117. Calling a spade a tool designed primarily for the purpose of digging or removing earth..

6th February 2011. Those of a sensitive nature can skip the first part of this post..! Walking into town for the bread with the dog on this fine sunny morning I needed one of those small black plastic bags that the Town Hall has thoughtfully provided around town for dog-owners. Pulling one out of the dispenser, I couldn't help noticing the sign provided for our edification. With customary Gallic disdain for any terminological inexactitude coupled with their predilection for linguistic precision (Sir Humphrey would be proud of me!), it announced that these bags are intended for "déjections canines". It's clear that a sizeable number of the populace are having trouble even comprehending the sign, judging from the copious amounts of déjections canines that lavishly decorate the streets. Given that France has the highest dog population in Europe, this adds up to more than a "hill of beans" - as Bogart might have said. You only need to look at this site to recognise that it's a problem in France.

It's not helped by the fact that many dog-owners live in flats in the centre of town and thus don't have gardens where their pooches can roam. Bayonne is otherwise a clean and litter-free town, as can be seen from this live video feed. Phew - let's move on!

Trois Couronnes

As it was a sunny and bright afternoon, we drove south down to Saint-Jean-de-Luz to have a stroll in the early February sunshine. Along the distant horizon, the Pyrenees and the pale mass of La Rhune and the Trois Couronnes emerged above the silver blue haze like the faintest of shadows against an even paler blue sky.

La Rhune

Saint Jean de Luz was busy.. with many people sunbathing on the beach and even a couple of brave souls in the sea. We found a small gallery that was open that was showing some very interesting portraits by Joaquim Hidalgo, a Madrid-based artist.. slightly reminiscent of Gustav Klimt.

7th February 2011. A few weeks ago I mentioned here the disturbing story of the decline in numbers of the world's honey bee population. Before you glaze over and move on, it's worth remembering that almost a third of global farm output depends on animal pollination, largely by honey bees. These foods provide 35% of our calories, most of our minerals, vitamins, and anti-oxidants, and the foundations of gastronomy. Yet the bees are dying – or being killed – at a disturbing pace. More here.. A quote from Albert Einstein on the matter: "if the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, man would have only four years to live". In my view, the disappearance of the honey bee is a greater threat in the short term to the continuance of life as we know it on the planet than those posed by global warming, ozone holes, depletion of oil supplies, terrorism or whatever you want. The strange thing is that the fate of the world's honey bee population doesn't seem to be too high up on anyone's political agenda, anywhere.

The media buzzword for this phenomenon is "Colony Collapse Disorder" or CCD - which doesn't sound quite so threatening - so if you are lucky enough to hear CCD being discussed, at least you'll know what it stands for and why we should be so concerned. Like to know more..? Start here, here, then read the Scientific American here, a report from the Congressional Research Service here and finally here's what the EU is doing. I'd suggest you write to your elected representative without delay to:

1. Make sure that they are aware of the threat posed by CCD;

and

2. Ask what they are doing about it.

You can find out how to contact your MP (UK) here or your Representative (US) here.

Does the word Bugatti mean anything to you..? A couple were sold over the weekend by Bonhams in Paris for a substantial wodge. There's a nice little story and a video clip of one of them being driven here.. I'm unable to post the clip here unfortunately. I must say that I twitched when the narrator said the cars were Italian - I'd always thought they were French but looking at the Wiki page, I think you could be excused for saying Italian French or even German. These beautifully built, jewel-like cars were the Lotuses of their day.. built with lightness being the key to their performance. I think it was Ettore Bugatti himself who, at the time of the domination of the Le Mans 24 hour race by the supercharged Bentleys, declared that they were "the fastest lorries in the world!" From an English perpective, that's a real knuckle-clenching comment to absorb brought up as we are with the Bentley Boys legend - but unfortunately it's true.. The modern Bugatti company is now owned by - would you believe it - Volkswagen.

