WHEN
YOU THINK OF FRANCE...
When
you think of France, you think of the cuisine and the wine.
When Jack and I think of France, we think of bicycles and a
group of ten individuals who have come together to share in
the former! Over the last seven years we have gathered together
people from the Island (we include some from the lower mainland
as well!), and guided them on an introductory tour of rural
France on two wheels.
Wine is more than a drink in France. It
is inseparable from life and fine wines are a civilizing pleasure
which speak to the palate and the mind. You can not visit France
without gaining a profound respect for wine. It is everywhere.
It fills shop windows, (even in gas stations), it is served
at every meal and it is offered as a gift. Everyone has their
own private cellar with a collection of bottles sans labels.
Bottles that are presented without labels have passed under
the taxman’s radar! But it many cases these are the ones
that come with the real stories.
Each year we become temporary residents
of a small village in the Loire, near Chinon. Chinon wines are
full bodied reds made from cabernet franc grapes. They come
with a spicy aroma and age well. The character of the region
is most apparent in the wine cellars which are often old quarries
hollowed out of the limestone slopes at road level. This feature
appeals to the practical nature of the winegrower. They are
able to drive their vehicles straight in as the galleries can
extend for several hundred metres. Some of the galleries open
up into chambres where local societies hold special events.
Our
particular village has its own co-op wine cellar. Over the years
they have used the stone from the quarry to build their houses
or to make additions to their ancient properties. Last summer
we were cooling our weary cyclists’ legs at the “Spa”.
The spa is actually a spring that has been used as a lavoir
since the 1200s. Once the existence of a spring was discovered
they often built stone and wooden structures that would provide
protection for village women doing their laundry or collecting
water. A small pool was created as a result. Voila, the perfect
spa!
As we were massaging our muscles, Christophe
who lives across from the lavoir asked if we were interested
in tasting some of his brother-in-law, Rene Pean’s wine.
Once we assured him that we were all wine connoisseurs and thirsty
to boot, the date was set! We were to meet at the Spa the next
evening at 7:30 on our bikes. We didn’t want anyone driving
under the influence.
7:30
came, all ten of us were at the spa ready to go. Christophe
drives up in his small Peugeout (he has to work later) and we
set off following in the traditional French crocodile. Traversing
small lanes, sunflower fields and a barnyard we finally stop
in the middle of an old quarry that is in the middle of a woodlot.
The entrance is marked by a large wooden door “borrowed”
from the ruins of the Chateau in Chinon. A large clay oven butts
up against the stone wall, used for summer fetes, they bake
the lightest fouee. A fouee is similar to pita bread and can
be stuffed with cheese, or mushrooms and garlic, or local preserves.
But I digress. Bikes are left at the entrance and we prepare
to enter to the welcoming cool of the cave!
A single fluorescent light illuminates
the barrels and displays stone walls mottled with mould of the
ages. Now this isn’t just any mould. This is the breath
of the angels! It colours the walls and it provides a protective
cover for the bottles. While Christophe starts opening bottle
after bottle and the glasses are spread out the length of the
table, he explains the history of the area. He details how the
land is kept within the family and the significance of the family
name. The wine flows, stories are created and embellished, the
connection between the creator and the consumer are forged!
Christophe delighted with the success of
the evening offers to share something very special. Over the
years they have created a fortified wine by placing black walnuts,
and fruit peels in with the wine. Once the mixture has settled
the wine is decanted and stored for special occasions. This
wine is put down at the birth of their children to be drunk
on the occasion of their weddings. Rene showed us how these
bottles are stored and pulled one out of its sanctuary for us
to see. It is almost as if a small black furry kitten is wrapped
around the bottle. Once again this is the protective mantle
provided by the angels. This bottle was opened and shared amongst
the group.
The nectar of the gods! The stuff of dreams,
wine for intellectuals as Jules Romain so aptly christened the
wines of Chinon. We were willing inductees, amis amateurs, and
did not hesitate to join in the refrain:
Fill the glass up to
the brim
With this wine for it is fine
And let us drink to La Touraine
And let us drink to old Chinon
In our excitement over this discovery we
asked if it was possible to purchase any of this wine. There
was an awkward silence. “This wine is not for sale”,
announced Rene, “this wine is to share with friends.”
