoke the following morning to glorious sunshine and a stoll round the Sunday market stalls and up the narrow streets to the church below the ruined castle, the gryphon vultures circling overhead.

We bought mountain cheeses and sausage which are typical of the region, and set out across the mountainous landscape towards the coast again and Tarragona. The province of Arragon is sparsely populated, with small hillside villlages and small towns and dramatic vistas, with huge wind farms - we'd never seen so many wind generators in one area, but they did not seem to detract from the splendour of the landscape and, I guess because of them, the roads have been very well engineered so that driving was not at all difficult and we could admire the scenery. More on Morella here.

Near the village of Cretas we came across this 15th century hermitage, with its ancient rock causeway, even more pretty in the poppy season, and a tranquil stop on the journey.

So gently we descended through the forests of winmills towards Tarragona.

We really enjoyed our overnight stop in this a city of Roman origin, with plenty of Roman remains including a tower and arena.

We had plenty of time to stroll, and to ride on the tourist bus, to see the mediaeval cathedral and the steep old town centre and Roman ramparts.

We stayed right in the centre and ate tapas in the square right in front of our hotel. More on Tarragona here.

So we returned to France last week very content with our 10 days' holiday in Spain. Thanks to Brenda for welcoming us in Granada and to Linda for suggesting some places to visit on the return journey. Lots more to see in the future...

To Spain and back - part 1, Granada

2011-05-10T16:26:00.000+02:00

We have just arrived back in France from Granada. It was a wonderful week despite occasional torrential rain, and we were lucky to stay with our friend Brenda whose knowledge of the Moorish past of the city is extensive and who offered her services so willingly as a guide. We found Granada really attractive and will certainly return, if only because we have yet to see all of the Alhambra.

Some of the best moments were spent visiting Nasrid (mediaeval muslim) houses from the humblest to the richest. The decorated arches over doorways and windows, the courtyards with pools, galleries with wooden balustrades and the play of light and shade were wonderful. Here are a couple of pictures:

Alongside this restrained beauty the baroque excesses of some of the Christian churches was rather hard to bear, but taken in small doses there were some fine scuplptures and ornaments.

We did a lot of walking and found wonderful views of the Mediaeveal Albayzin area, not least this one from the top of the Alhambra fort.

We were lucky enough to be around for the Festival of Crosses on 3 May with displays of red-flowered crosses, plants, copper pots and other items including apples speared with scissors (a symbol intended to ward off evil spirits):

Despite failing to get tickets for 2 of the palaces, we saw a lot of the Alhambra, including the Generalife and gardens and the forts, and came away with memories and photos to treasure:

After a week we've come away with a strong desire to return, and views of the Sierra Nevada above the city fresh in our minds.

Health, wealth & happiness

2010-07-22T05:13:00.003+02:00

We have had constant need of the health services since we came to France, but at no time more than over the past two months. Mary's undiagnosed heart problems led to a mini-stroke, the pompiers came and in no time she was in hospital in Montpellier. Later in the heart unit her narrowed artery was corrected by a 'stent' and now she has blood-thinning drugs and several more. All simply paid for by our carte vitale and the complementary insurance we took out as soon as we arrived. We were especially lucky being near one of the leading centres for heart treatment in Europe, but the care was impressive in any case.

Emergency services tend to be pretty good in England too, but the big difference we notice is in the regularity and thoroughness of GP visits. The necessity of a designated GP or médecin traitant here is fairly recent - in the old days, people went straight to specialists. The GP was supposed to act as a gatekeeper saving specialists' time, but in addition for me it makes good sense especially if you don't know quite what is wrong with you - how do I know whether to go to the cardiologue or the gastroentérologue.

Many GPs here (like ours) offer supplementary services - homoeopathy, acupuncture for example. None of these ever seem to have done me much good, but the regular checkups and tests are very reassuring especially after a sudden emergency like Mary's - a partner like me can only really watch and wait and feel anxious - unexplained pains suddenly seem more serious! In England I only really went to the doctor when there was something obviously wrong, prescriptions were renewed automatically and nobody ever suggested regular visits. I have an underactive thyroid for which I've had regular blood tests for years but that was all that was tested for.

Here I go to the doctor every three months, essential to renew my prescriptions, and I have annual blood tests. These are three pages long and handed to me the same day with abnormalities highlighted in bold print. Thus I discovered my excess cholesterol, now well-controlled by the statin Tahor. Our GP was recommended for his diagnostic skills, and he also put his finger on one of the causes of my throat nodules, which stopped me singing for nearly a year - acid reflux from the stomach, now also well-controlled with drugs, as is the pain from my arthritic knee.

You can see why the pharmacist is such an important part of French life! Of course, like other health services the French one is creaking under the strain of paying for our better health and longer life, and part of this is due to the drugs bill. But here we know all the time how much things cost, and while much is reimbursed, often we pay upfront for health services. The regular statements from the CPAM and the mutuelle make fascinating reading.

To get back to my regular and reassuring GP visits, in my heightened state of anxiety over my own health I had a conversation recently with a British friend who is undergoing treatment for prostate cancer. We talked about the difficulty of getting tests for PSA (prostate-specific antigen), an advance warning indicator (in the blood) of prostate problems. So I asked my doctor yesterday if he could arrange it for me and he pointed out that it is already part of the annual blood tests I have as a matter of routine. He also took my ECG (normal apparently) which I insert here just for the hell of it:

Finally, I'd thought the title of this post would be a quotation from a famous writer, but though many have used combinations of 'health, wealth and happiness' in their writings, and though it is now a catch-phrase and frequent title of books and websites, I can find no obvious source. Health and happiness are most important, but of course wealth helps, if only enough to pay for the mutuelle!