116. Six Nations

6th February 2011. Good result for the England XV in the opening match of the Six Nations on Friday night in a hyped-up Millennium Stadium in Cardiff. A very physical, aggressive and confrontational match with the Welsh was not helped IMHO by all the hype that went on before the game. I must admit to an intense dislike for all that pre-match hoop-la that we get these days. I think the worst two offenders for it are Wales and Scotland. On Friday night, we had complete overkill - with a Welsh male voice choir, sheets of flame that would do an oil rig proud, all the dry ice 'smoke' and lights at the players tunnel, Tom Jones hits belting out on the sound system, military goats, the announcer reading out the players names in the manner of a bingo caller et al.. To me it's all so unnecessary. I don't need to be pumped up artificially by all this nonsense. Don't mention warbling sopranos singing the anthems either.. aaagghh! At Twickenham, we get most, if not all, of this and the same announcer who reads out the players names in the manner of a bingo caller. Who on earth thinks this is a good idea?

It's the same in Scotland - a lone piper standing up on the roof somewhere, more fireworks, smoke and mirrors, overflights by the RAF, and then that awful maudling "Flower of Scotland" - great when sung by the Corries before a crowd of 'folkies' - but, at the risk of annoying those north of the border, as a national anthem it leaves a lot to be desired - "And send them homeward, tae think again.." - in your dreams. What's needed is the rambunctious "Scotland the Brave.." or the "Black Bear". Sing something positive and rousing that lifts the spirits - not some dreary folk song cocking an eye to the past. Accept no substitutes. Here's a clip that captures all that's best about Scotland.. and it makes me shiver listening to it even now..

 

In the interests of balance (been watching too much BBC) I have to say, and it might be viewed as heresy in some quarters, but "God Save the Queen" wouldn't inspire me to crush a paper cup.. Needless to say, the ones that get my vote are the Marseillaise, Fratelli d'Italia, Land of my Fathers (Wales) and both of the Irish ones.

As I made my way down to the river early yesterday morning it was marginally less cold than it's been over the last few weeks - I hope we've seen the last of that cold spell. I went out in an VIII set up for rowing (ie, with one oar each). It was one of those strange sorties that comes along every now and again when, with a club crew who have rowed together before, it didn't seem to matter what exercise we did or corrective action we took, the boat remained chronically unstable, without any of us being able to put a finger on what was going wrong. It made for an uncomfortable sortie. Did 12km (running total: 418km) 

115. Fête de la Chandeleur aka Pancake Tuesday

2nd February 2011. Today was la Fête de la Chandeleur or, as we poetic Anglo-Saxons would have it, Pancake Tuesday - although strictly speaking, its correct title should be Candlemas, but between you and me, let's stick to Pancake Tuesday.. (I was way off here.. Lesley pointed out in a comment below that La Chandeleur and Pancake Day/Tuesday are two different things.. La Chandeleur is Candlemas but Pancake Day/Tuesday is Shrove Tuesday which is the day preceding Ash Wednesday and falls on 8th March this year. There'll be a test afterwards to see if you were paying attention!) 

Anyway, here's what pancakes look like here in France: 

This evening, Madame was ensconced in the kitchen for a good while - which was strictly off limits and Streng Verboten! to the likes of me and the dog. (Un Angliche in the kitchen..? Beh non!) She appeared briefly in order to raid the bookcase for a bottle of rum and other delights - making my nose twitch with the tempting smells that wafted out of the kitchen..

Draw your own conclusion!

Then, as if by magic, the pancakes started arriving.. first, the savoury ones.. with ham and cheese. Think I might have had two of those.. Next up, was one with a black cherry filling.. then I think I had - it all starts to become a blur round about this point - a chocolate one. Or was it two? Finally, with a drum roll, one that had been flamed in rum. Yum-yum - or as they say here - miam miam!

I remember Pancake Tuesdays from when I was a kid and they were usually served with lemon juice and sugar at home.. which I'd still enjoy very much. 

In any discussion of pancakes, Pat Buchanan's crack about Bill Clinton during his first Presidential campaign always springs to mind - it ran something like: "Bill Clinton's foreign policy experience stems mainly from having breakfast at the International House of Pancakes.."

