Lily's Blog

You know the feeling. Off on hols to sunnier climes. You leave Ireland and land further South. The first thing you notice is the lovely warmth which envelopes you as you emerge from the aeroplane. Even a ‘low fares airline’ can do nothing to dilute that feeling.

Early Sunday morning, 6th June, husband, youngest son and myself, Limerick to Cork as dawn breaks over Ireland. Uneventful Ryanair flight to Carcasonne. Having been travelling to South of France for many years, we never check a weather forecast. Sure the sun always shines in the South of France in summer. If it rains, it does so properly, quickly, it’s over and back to doing what it does well, sunny and hot.

I should have had my card marked for this holiday so to speak. We arrived in Carcassone. No sunny blanket enveloped us. We were drenched before we even got into the airport building.

Not rain, a deluge.

I couldn’t believe it. We got our rented car and drove the hour and a half east to Serignan expecting the sun to start dazzling … soon.

We drove and drove.

The rain poured and poured.

We arrived in Serignan, dropped bags at the house where we were staying and checked out the town.

Had lunch in town square … in the rain.

And so it continued for a week. Eldest son arrived to join us for the second week.

Sun still had not arrived. It was mainly overcast, raining by times but also cold.

We looked up the weather forecast for the second week … mixed. Believing from many years experience, that ‘it never rains in Maussane’, we set off on Monday morning to chase the sun, driving from Serignan (A on map below) to Maussane (B). We had a most beautiful sunny Monday afternoon cycling in sunshine in Les Alpilles, a small mountain range close by. We hoped/planned to do further cycling over the next few days.

We woke up to torrential rain on Tuesday morning, plans for cycling were quickly abandoned. Seemed like the bad weather was following us!

What we were unaware of until much later was of the devastation nearby. I wondered at texts from home checking were we okay. I was thinking how thoughtful people were just because we were having bad weather. It’s only as I read now of what actually happened, I can understand people being concerned. Quoting Friday’s Irish Times:

Torrential rain on Tuesday afternoon caused the worst floods in the region (French Riviera) in almost 200 years, with trees and cars being swept away and huge craters opening in village streets … Up to 40cm (16in) of rain fell since Tuesday, causing the worst floods in the region since 1827. “We have never seen so much rain in the month of June,” Patrick Galois of Meteo France said … Many of those who died were trapped in their cars as waters surged through streets in the worst hit area, around the town of Draguignan (C on map) … hundreds of holiday-makers were forced to leave flooded campsites and took refuge in makeshift shelters provided by local authorities.

Reading this certainly puts ‘bad’ weather in context. We experienced nothing like this so have absolutely nothing to complain about.

We’re off home tomorrow. Whilst it was lovely catching up with eldest son, we never really caught up with other sun!

As you can see, I’m back blogging.

I love Michael O’Leary. Well more specifically I love Ryanair’s cheap flights. He made a few days in France over the Easter break, possible.

We had some lovely weather, food and wine, beach walks and sight seeing. I could have stayed a lot longer …

One thing caught my eye (excuse the pun when you see what’s coming!) in Villeneuve-Lès-Béziers. Looks like Denis is walking over to steps where people descend.

Nope it’s Trompe l’oeil. I looked up wikipedia for a better explanation of Trompe l’oeil, than I could give. Trompe l’oeil (French for ‘trick the eye’) is an art technique involving extremely realistic imagery in order to create the optical illusion that the depicted objects appear in three dimensions, instead of actually being a two-dimensional painting.

This painting is all on one flat side of a building. It was done in 2007.

I love the way the shadows have been painted. As it happened when we saw it, the weather was very overcast.

Clever or what!

There are lots of fig trees growing here.

The Common fig (Ficus carica) is a large, deciduous shrub or small tree native to southwest Asia and the eastern Mediterranean region. It grows to a height of 23–33 ft tall, with smooth grey bark.

The leaves are 5-10 inches long and 4-7 inches across, and deeply lobed with three or five lobes.

In the Book of Genesis, Adam and Eve clad themselves with fig leaves (Genesis 3:7) after eating the “forbidden fruit” from the Tree of Knowledge.

I’m with Eve on this – her choice of leaf for coverage was good!

However what I didn’t know was -

The sap of the tree’s green parts is an irritant to human skin.

I didn’t know this when I was trying to work out how many fig leaves Eve would have needed!

The fruit is 1-2 inches long, with a green skin, sometimes ripening towards purple or brown.

Fresh figs – delicious!

Whilst the ‘Tour de France’ may be going on while we are here, we are doing our own ‘Petit Tour de France’. Cycling has always been part of our holidays.