The South-West

2010-07-19T14:06:00.011+02:00

We've just got back from a few days near Lourdes. We went, first, to meet some friends who are keen cyclists. They had taken their tandem there because the Tour de France is now in the Pyrenées and there are various cycling events arranged around the Tour itself. We prefer to follow the race on tv, which we enjoy a lot - better to see how the race develops than to see it all whizz by in a few seconds, even on the mountains. The contest between Contador and Schleck, the battle behind them among hopefuls, and the sad fading out of Wiggins, Armstrong and all, is a source of interest and amazement.

Lourdes itself is a pleasant and interesting town, if you discount the endless gift shops, or perhaps they even add to the individual charm of the place.

Mary went to the grotto to collect holy water and then we toured the town on the little train, an excellent way to see all the sights in a fairly short time.

The next day we took our friends wine tasting in the coterminous areas of Madiran and Pacherenc du Vic Bilh, north of Tarbes. They had never done this before, and we chose a contrasting pair of producers, the go-ahead Co-op at Crouseilles where Jane took great interest in Mary's earnest discussion with the chap behind the counter...

...and then a splendid individual producer, a woman in a man's world, at Domaine Labranche-Laffont. The vigneronne Christine Dupuy was away at an event but her architect husband welcomed us and showed us the vineyards including some pre-phylloxera Tannat vines which they use for a long-keeping deep-flavoured red. It was a splendid trip to an area I had long wanted to visit for the delicious Pacherenc whites, and where we discovered a range of marvellous red Madiran wines too. The roads and villages in that area are not easy - twisting, difficult to follow on the map, but the countryside is lovely and the Pyrenees often tower in view to the south. We returned delighted with our trip.

What's in a name?

2010-07-15T06:38:00.004+02:00

The village nearest to us and Lunel is called Saint Just. It is a pretty place, just on the fringes of the marshes and lakes or étangs which lie between us and the sea, and it is passionate about bulls - the panels on the roundabouts at either end have nice metal cutout heads of black bulls and white horses. You can find out more about the village at http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint-Just_(Hérault) but not, as far as I can see, which of the several possible saints of that name was behind the original mediaeval settlement. But the family name Saint Just is famous in France because of the Count of that name who was a key players in the French Revolution, the so called 'Archangel of the Terror'.

When I was young I used to go on holiday to Cornwall and recall the picturesque village of St Just in Roseland, not far from Truro. The saint in that case seems likely to have been the 7th century archbishop Justus of Canterbury. Back here in France the village names that have intrigued me most are those ending in -argues or -ergues. They caught my attention first because we were for ever muddling Vérargues and Valergues, Souvignargues and Sussargues, and so on. There are I find over 40 names like this among the 750 or so communes in the Hérault and the Gard, and the suffix means 'earth' or 'soil' - territory perhaps, or in wine speak, terroir - in the local langue d'oc (roughly like Provençal).

The parallel word is that for water, Aigues, which crops up in the names of towns and villages, several called Aigues Vives (living, or fresh, water) and one not far from us Aigues Mortes, (literally 'dead', that is salt, water). We love visiting Aigues Mortes despite or perhaps because of its overtly tourist aspect.

Here is the complete -argues list - a kind of blank verse you could chant:

Aimargues, Arpaillargues-et-Aureillac,

Aubussargues, Aujargues, Baillargues,

Bouillargues, Bragassargues, Buzignargues,

Caissargues, Cambon-et-Salvergues,

Candillargues, Cavillargues, Domessargues,

Estézargues, Galargues, Gallargues-le-Montueux,

Générargues, Goudargues, Guzargues,

Lansargues, Marsillargues, Martignargues,

Massillargues-Attuech, Mauressargues,

Montignargues, Olargues, Parignargues,

Saint-André-d'Olérargues, Sainte-Croix-de-Quintillargues,

Saint-Jean-de-Ceyrargues, Saint-Vincent-de-Barbeyrargues,

Saint-Vincent-d'Olargues, Saturargues,

Sauteyrargues, Savignargues, Souvignargues,

Sussargues, Valergues, Vallérargues,
Vendargues, Vérargues

Back again!

2010-07-09T21:53:00.005+02:00

Here I am again after a long break from the Blog. I can't really say why I stopped, but now I feel I want to write again, and I hope to do so fairly regularly.

Tomorrow is the start of the Fête de Lunel which always takes place in the week around the National holiday of 14 July. We probably shan't be going this year, but for the last three we have been around to see the procession on the first Saturday, the 100 bulls running through the town and into the Arènes, and we've taken part in other festivities including a déjeuner au pré (sausages and pastis for breakfast at a manade or bull farm, with eggs and flour thrown about to liven things up) and visits to the Arènes for the Course Camarguaise.

Those who regard bull fighting with suspicion seem to me to be right about the Spanish Corrida, cruel and ending in the death of the bull. Corridas happen here in the Languedoc, but our local tradition around the Camargue and featuring the local black bulls is much more entertaining and allows the bulls their chance of glory. Young men - raseteurs - chase them to try and retrieve trophies tied to their horns, and they in turn chase the young men. Bulls retire at around 15 years old, and there is a champion bull as well as a champion raseteur each year.

This year we have a whole family (adults and children) staying for the festival weekend, and one of the women is taking place in the parade tomorrow dressed in traditional Arlesienne costume. I've put a couple of pictures of previous years' Fêtes with this post to give a bit of a flavour of the event. Today we were in town shopping and there was a whirl of activity as extra counters and tables were erected outside cafés, tiers of seats erected alongside the procession route and a special road surface laid round a tight bend so that the bulls won't slip over. Proper tarmac - I'm all of saving animals from getting hurt, but it did strike me as a bit ironic that the road crew was out specially for a week of bulls and horses passing to and fro, while our little cul-de-sac has been a mass of potholes since we arrived here over three years ago!

Lunel on Sunday

2009-11-15T12:18:00.006+01:00

I left a long gap - sorry folks, too much to do and I kept feeling uninspired about writing. But this morning we walked into Lunel as usual on Sunday. The town is always buzzing - market day, most shops open, cafés full to bursting and friends meeting each other in the street. Mondays are by contrast almost dead.