Recognizing our gaffe we quickly thank him for the privilege
of allowing us to share his creation. As we got ready to mount
our bikes Christophe announced that we should continue this
tomorrow evening “chez vous”!
Now after a number of glasses of wine
one’s proficiency in a foreign language tends to deteriorate.
And Jack heard Christophe quite clearly – tomorrow night
– chez nous! We are going to Christophe’s to continue
our introduction to the wines of Chinon.
The next evening it was raining as it can
do in the Loire! Quite heavily, as it can also do. Once again
we were to set off by bike but for some reason there weren’t
quite as many takers. So we left the others preparing dinner
and three of us set off with Jack shouting encouragement –
après moi le deluge! Upon our sodden arrival at the Spa
we could see Christophe, his wife and two small children getting
into their car. Oops! Slight misunderstanding. No problem, we
will get together again. Slightly bemused smiles are exchanged,
the family drives off and we now soaked to the skin get back
on our bikes and puddle jump our way back to the farmhouse.
The black thoughts running through my mind are thankfully unprintable.
After a normally idyllic, but in
these circumstances a little frosty ride, the three of us arrived
at the farmhouse. We arrived just in time to see Christophe
carrying a full wine carrier into the kitchen – chez VOUS!
Loaves and fishes being the order of the day; dinner was expanded
to include Christophe and his family. Good food, amazing wine,
rain on the roof and fifteen people in a small sitting room
come kitchen. What more could anyone ask? Christophe did apologize
that the fortified wine was only ten years old therefore a little
young, but I can’t imagine anything tasting any better.
by Jeff Ford (submitted January 2003)
For
twelve days in September, my wife and I had the pleasure of
staying in Provence. With her parents in tow, we traveled to
Avignon on the TGV (train a grande vitesse) and settled into
a guesthouse located in Caromb, a charming hilltop village
with the backdrop of Mt. Ventoux.
The
train trip from Gare Lyon in Paris to Avignon was astonishingly
fast at just 2 hours forty minutes and was reasonably
priced. We made things easy for ourselves on the way in by staying
in the Holiday Inn close to Gare Lyon that we came to by the
Air France shuttle.
"Le
Charmery" is owned by an interior designer from Vancouver
who undertook a fairly lengthy renovation of a three story building
on the third ring road of Caromb. (Caromb is a quaint village
twenty minutes north of Carpentras) The guest house was
spacious and exquisitely decorated with the well known ochre,
burnt sienna and pastel blue colors synonymous with the region.
Both the kitchen and living room open onto an expansive English
rose garden accented by a wading pool and fountain. The garden
proved to be a lovely spot for picnics and sampling local cheese
and wine.
We
found ourselves quickly immersed in French country living.
"Les francaises savent manger," the French definitely
know how to eat. My wife and I became ensconced in the many
cookbooks left by the owner and other guests. We made ratatouille
and soupe au pistou with fresh ingredients from the market.
Our own unique creation was a gnocci dish with fresh figues,
chevre - goat's cheese, chorizo sausage, red onion and peppers
matched with a sampling of wines from the Cote du Ventoux and
Cote du Rhone regions. Be sure to commence each meal with the
local aperatif Muscat.
The
markets of Modene, a fifteen-minute drive east, were
an inspiration. The vendors took great pride in their wares,
which encompassed everything from soap, lavender honey, fabrics,
and antiques to olives, fresh cheese and meat. Ask around locally
to see which markets are open especially if you want to see
a town in the relative calm of a non-market day.
We
found that when planning our day trips, no single guide gave
all the sufficient information; we took to piecing together
descriptions from the Green guide, Fromme's etc with recommendations
from the guest book. Our most memorable day trip was north to
Vaison-la-Romaine, site of an extensive Roman ruin and
amphitheatre. Then we traveled west and south through Segueret,
Gigondas, and finally Beumes de Venise at the southern end of
"Les Dentelles" mountain range. We sampled wines from
several vintners along the way and brought home our favorites
from the Georges Meffre winery.