Each day Denis and victim (either T or me) goes. Sometimes Denis goes cycling with one of us in the morning and t’other in the afternoon. It’s easier cycling in pairs than in threes. Although there are lots of quiet country roads, some roads we meet are busy. Middle mouse arrives this evening, so we will get four bikes for next few days per Tommy’s suggestion, but two pairs for busy roads.

Tommy is doing great cycling and I think hugely enjoying the accomplishment. Cycling a two-wheeler takes a fair bit of coordination and balance and if you’re challeged in any of those areas, then cycling itself is a big challenge. To be able to cycle a two-wheeler at all, is achievement number one. To cycle a two-wheeler for decent distances at normal speeds, is achievement number two.

Whilst I might go on longer cycles with D than Tommy, I get far more enjoyment from hearing about Tommy’s

When out cycling, one gets plenty of time to think. Whilst I was out on a long cycle with Denis last Saturday, I was thinking of a triathlon I had done in Sligo in the 80’s. Not many people took part in that first Irish triathlon and certainly not many girls. One person taking part was an Ann Kearney from Dublin, a mother of two young children at the time. A very nice person. Ann unfortunately died five years ago. Her daughter Caroline also went on to sporting greatness and was an Irish olympic hopeful, but was tragically killed three years ago in a cycling accident in France, aged 24. Report here.

Life really does send missiles.

Least anyone mistakenly think just because I took part in the first Irish triathlon, that I’m some sports person, I’ll put the record straight fast. I’m not. I just like being fit.

I had completed two Dublin City Marathons, can’t remember the years but unbeknownst to me at the time, Denis also participated in one of those marathons. Judging by both of our times, I spent the race running after him. However I am happy to say I completed both in 4 hours and lots of minutes. (I only rememember the exact number of hours, not the minutes. I can guarantee there were lots of minutes though.)

I was working in Sligo when it was announced that the first Irish full triathlon was going to be held there. I always found cycling easy. I could run. However there was one ‘fly in the ointment’, I couldn’t swim. I was in my 20’s at this stage but had never learned to swim properly. I was afraid of water. An aunt, with whom we spent our summer holidays, had regularly brought us swimming as children in Williamstown near Blackrock in Dublin. The waves were huge lashing against the rocks. I was terrified. That did the damage I think.

So the challenge was, learn to swim, so as to be able to swim a mile in the open sea. The triathlon was fifteen weeks away.

I like challenges, big challenges!

Fiftten weeks passed. That cold early Sunday morning in June came. I had learned to swim. Back stroke. I still hadn’t got the hang of breathing but I had one stroke. I reckoned no one was going to let me drown, there would be rescue boats in the water.

We started at the end of the second beach in Rosses Point and I let all the swimmers go in ahead of me. I then started on my back and back stroked the whole way across Sligo Bay coming ashore at the sailing club. Since I was the last of the swimmers, the ‘end of the race’ rescue boat kept me company the whole way. I never needed to worry about drowning! As far as I was concerned I had actually finished my triathlon once I had the swim over. I was now on the homeward stretch starting the 56 mile cycle and then running the half-marathon. They both seemed a doddle after the swim. I finished the race in an overall good time.

I stuck at the swimming but have never overcome my fear of water. I can swim all stokes now, breathing fine. I can get into a pool and swim a mile in lengths up and down, without a second thought. But if the pool has a deep end, I will only do it at the side. Years later I did a diving course in Australia but again fear of the water overtook me. Though I passed all the pool tests, I wouldn’t back flip with bottles over the side of the boat.

Back to ‘Le Petit Tour de france’

Tommy and Denis have just gone off for today’s cycling odyssey.

If we’re counting rising to a challenge, Tommy beats us all …

Hands down.

Go Tommy.

We now cheat at camping.

We don’t do any cooking. In earlier years we did cook, but now that the family has reduced … we allow ourselves this. Plus French food is so delicious and coming from Ireland, it’s inexpensive. In any case a holiday for me is a break from shopping and cooking.

I can’t believe I got this far into the holiday without posting on food, I love my food!

Breakfast picnic:

Spoiled for choice with breads

Lunch: Picnic for lunch. Today olives, goats cheese and baguette. (I’m sounding like Lorraine!)

Or maybe grab a slice of pizza

Coffee stops springled in, maybe with something from the Patisserie.

Dinner: There are abundant restaurants to eat out at night. One particular favourite is called ‘Aux delices des Alpilles’, which specialises in salads amongt other great cooking.

At this stage they know us well, checking when we first turn up each year, like the swallows, how many of the garcons are with us

I’d like to straighen up the little bowl of fig chutney in that photo!

Those salads cost 11-12 Euro, house wine 4.80 for demi-litre!