Our regular routine is to buy vegetables at our friends Christine and Martial Vanvooren's stall (untreated produce from their market garden on the way to Marsillargues) by the Halles, then to get cheese at the magnificent stall in the Halles (maybe also fish, or duck sausage, from other stalls there), then meat at the Halal butcher Encas and bread at one of the central bakeries, after which it's time for our coffee or beer. We almost always end up at the Bar des Sports on the corner opposite the Pescalune statue (see previous post on Lunel).

This morning we met our neighbours there and 6-year-old Rémi was chattering away about his life and his friends - and rushing off to meet them - while his dad Bruno drank a coffee with us en route to their lunchtime engagement. Mum Christine was there in passing, but had already met up with friends in other cafés, so only said a quick hello in passing. And several of their friends stopped to say hi too, so we were well entertained for over half an hour before we set off back through the flower market towards home.

There we found the little drama of the morning - the pompiers (firemen) were there lights flashing rescuing a lady who'd fallen down the steps from the main market and apparently broken her ankle. In France you always call the firemen rather than ambulance first of all for an accident and it's they who are trained in first aid.

Then as we walked back down the avenue des Abrivados I remembered to take a photo of the completely blocked footpath - the Mayor here is very keen on keeping footpaths for pedestrians, but each Sunday as you can see the path by the carpark is occupied by cars to you have to walk in the road, and it's about time someone did something! And for autumn colour nothing beats the pyracantha just along the road from our house!

Bed & breakfast

2009-10-05T09:48:00.004+02:00

When we came to France we found ourselves in a house with spare bedrooms and we decided to offer B&B. To begin with it was mainly for our UK friends and acquaintances, but in 2007 France passed a law requiring all publicly advertised accommodation to be formally registered. The Lunel Tourist Office noticed our website, and we decided to register rather than remove the details.

It turned out to be a fairly simple process. We were offered the chance to register with accommodation agencies, but decided to remain 'hors label'. So some Tourist Office staff came with a local Councillor whom, as it happened, we knew. M Moysan is a neighbour and the Member responsible for cultural affairs and we'd already met him to discuss music in the town. Apparently they usually bring an elected Member with them, and in this case I think it satisfied a natural curiosity to see how his English neighbours lived, which we well understand. Anyway, we apparently passed with flying colours and duly completed the paperwork. Now we appear in tourist guides and pay the very modest taxe de séjour which helps fund tourist publicity.

Lunel is not crowded with B&Bs - it's not really a tourist town, but a lot of people pass through or find it convenient between Nîmes and Montpellier, hills and sea, vineyards and Camargue. So it's not really surprising that almost immediately people (mostly French) started to phone with requests for rooms. Several were pilgrims, starting from Arles via Saint Gilles and Vauvert towards Montpellier on one of the many routes across France to the shrine at Compostela in north-west Spain. One of these was a young Korean man spending the last of his savings on a life-changing journey having lost job and girlfriend all at once. Others have been people visiting friends and relatives nearby, or coming to a wedding in Lunel, or taking work-related exams which start bright and early in the morning. Just now we have a young man, Gabriel, who is with us 5 nights a week for 3 months while he takes an arduous heavy lorry-driving course; and Theresa, a young Englishwoman, as just left having been over for a fortnight to train French franchise owners how to run a Bagel outlet in a new shopping centre in Montpellier.

We still welcome friends and family from the UK and elsewhere, though visits have tailed off in the past year because of the fall in the value of the pound though we still welcome all who can make it. For the rest we try to cover costs, not really to make a profit. We have other English friends who have run their B&B as a fully-fledged business and have scarcely had a moment to call their own between March and October. We try to balance our life and other commitments here with our efforts to offer a comfortable and enjoyable stay for our paying guests, but in any case our French guests have offered us a glimpse of the country and culture we've joined and an opportunity for us to practise and develop our language skills!

The silence of the bees - Le silence des abeilles?

2009-09-18T10:52:00.006+02:00

This week 10,000 bee specialists from all over the world have gathered here in the south of France for the 41st Apimondia conference. I hadn't heard of this until our local newspaper published an article today highlighted the event and the work of Vincent Tardieu. He is a French journalist who writes a blog (and has published a book) called L'étrange silence des abeilles, about the often mysterious disappearance or reduction of bee populations. Of course this is deeply worrying because much fruit and vegetable production depends on bee pollination.

As the newspaper says, the problem is that although they disappear by the thousands or millions, nobody really knows why, and Tardieu has attempted to find out through enquiries in the USA, in France and elsewhere. He says: "beekeepers think the problem is pesticides, virologists think it's definitely a virus, some entomoligists think it is a parasite, while other researchers blame some kind of genetic decline or competition with foreign immigrant insects.

One of these is the Japanese hornet (voir aussi article en français), a fearsome beast 5 cm long with a violent sting and no natural predators. As a wasp-hater since childhood I'm particularly worried about these because their huge nests have been spotted in the south west of France. Apparently they kill ordinary honey bees by hovering outside their hives and decapitating the workers as they pass. Ugh!

The article refers to the industrial-scale pollination practised in the USA with huge trailers of beehives being towed round orchards from Florida to California. There, bees are disappearing though nobody has found carpets of corpses. In a murder mystery, it goes on, if there are no corpses then there isn't a mass murderer, but Tardieu is convinced that reductions in bee population are due to a cocktail of ills, parasites and chemicals which threatens their very survival. He ends "these extraordinary insects preserve our delight in food and in the beauty and diversity of the countryside, so keeping them alive is very much our business."

Two footnotes. Our friends Christine and Martial Vanvooren who have a market garden here in Lunel use other insects to pollinate their crops inside poly-tunnels - this is obviously practicable if you have an enclosed space but not in the open. And I was relieved to discover that grape flowers are pollinated by wind so it seems our wine supplies will survive threats to the bee population.