The
most memorable villages of our twelve days in Provence were
Gordes, L'Abbaye de Senanque, Vaison la Romaine, Beumes
de Venise, Modene, Le Barroux, Beux en Provence and Ile sur
la Sourge. A stones throw away from Caromb were the acclaimed
restaurants of "vielle four" in Crillon-la-brave and
"Geraniums" located below the twelfth century castle
in Le Barroux. Both restaurants offer set menus from 25 Euros
and up. Be sure to avoid the tourist trap of Fontaine de Vaucluse,
the source of the River Sourge.
by
Mary Lynn Desroches (submitted November, 2002)
My
worries about making ground travel connections and communicating 'en
Francais'” almost convinced me to cancel my trip but the worries
were for naught. All rumors of French rudeness, sidewalks strewn with
doggy-doo and bad food were unfounded as well.
My hotel in Paris,
called Hotel de Palais Bourbon, was an immaculate old
family-run place with the smallest elevator imaginable. The doyen of
the family was a stooped old woman with white stringy hair. She appeared
to shake her head no when I asked her to dry my rain-sodden denim skirt
but after a moment or two she indicated that it would take almost an
hour to dry, and would that do?
The first myth about
Paris to crumble was the one about doggy-doo. Folks I'll
always call "Men in Green" swept the dog shit into the gutter
with their green bristled brooms:
I toured the Rodin
Museum and marveled at the way he sculpted hands. Then it was
time to catch the fast train to Tours.
Our
guide, Jack Saprunoff, wearing a bicycle helmet so I
could pick him out of the crowd, met me in Tours. Jack teaches school
in Comox and has been vacationing in France since 1984, leading tours
there these past five years. His wife Shelagh owns
Traveller's Tale in Courtenay, and she was waiting for us at
the farmhouse, called a gite.
We
would stay at the gite in the Loire Valley for one week,
cycling out in different directions from there. The organization
called 'Gites de France'” runs a central booking agency and rates
the gites based on their amenities. Ours was rated as a 'two ears of
corn' gite. The most elaborate have five ears of corn. These would probably
have a private swimming pool and a larger number of bedrooms.
Our gite was on the
Beaulieu farm, a 55 hectare spread of sunflower
and wheat fields. The structure containing the gite resembled
four townhouses. Our group had the middle two, the farmer and his wife
and the farmer’s son and his wife occupied the outside two. Chickens,
cats and a few dogs were the only livestock.
That
night I discovered that the cycling part of the trip was just a way of
justifying one gastronomic experience after another. The food
and wine we had was glorious. Mussels cooked in wine,
shallots, tomato and garlic. French bread for soaking
up the mussel juice. Blue cheese and fresh pear slices.
Cassis soaked sherbet. (Cassis is a red currant liqueur.)
The next
day we pedaled along the Loire River to Langeais
to see the first of many chateaus, but the chocolaterie outside
the chateau caught my eye and I spent as much time inside admiring
the goodies as I spent touring the chateau.
Here is what the fruit tarts looked like:
The
price tag you see is in euros. I ordered 150 euros from
my local bank about a month before I left, because I knew I would have
to pay for bus and taxi fare on arrival. It takes about one week for
euros to be received.
Here is what
the town of Langeais looked like through the
gun-firing openings of the castle there:
On
the way home from Langeais we stopped to see the castle which inspired
the famous story of Sleeping Beauty. Apparently the
author of that famous story stayed here for a period of time.
Dogs
are everywhere in France, but on the whole they are much better behaved
than dogs here. Often small dogs would be carried in the arms of their
owners during a tour of a chateau or museum. The dogs in this next photo
caught my eye after I toured the Chinon ruins where
Joan of Arc first met with the Dauphin to convince him
he should be king once again. Joan picked him out though he was disguised
as a courtier, and it was intuitive powers such as these which later
caused her to be branded a witch and burned at the stake.
The
next day was Market day in Loches, and we were each
given an assignment to purchase a part of the evening meal. The market
was large and I enjoyed the tremendous “joie de vivre” of
the men who sold their products. This sausage maker
even offered taste samples to the dogs passing by.