One well fed mouse and his parents.

But all the cycling and walking is working off the calories. Today 60km cycle over Les Alpilles. More on cycling another day …

Grannymar left a comment on a previous post that she was enjoying these holiday postcards, so I thought I would send a real holiday postcard to readers of this blog from Maussane.

Well half postcard, half thank you card.

After a bit of a shaky start, I am now a seven-month-old blogger. Don’t we age fast!

Thanks to you for your company on the blogging journey. It woudn’t be the same half as much fun, without you, the reader!

The sign going into the fruit and vegetable shop in the village does not do justice to the beauty of the produce contained inside.

This photo essay gives a little idea …

Really it’s not a fruit and vegetable shop at all. It sells local produce from the region. Goats cheese for example on the second shelf down

2 figs and 1 peach for my early breakfast cost 78 cent.

I write this at the campsite looking out on tall conifers, green hedges and a blue sky. The sounds are of wood pigeon and crickets. If I rub the wild fennel between my fingers, I can smell the aniseed.

People are amazed that at my age, I would choose to camp. I get plenty of raised eyes. Denis and I are very different in many ways, but we both love camping.

Then we did spend our honeymoon, cycling the island of Cyprus.

I will admit, I am now only a ‘fair weather’ camper. I will camp only at good camping sites and only in good weather. I wouldn’t camp in Ireland – it has neither the good campsites, nor the good weather. Here, when occasionally the weather breaks, it does so, gets over itself quickly, and then back to sunshine.

With good weather and a good campsite, camping is heavenly. It’s the one time of the year, one gets to live in the great outdoors.

And for me the outdoors really is great; to wake up in the fresh cool air, to listen to the various sounds, to go to sleep with the stars as a ceiling.

But then maybe there is a bit of an itinerant lurking inside me.

Last night, in the darkness, there was an air display – a thunder and lightening storm. Rarely does a year go by without at least one decent storm. Over the years, I have gotton used to their ferocity and now really enjoy these natural fireworks.

A natural Bastille Day celebration!

The previous night, the night-sky was spectacular. Lots of stars. It was great just lying there late, chatting under the stars. (Cameras actually lie. There was a brilliant bright sky that night. The photo just shows black.)

Years ago while in India at monsoon time, with its constant heat and humidity, I came to really notice how nice a shower is, how nice water is, how nice the feeling of actually being clean is!

We all live lives such that we stop noticing.

Camping for me is an annual return to actually noticing. Noticing the ordinary things we take for granted. An annual ‘Back to Basics’.

Camping for me is time to ‘smell the roses’

PS I wrote this earlier this morning to post later in the day. When I had internet access, I read Tommy’s blog to find he also has posted about camping. The idium ‘One man’s meat is another man’s poison’ comes to mind. He has pointed out some negatives.

Must say to him in relation to:
‘… symphony of insects performing their own version of dawn chorus …’
It’s only the male crickets that make the noise!

So I guess you have both of our takes on camping today!

We are camping in a small French village called Maussane, Denis, youngest mouse and I. We have been coming to this village for about ten years. Middle mouse will join us for a few days next week. Though he tried, it’s looking doubtful if eldest mouse will make it.

Posting on the blog may be more irregular. I’ll see what I can manage. The one good thing is that there is great internet access. Dublin please copy. Cafes/campsite have free Wi-Fi.

In our early years coming here, I remember Patrick used to cycle over every morning to an internet cafe in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence. This cycle was about 15km in all, over Les Alpilles, the small range of mountains in Provence, uphill for the first half and downhill thereafter.

What I love about this type of holiday is the great weather, relaxed pace of life, un-spoilt French village, lack of tourists, great food and wine, lots of walking, cycling, reading, playing scrabble. Lots of time to chill.

Speaking of scrabble, over the years we have played lots of scrabble, with bonus points being added to scores, reducing as mice got older.

Youngest mouse has long since lost any bonus points.

Last night the three of us played our first game of scrabble on this holiday. Youngest mouse beat his parents.

Again.

This is beginning to become a consistent pattern.

I am now working on bonus points for the auld pair!

I write as I drink coffee in the square, listening to a live band play as part of the festivities for Bastille day tomorrow. Denis and youngest mouse are gone to rent bikes.

Who wouldn’t like Mondays in Mausanne?

She has come with us on holidays. God, how I hate listening to her. Denis obviously likes her, otherwise he wouldn’t have insisted on her coming.

She is a help, but I wouldn’t choose her company.

She’s much more patient than me. That’s why he likes her, (plus, he adds she has a mute button and volume control!)

Yeah she’s much more patient than me. When things go wrong,

In that calm, even voice, all she says is …

‘Recalculating’.