Wirksworth to the fore

2009-09-10T17:43:00.010+02:00

As I write, the Wirksworth Festival is about to start and the latest issue of Community Fayre has just arrived in the post. Those who thought this blog would be about our life in France need to adjust their sets, but only slightly - it is about our life, and occasionally that will include our life before France, including 27 years in Wirksworth, the little Derbyshire town that still means a lot to us. Among other things we still have family and friends there.

Community Fayre is the community newspaper. It has just reached its 150th edition and is full of interest for those like us who have Wirksworth connections. Apart from the Festival, of which more below, it has articles on Elliott Rennie promoting his Ellympics (slow motion sprint, paper plane javelin and invisible curling) from the 4th plinth in Trafalgar Square - Elliott is son of our architect friends Rosie and Graham and also a colleague 'cellist of Mary's in the community orchestra (a genuinely inclusive musical group that's been going for many years).

The word community appears a lot in Wirksworth life, and there it is not an empty word. Long before we arrived there Anthony Gell School had been a beacon for town activity as well as secondary education, and for a time the whole of Derbyshire imitated Wirksworth's Community Education Council. The Town Council supported community efforts, as it doubtless still does, despite its own slender resources. (We have often bemoaned the way English local government takes away funds from local initiative whereas the French commune system leaves even small towns and villages with much more local control). The paper, the orchestra, the twinning with Die, the festival and much more sprang from this sense of sharing resources and working together. Small as the town is, it punches well above its weight.

The Festival has become a real artistic beacon, both in performances of all kinds and through visual arts - the Art & Architecture Trail is extraordinary, preceded only at the beginning by a few events in much larger places like Brighton, and both visual arts and music have both retained a local element as well as attracting talent from much further afield. It will, undoubtedly, be a great success, and we are proud of all our friends including the current Chair Bill Lounds who put so much effort into making it so.

Community Fayre this time is full of nostalgic memories and touching reminders of old friends - the Sam Taylor award set up by his parents Judie and Paul and brother Tim in his memory (he was killed in a road accident 11 years ago) for an outstanding pupil at the secondary school; our old neighbour Lester Simpson who has brought his huge musical talent into the life of the town, a memory of Ken Wilson who died this year and helped our sons among many others in Wirksworth Cricket Club, Lee Bowyer from our son Sam's year in school now following in his father's footsteps in the family paving and aggregates business. It also recalls the beginnings of Community Fayre itself in the early 80s, shortly after we arrived in Wirksworth. For those of us who have lived there it's a proud product of a real town community.

We can and do keep in touch with those, friends and family, who are still alive and well and living in Wirksworth, so there is special poignancy in remembering some of those who have died. Some of them are mentioned above, and other special friends included Mike Pegg who shared my enthusiasm for wine and passed on to me his home-made wine racks; Maggie Riddle whose friendship reinforced our involvement in twinning and our developing interest in living in France; and Peter Hoon, whose lovely black and white prints of Wirksworth were so often Christmas cards or little gifts we still treasure. His widow Jenny is curating an exhibition of them in the Festival this year, and I have used some to illustrate this post.

French Quakers

2009-09-03T08:03:00.006+02:00

I was brought up a Quaker (member of the Society of Friends), worked for many years in the British Quaker headquarters and, although I'm no longer a member I still have sympathy with Quaker principles and admiration for many Quakers. Long before we came to live in France I also knew that there was a place called Congénies, the original seat of the French Société des Amis but I had no idea that it was just along the road from Lunel and that the old 19th century building had been restored as an active Meeting House. We quickly made contact with local Friends.

The origins of French Quakerism are romantic, told in full on the Congénies website where you can also find details of current activities. In brief the original group was part of the widespread protestant dissent in the Cevennes in the early part of the 17th century, but unlike many other such groups which fought a guerilla campaign against government forces, this group was pacifist. So in a sense the French group predated the birth of British Quakerism in the 1650s. But because of language barriers (at that time they spoke Occitan, not French) and poor communications, the French group did not learn about or identify with Quakers elsewhere for over a century.

But they did eventually become Friends or Quakers in name. Even now the Society in France is very small, with only around 500 adherents, and apart from a Centre in Paris, the Meeting House Congénies is their main building. We found we had friends in the Meeting already and we soon began to attend Meeting from time to time and to help out with the considerable job of running the Congénies Centre and its activities.

Just as churches in England are charities, so here they are associations. But religious associations are complicated here, and it has been interesting for us as sympathisers but not members to find that there is a role for us in the 'lay' association which has to exist to run nonreligious Quaker activities (upkeep and letting of the Meeting House for instance) alongside the 'church' or religious association (which has its own Law of 1905). In such a small group people are of course glad of any help they can get but it is at least a comfort to me that, thanks to this strict separation of the secular and the religious in the French state, there is a natural place for someone like me who no longer believes in a religious sense but who is a sympathiser.

Further information about Quakers on these sites - France, Britain. These sites and the Congénies one above have links to further sites.

La vie associative

2009-08-31T15:47:00.007+02:00

I've just met a British man who has lived in northern France for a few years and is gradually improving his French. Like me he finds this hard work, and nowhere more so than in meetings - also like me he had spent years training people to run meetings well and in the end he has given up the struggle of going, and with it given up some of the friendly contacts you make through belonging to local associations.

In France associations are part of everyday life and, like many British clubs, an ideal way of finding social life, so many expats in France join them and find themselves involved in the unique French meeting. In the UK these are usually relatively orderly affairs in which there is a Chair(person) steering the business, a secretary taking minutes, and a written agenda. I have never encountered the latter in France, and almost all the meetings I've been to have taken place in a constant buzz of talk, after the long flurry of bises and handshakes at the start. Since even French people find it difficult to hear what's being said, it's no wonder foreigners feel left out if they are uncertain of their French.