While
I was selecting melons, picking up each one in turn and smelling
it, one of the shopkeepers said loudly in French
“ I like your melons”, perhaps thinking I couldn’t
understand him. When I got over my shock I realized he was just
trying to amuse his fellow shopkeepers with a ribald comment,
and I graciously accepted the compliment.
That evening we cooked
a lovely meal and sat out till eleven in the courtyard of the gite. No
mossies there. It was warm and light till ten pm and the evening sky
was lovely.
The next day we cycled past vineyards to Crissay-sur-Manse,
one of the most beautiful villages in France. On the
way Jack had us pose in a field of sunflowers:
In the auberge
at Crissay a drawing that I would have loved to buy caught my
eye.
Alas
it was not for sale.
On
the way home we tasted delicious wine at an organic winery called Domaine
de Rouet,
and further down the road made friends with a donkey.
The next day we cycled
to Azay-le Rideau via the beautiful mixed deciduous
forest lands. The chateau there was never a fortress, but it features
turrets, a moat and even a sentry walk, just to show the importance of
its owner.
The
walls inside were covered with intricately patterned linen fabric.
Gastronomic
adventures were scheduled later that day, as we had lunch 'on
the farm', under umbrellas much like the ones in this photo:
We were served in
the courtyard of an actual farm, but the food was anything but homey.
One main course featured four small potatoes as a base, shredded cooked
carrot on top of them, and a thick slice of pork with a sauce to die
for on top.
The
desserts were a treat for the eyes as well as the palate:
Once
the seats are filled all others are turned away, as the expectation is
that diners will spend three hours or more having their
meal. What we would call an appetizer they call the entrée, our
entrée is what they call the plat. It is considered gauche to
have coffee with the entrée or the plat, and when you order coffee
you will get espresso unless you ask for un grand café.
In
France I felt taller than I do in North America, because many
men and women were considerably shorter than I. Impeccable personal
grooming was widespread there. The French even groomed their
cars for hours, brushing the dust off with a soft brush. The predominant
paint colors for cars were dark blue and black. I saw no cherry red,
yellow, bright green or blue cars.
Though cyclists
were plentiful French drivers gave us a wide berth
and never honked their horns. Rarely do French cyclists wear a helmet
but by law their bikes must have a bell so that they
can ring to warn pedestrians of their presence. We rode on sideroads
with little traffic other than the odd tractor. All
were paved but they were only five feet wide, not even wide enough
for two small French cars to meet. Temperatures were ideal for
cycling, about 24 to 28 degrees Celsius most days.
After
we left the gite for the last time we traveled by car to Amboise,
where Leonardo da Vinci spent the last three years of
his life. Our hotel there was at the foot of this chateau.
The visit to Leonardo's
last home was a highlight for me. Just to see his drawings of gear
mechanisms, water wheels, weapons, ball bearings and the human form
brought home the breadth of his genius.
The
next day we caught the train to Paris, and I traipsed
through the Louvres and walked from there to the Arc
de Triomphe. After ascending and descending the 269
steps to the top of the Arc I was ready for a taxi ride
home.
And what a ride it
was. The driver sang of amour and chatted amiably with
me en Francais until a middle-aged blonde woman driving a small car pulled
up beside him (as we bounced along at 60 kmph) and repeatedly asked him
to have tea with her. He acted flattered but refused the invite. Then
he turned to me and said that he doesn’t always refuse such invitations.
The last time he said yes he traveled to Italy with the woman and together
they had a great time.
So,
would I visit France again? You bet.
In
July 2006 Jack and Shelagh Saprunoff owners of
The Traveller's Tale will be drawn back once more to the river valleys
of France. This time they will be offering three tour options: 2 - 10
day tours of the Loire and 1 - 10 day tour in Burgundy. As before our
main mode of transportation will be bicycle with each area having its
distinct attractions.
If
you are interested in any of the tours phone 250-703-0168 or
info@travellers-tale.com
to receive a copy of the brochure and detailed itinerary.
We
are posting travel journals, so please email us your
travel experiences - good or not so good to share with
the world.
We
would love to hear from you!