In England, we both spent much of our lives working in voluntary organisations, at different times as paid workers and as volunteers. I spent most of my working life employed to improve the voluntary sector, so I'd tried to understand how the 'voluntary sector' worked in France, without much success. Some years ago a French friend used the expressive phrase le tissu associatif to describe the voluntary sector in France, but it was only after our move that I discovered how important the association is to everyday life here. The idea that people should be able to band together to do things for mutual and/or community benefit is at the root of the modern state: the right to form associations is enshrined in the law of 1901 which everyone knows about.

Of course many people belong to clubs and societies in the UK, but many of these are not really seen as part of the voluntary sector. Here everything from sports clubs to arts festivals, small local choirs to national charities, environmental organisations and campaigning groups are Associations Loi de 1901. They have a status in and alongside every commune and alongside the local and national state and commercial sectors. And they have advantages in exemption from taxation and in access to local communal resources, meeting rooms and so on. Above all they are in most people's minds as part of everyday life, whereas in the UK many people who belong to clubs don't really think of the voluntary sector or know what it is.

Because the association is such an engrained part of French life people here do jobs as part of the bureau (committee) of the association, and presumably enjoy the even more frequent meetings involved! Otherwise France and England are nearer when it comes to willingness to volunteer - never enough pairs of hands for some jobs, some members who are content to enjoy the group activity but don't offer to help out, and plenty of people who'd never think of doing work without pay. However, I think the UK is a long way ahead in organising volunteers through local volunteer bureaux and I think in training programmes and so on. (committee) of their favourite

I think la vie associative is a healthy and positive part of French life and we really enjoy our voluntary work here - I just wish meetings were less chaotic!

Why Lunel?

2009-08-16T10:14:00.008+02:00

This was the question we were asked often by French friends when we first arrived in France, and are still asked at regular intervals by French and English friends and acquaintances alike. We've been here over 2 years now and have no cause to regret our decision, so I thought we should try and explain both our reasons and the varied motives of the questioners!P

We started to come to France regularly in the early 90s following the twinning of our UK town Wirksworth with Die in the Drôme. After numerous visits we decided we'd like to live in the south of France when we retired, but that we'd prefer open skies to mountains. Unlike many people we know, we also wanted to live in a town with services we could walk to, not a remote village to and from which we'd have to drive to get food or medical attention. We wanted a fairly modern house, not one we'd have to restore or maintain a lot.P

Some of the French people we met found our decision to live in a place with a fairly high north African population hard to understand, but our experience of London, Nottingham and the UK in general had accustomed us to multi-cultural populations. Lunel has a mosque, some halal butchers and you often hear Arabic spoken in the streets and cafés. In many ways though, the more traditional culture - Occitan influences, everything connected with bulls and horses, the Spanish influence - seemed more unusual to us, but we have been fascinated to discover it all.P

For others, whether French or English, it is our choice of a comparatively urban setting that has been difficult to understand. This is of course just a matter of taste, but while we admire the beautiful rural retreats of many of our friends, we have already had many occasions to be thankful for the convenience of medical services at hand, and get more exercise walking or cycling around town every day than I think we would driving everywhere. We also know people who have struggled in emergencies through their relative isolation, and we wonder if in 20 years' time lifestyles which depend on cars will be sustainable, let alone environmentally sound.

Lunel is not a smart town, and many of our friends have I think consciously chosen prettier surroundings or more attractive local markets and shops. But this is a functional town, much of it quite old if still rather down-at-heel, growing fast and so with life and resources even in a recession, and new resources like the Médiatheque about to open on our doorstep. It's convenient for 2 (you could argue 3 or 4) airports, the Autoroute and the railway. But most of all, in a short time it has become home and we have good friends and neighbours here. No regrets, in other words.
P

The symbol of the town is the man fishing in the canal, the Pescalune. Only people born and bred here can describe themselves as 'pescalune', while we incomers are known as Lunellois. But I like to describe myself now as 'presquelune', hopefully becoming more identified with the town as the years go by!

Music outdoors

2009-08-15T09:16:00.006+02:00

Each 22 June is the Fête de la Musique in France. All over the country, in halls and theatres and most of all outside there is music of all kinds. I was spoilt for choice of photos of this year's offerings in Lunel and in the end chose the South Highland Pipers, a versatile crew who did not only Scottish but Irish numbers with appropriate changes of instrument. Now, as I write, it's the Lunel Jazz Festival with 4 evenings of late concerts under the trees in the park.
P
All through the summer in the south of France there are outdoor concerts. When we were in England we went to a few, notably a performance of Don Giovanni in the beautiful gardens of Tissington Manor. Indeed there are opera companies which specialise in outdoor performances - but they have to be prepared for rain. When we went, with our French friend Françoise on her first ever visit to England, we took a picnic (bubbly, smoked salmon etc.) which we ate under umbrellas with 100 or so others in the rain, and Françoise was already amazed; but when the performance started it poured down at least twice and the musicians had to stop and scurry for cover, while we sat in soggy rows, umbrellas deluging water each into 2 neighbours' laps. Then we left, before the opera was finished, and we heard afterwards that they had sung the final arias huddled undeer a little hut which was the only covered part of the set. Judging from the weather reports from the UK this year people will not have had an easier time.
P
The French experience is much more reliable, apparently. Thank goodness, because people pay mega-euros to watch grand opera in the Roman theatre in Orange or in the courtyard of the Palais des Papes in Aix-en-Provence (as we did a couple of years ago to hear our all-time-favourite Marriage of Figaro). There is an odd performance cancelled because of a thunderstorm, but usually the rain stays away and the warm late evenings are ideal for sitting and listening. And although the acoustics are variable, and amplification almost essential even for classical music, and although insects sometimes home in on the bright lights to plague audiences and performers, it's preferable to the stuffy interiors of concert halls in a hot summer. A few weeks ago we went to 2 indoor concerts here in Lunel - the Cheltenham Ladies College choir and string orchestra, and the Bucks County Youth Orchestra. They were in the Salle Georges Brassens, an impressively refurbished concert hall, and it was comfortably cool, but the sound of the air conditioning did not add to the enjoyment of the music!
P
The only slight blip in our enjoyment of the jazz this week has been the appearance of one of the local policemen ejecting people from the small patches of grass where they were sitting, near the main seating. We had our chairs on the paths, which was fine, but it seemed to be unnecessarily officious. His colleagues strolled by without commenting or intervening, it was just him!
P
Now we look forward to the start of the new season of music with rehearsals of our choir Crème Franglaise and then at the end of October the (definitely indoor) Mandoline Festival, almost unique in the world and with music of terrific quality and variety.

Wine

2009-08-12T10:06:00.007+02:00

It's time I wrote about wine on this blog. It's one of the reasons we are in France, and a continual interest and pleasure. There is plenty about it on our website too but this adds another dimension.
P

Living in England we enjoyed the benefits of an international wine market - plenty of choice from Europe, but also from the Americas, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. Also the supermarkets took (still do take I think) their wine buying seriously, employing reputable experts to select their wines, and we could always select with the aid of tasting columns in the weekend papers and of websites like Tom Cannavan's excellent Wine Pages. And in Wirksworth we had a wine tasting circle which met regularly over many years, a group of friends who enjoyed evenings together but also explored different kinds of wines - grape varieties, countries, supermarket favourites and so on.

All the time (since the early 1990s) we'd been coming to France and visiting vineyards. The photo shows me recently in one of the first I ever visited, Cave Didier Cornillon in Wirksworth's twinned area of the Diois (a group of communes around the town of Die in the Drôme départment). The pictures in the background are by our artist friend Ali Benyahya who lives nearby and is building his gallery next to Didier's caveau.
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To begin with on holidays we explored the Die area and its delicious sparkling Clairette de Die, and so met Didier soon after he had branched out on his own from the cave coopérative in the area (now known as Jaillance, with an output of 6 million bottles of bubbly a year and an impressive website - take a look). Didier has also prospered, making an impressive range of still wines as well as Clairette and, for a few years now, also running a good winery in Tunisia. Then we branched out down the nearby Rhône Valley, into Provence and the Languedoc, and of course we could not resist calling in on Bourgogne, Beaujolais, the Loire Valley and indeed Champagne on our journeys to and from England.
P
The contrasts with the UK are striking. Although wine is much more part of everyday life for many French people, most only know the wines of their own region. Exclude Champagne from that - everyone drinks it on festive occasions. Maybe people buy Bordeaux reds on special occasions. But to find people in the Languedoc who know or drink Beaujolais, Bourgogne, Alsace or Loire wines or even Côtes du Rhône, still less know which grapes are used for what, is fairly rare. And as for overseas wines, you find very few on sale and fewer French people who know anything at all about them. It was a real surprise to find a local vigneron who had been a consultant in Uruguay and was full of praise for South American wines - but admitted that the experiment of importing them to sell here had failed.

So I've had the pleasure of being accepted quite quickly as someone who 'knows about wine' among French friends, and as a result have extended my researches through introductions to some of the fairly numerous family members and friends of friends who are in the wine business. We have so much to explore still in France - the south-west, the Jura and Alsace, and the whole of Bordeaux - and within driving distance into Spain and Italy too, although we have started to discover the diverse wines and unusual grape varieties of north-east Italy near to the Slovenian border, which are hardly known in England let alone here in France! And we're hoping to develop a regular wine tasting circle here too.

Friendly French

2009-08-08T09:17:00.004+02:00

This week Mary went to a committee meeting. As in most organisations, whether choirs, churches, sports clubs or whatever, people often rely on them and their meetings for social contact and mutual support. In this case people were feeling upset and perhaps guilty because a member had sadly and unexpectedly died and they wondered if they had done enough, whether they could have helped more and so on. But in the course of conversation it turned out that the person in whose house the meeting took place lived only 3 plots away from another active member, but neither had any idea that the other was a neighbour.

This would not I think happen in our street. When we arrived in late 2006 three neighbours were in the road welcoming us ten minutes after we'd arrived, and we've experienced unfailing friendship and support from our neighbours ever since. We live in a cul de sac (which by the way is technically a French expression but is hardly ever used for a dead-end road - un impasse or voie sans issue on road signs) in which all the houses are fairly close together, and people tend to know what's going on nearby. English friends in towns and villages nearby confirm that neighbours are equally friendly and act as an informal neighbourhood watch!

But there's one feature of French life which is different from what we are used to in England. Both the letterbox and the doorbell are at the front gate, not at the front door of the house. Obviously this makes life easier for post-people and other deliveries. Among other things they don't have to risk life and limb if there are dogs in the front yard. But when someone comes to your house, unless they know you well they ring the bell and wait in the street. Given that many French homes have large solid gates and high walls or hedges, you've no idea if anyone is in or not, especially if the front garden is large. In the case of our committee friend who had not realised who were her neighbours, she lives in an area with large plots round each house and far enough from the centre of town that people use their cars all the time rather than walk, so it's not surprising that she hadn't bumped into them in the street.

When we came to France we carried in our minds somewhere the myth that French people are more private and discrete than English people. We have not found this at all - indeed we've been overwhelmed by kindness and warmth on all sides - and we've also found a similar myth here about how 'the English' are back in the UK. It all confirms us in the resolution we made early on not to generalise about 'the French', but at the same time you realise that simple things like the placing of letter-boxes and doorbells makes a difference to everyone's view of privacy.

There is one final thing - if you know roughly where someone lives but have forgotten the exact address, the letterbox usually gives you a clue - you are supposed to put your name on it. Indeed, when we first came to live in France and borrowed a friend's house for a few weeks, the post woman took back mail addressed to us at first because we'd forgotten to add our name to our friend's letterbox!

Language

2009-07-29T14:49:00.009+02:00

We've just finished a season of French conversation classes. Well, classes is a bit of an exaggeration - mornings of exploration followed by great lunches more like. It's over two years since we discovered the RERS (Réseau d'Echanges Réciproques des Savoirs) network. This is a national network of associations for the free exchange of information all over France. Its local branch around the town of Sommières a few km north of here has over 140 members.

We'd been searching for French lessons, and Quaker friends suggested we try the Tuesday morning sessions of RERS in Calade, a social centre in Sommières. We discovered a vast echo-ey building (an old school, which like many ex-schools in the UK is well-adapted to adult education, but not to multiple groups of loud pupils and loud teachers competing in close proximity to share their limited knowledge of foreign languages), and soon decided to meet in people's houses instead. Mary and I had steered clear of purely British groups like Britsnîmes (a very popular English-speaking association based around Nîmes - lots of French people like it too) because we wanted to prioritise learning French rather than meeting other Brits. We do this anyway in RERS...

Initially, the conversation group was for English-speakers (British people, a couple of Danes, a couples of Swedes, a German person or two) to brush up their French for an hour from 10-11. Then French speakers who liked to learn English started to arrive at 11 to have an hour's English conversation. Soon, the English conversation became serious enough that Mary began a separate Monday evening group - suitable for people who work as well as us retired folk - here in Lunel: this now has a dozen members, and is very successful. But we still have the Tuesday So now, each week except in August, a group of 15-20 meets in someone's house to converse in French for 2 hours, and in English from 11 on, followed by a shared lunch (delicious and varied - surprisingly there is usually enough of everything and rarely too much of anything).

This only describes a fraction of the activities of RERS, of which more anon. But it has been the start of some wonderful friendships for us as well as helping us improve our French.

Cycling

2009-07-25T17:55:00.011+02:00

This is a good weekend to write about cycling as the Tour de France reaches its climax. Since we've come to Lunel our bikes have come into their own - nice flat countryside after the serious hills of Derbyshire. We often use our bikes for gentle trips into town, and Jon rides around the local countryside in search of old roads, nice views and good photos. Lunel itself has made some efforts to accommodate cyclists, with green lines on pavements here and there, but these seem to lead to places you don't want to go to, or to peter out or include serious bumps over kerbs that are not really adapted. So I've joined Lunel à Vélo, which is a combination of social cycling group and campaigning organisation. You can see their blog at http://lunelavelo.over-blog.fr/

Cycling is a passion for many in France, and there are few fine weekends when you don't find parties of lycra-clad cyclists pedalling the roads into the Cevennes. That is far more sporting than we, or I think the average Lunel à Vélo members, are. The Tour of course is at another level altogether. Two years ago (amid drug scandals which have frequently marred the race) it passed the end of our road here, and my main memory is of 2 hours of wierdly-shaped publicity vehicles and then two groups of cyclists, two pelotons (the word comes from the same root as platoon) flashed by. This year we have watched most of it on the television, to begin with with curiosity, but with increasing admiration and sense of suspense.

There are some who say that the whole race is bound to be riddled with drugs - how can we know, although there are random tests? But the sheer power and endurance of riders who can ride over 150 km most days for 3 weeks at speeds averaging nearly 50 km/h (30 mph in old money) is awesome, and we have cheered the heroism of the American many times former winner Lance Armstrong who has returned this year after several years recovering from cancer and retained his third place with the most formidable climbs. We have admired the transition of Bradley Wiggins from Olympic track gold medallist to successful Tour rider who found reserves of strength to hang on to 4th place on Mont Ventoux; the amazing and talented Schleck brothers whose performances credit the tiny country of Luxembourg; and the sheer brilliant speed of the Manx Mark Cavendish who bursts through to win more stage than anyone else and hopes to do the same on the Champs Elysées tomorrow. We admire the supreme talent of the winner Contador. And we admire the teamwork of those whos pace-making and sheltering from the wind enables each of these stars to achieve what they do.

Weather

2009-07-24T08:52:00.009+02:00

The British are supposed to talk about the weather more than most, but we've found our French acquain- tances pretty adept at it! We moved here for the 300+ days of sunshine a year you get in the 'banana' along the Languedoc coast of the Med, even when it is stormy and cloudy over the Cevennes inland. Like today for instance, with a clear lue sky and temperature already 26° at 9 in the morning. One of the few things I remember from our geography teacher Barney Jacob, who had catch-phrases including 'med typ clim' (for Mediterranean-type climate) which we have now learnt means weather like this. Not really surprising when I think about it!

On clear days like today the wind comes either from the north or north-west - Mistral or Tramontane - and the humidity drops well below 50%, so washing dries quickly but you have to water the plants more (and it's never really enough - lots of people have automatic watering systems here). The northerly wind can be quite violent (common motorway sign - VENT VIOLENT SOYEZ PRUDENTS) but usually it's just a pleasant cooling breeze in summer. On the frequent bright winter days it's another matter, positively cold.

Then quite suddenly the wind will switch - anywhere from easterly through southerly to westerly brings humidity and cloud from the sea and just sometimes rain. When it rains it rains. 15-25 mm in an hour is not uncommon, and we once had 50 mm. Naturally the drains cannot cope and if you go out you wade through lakes.

Lunel is prone to flooding, but luckily we are on the good side of town, 11 m above sea level as opposed to 9 on the east side where houses are regularly flooded. This comes partly from flash floods from storms here and partly from the river Vidourle which runs about a km east of the town and brings the accumulated storm waters from the Cevennes. It is one of the most notorious rivers in France for flooding, and the town of Sommières a few km upstream has terrible floods once every 20-30 years, with perhaps 2-3 metres of water reaching up to the first floors of houses in the town centre. Stories of large fish in people's bedrooms are commonplace. This is not new - at the Roman site of Ambrussum on the river between here and Sommières excavations have revealed buildings destroyed by floods and rebuilt each time a little higher above the river at 25 year intervals 2000 years ago. Rivers in France have genders - Le Rhône, La Loire - but Le Vidourle is considered by locals to be almost god-like and so above gender, just Vidourle.

Oh yes, and we sometimes have snow, but not for long!

Le Pic Saint Loup

2009-07-21T18:41:00.011+02:00

Living as we do in the flat lands near the Mediterranean coast of the eastern Languedoc, the dramatic southern outpost of the Cevennes, the twin outcrops of the Pic Saint Loup and l'Hortus, are visible almost everywhere. Near the coast you see them on clear mornings by the Canal du Rhône à Sète, crouching on the horizon across the wild marshy country of l'Etang d'Or, the grander hills of the true Cevennes just visible beyond.

A little further north, in the vineyards just above Lunel and from the nearby A9 Autoroute, they provide a backdrop and hint at the great wines produced in their shadow.

But you begin to get a sense of the drama of the Pic, l'Hortus and the valley between as you drive west out of Sommières on the D1 through St Matthieu de Treviers towards the pretty and tortuous village of Notre Dame de Londres. All along the road are glimpses of the twin peaks.

Then suddenly you are much closer. The names of famous vineyards of the Pic Saint Loup appellation (still part of the overall Languedoc one, but the vignerons there relegate that to the small print) line the road and you find yourself dramatically between the rocks. They are hard to capture in photographs - trees and nearer hills keep obscuring the view, but here are a couple of pictures which make the link to the all-important vineyards.

A brief explanation

2009-07-17T14:36:00.007+02:00

This blog replaces the diary I've been writing on our website http://www.mnjenfance.eu/ for the past 2½ years. It will be a bit different - less a chronicle of events and more a series of reflections on our life here in France, perhaps pulling together some of the previous diary entries.

Although it's published under our joint names and I hope reflects our shared views, this is written by Jon.

I'll probably continue wine diary and other entries on the website. Here I shall write in English, but also in French from time to time. For the forseeable future, as part of my learning, my French will be checked with my teacher Rolande Guillaume, a splendid critic and good friend as well as aomeone who shares the joy of grandparenthood!

The name and logo on the blog need a bit of explanation: our site name and logo originate in the wordplay "M'n'J en France" (yes all right, it does not quite work in either language but it seemed a good idea at the time!), and then the pictorial representation of the letters mnj in the outline of the country. But neatly, the symbol we chose is also the astrological one for Virgo which is the birth sign for both of us.

We have lived in France for 2½ years, and I began to find myself repeating entries in the diary. There's a limit to how much people want to read 'and then we did this, then that'. Also, updating a website is rather less easy than posting a blog entry. So I hope this proves a good supplement to the website, but please continue to check it out, and look at photos of the month as well as what's new.

The Course Camarguaise

2009-07-17T09:10:00.010+02:00

Our form of bull-fighting happens all summer in the arènes of towns and villages across the eastern Languedoc. Teams of young men, raseteurs, pit their wits against a succession of bulls which have small trophies tied to their horns. The raseteurs have to get near enough to take each trophy in turn from the bull, and they do it by running past the bull and attempting to grab the appropriate thing as the bull turns. Then the raseteur has to escape as the bull chases him, and usually has to leap the barrier and grab the first tier of the balcony to do so. Just occasionally the bull leaps the barrier and runs round the passage at the bottom with spectators scattering rapidly behind barriers.

An afternoon's entertainment usually has 6 bulls for 20 minutes each. The best animals have competed for several seasons and are wily and agile, turning fast and keeping their trophies out of reach. A particularly successful bull will receive several Carmens, represented by snatches of music from the Bizet opera blaring over the loudspeakers, which for the rest of the time broadcast the mounting prizes donated by local businesses and associations which go to the raseteur who manages to grab each token in turn.

As the season progresses there are league tables of raseteurs, and various championships culminating in grand finals in the early autumn. There are also champion bulls, sometimes represented by statues like the one shown above on the roundabout near our house. Below are some photos of the Trophée du Muscat in Lunel yesterday.

La Fête de Lunel - the Lunel Festival

2009-07-13T19:31:00.004+02:00

This week it's the Fête de Lunel. On Saturday the town was packed for the opening procession, with people in traditional costume, marching bands and horses, culminating with 100 bulls running through the streets. For this reason the route is lined with sturdy iron fences over 2 metres high. A human being can comfortably squeeze through, but hopefully not a bull!

People are sometimes surprised to find a bull culture here in the south of France, but it's as much part of the local tradition here as in Spain. The black bulls here are smaller than the Spanish ones, and in the arènes the spectacles are courses camarguaises in which young men - raseteurs - chase (and are frequently chased by) bulls to retrieve tiny trophies tied to their horns. Each season there are leagues with champion raseteurs but also champion bulls. A bull may be 15 years old by the time it retires and the best become wily and smart, so the contests are full of guile and cunning, and athleticism as the young men leap the barriers for safety.

Each town, even quite a small village, will have its arènes and although a few (like Nîmes or Arles) are Roman, most like Lunel's are modern concrete structures. There are some corridas in the Spanish tradition here in the Languedoc, in which bulls are put to death, but most are courses camarguaises using the local black bulls and white horses, both originally wild in the Camargue and now raised on special farms or manades. Around the spectacles in the public arènes is a whole array of processions, ceremonies and rites in the manades and in the streets of towns and villages. These are not without risks, not least for the daring young people who dart out foolishly from the barricades as the bulls arrive. The release of the bulls is announced by cannon fire; at that moment, in our first year here, I was amazed to hear an announcement in several languages to the effect that 'bulls may be dangerous' and local councils put up notices disclaiming responsibility for accidents - health and safety is often stating the blindingly obvious - but even without the combined effects of pastis and sun the thrill is probably irresistible to some.

Horses in the streets are more controllable, and later this week there is a blessing of 100 horses in the square by the church. The horses, including young foals with their mothers, crowding through the streets, the colourfully dressed riders or gardiens, and the traditional occitan hymns are impressive and moving.