Here's "On Every Street" - a classic Mark Knopfler track that I haven't played in a long while:

114. My Rs

26th January 2011. In any discussion about the pros and cons of a permanent move to France, it generally doesn't take long before the knotty subject of actually speaking French raises its head. If the new arrival is serious about integrating with the local community, then it's a given that he or she must do so in the language of Molière. One of the difficulties is that while grammar, vocabulary, verbs (& all the tenses thereof) can all be learnt from a book, French pronunciation is a totally different matter - and it's made more complicated by the fact that we Angliche (or perhaps it's just me!) tend to continue to sound individual letters more or less exactly as they are spoken in English.

Don't believe me..? Well, the acid test for me is to try pronouncing any French word containing an 'r'. We pronounce 'r' in English either as "aah" or as a soft "ruh" - whereas in French it's pronounced as "airrr" with the 'r' an almost trilled rattly sound in the throat (or, as it says here, a voiced uvular fricative sound). The problem for us Rosbifs is that that sound doesn't exist in English. If I concentrate hard, I can manage it but slipping that - alien to me - sound into a long sentence invariably catches me out. There are a couple of words that always cause me grief: "serrurier" (locksmith) and another is the "RER" - the fast Metro in Paris.

I know I've quoted P. G. Wodehouse's observation on this before but he understood the problem perfectly: 

“Into the face of the young man who sat on the terrace of the Hotel Magnifique at Cannes there had crept a look of furtive shame, the shifty, hangdog look which announces that an Englishman is about to talk French.”

29th January 2011. Putting all thoughts of French pronunciation on the back burner for now, here's a real travel bargain from SNCF - and I quote:

"Dès le 24 janvier, avec Lunéa, profitez de l’Hiver à prix Fou, à partir de 19€ (1) en couchette 2nde classe pour tous vos voyages en France!

A SAISIR! EN VENTE DU 24 JANVIER AU 14 FEVRIER 2011 POUR DES VOYAGES DU 27 JANVIER AU 6 AVRIL 2011.

Prem's price Lunéa tax (including 3€ online reduction), from per person for a one-way 2nd class sleeper with Lunéa on a selection of destinations and the availability of seats at this fare. Tickets are on sale from January 24 to February 14, 2011, for travel between January 27 and April 6, 2011. Tickets are non-exchangeable, non refundable, on sale until 3 days before train departure. Online payment required with ticket to print yourself, send free ticket home, withdrawal self-service kiosk in French train stations, or SNCF Rail Europe (extra 10€ per folder). Offer not valid with any other promotion or discount rate station.

"Wot's that all abaht?" I hear you say.. In a nutshell: cheap overnight sleeper tickets from 19€ (couchette) on sale from 24th January 2011 to 14th February 2011 for all trips from 27th Jan '11 to 6 Apr '11. All the details here..

I'd suggest you book your ticket to the Pays Basque and start brushing up your pronunciation right now!

29th January 2011. Meanwhile, out on the river on another cold morning, this time in an VIII sculler - up to the turnaround and back, only stopping for the turn. (Phew!) 14km (Running total: 406km)

113. St Jean de Luz on film..

25th January 2011. If a picture's worth a thousand words, then what d'you suppose is the going rate for a short film..? I've decided to give my keyboard a rest for this post and instead show you activities in and around the jewel in the crown of the Pays Basque - Saint-Jean-de-Luz.. You'll see traînières racing in the bay of St Jean; the Fête of the Rouge et Noir (when everyone wears black & red) and the Rue de la République - with all its restaurants - becomes alive with travelling bands; the mass fandango dancing in the Place Louis Quatorze, the Fête du Thon (Tuna Festival); the pelote players and the bulls stuffed with fireworks (crazy!):

This clip (below) was from the Fête de Saint-Jean-de-Luz (when many are in red & black)... at 4:03 they start singing Hegoak - the Basque anthem which is sung on both sides of the border: It's clear that an overwhelming majority of the people take great pride in Basque cultural events and participation is widespread among ages in the community.

  

Now is it me - or does this not look like a lot of fun..?

A cultural interlude now - Maurice Ravel was born in Ciboure - across the harbour from Saint-Jean-de-Luz - in the pale stone house just left of centre:

 Some more culture of the musical variety:

Here are some students and concerts from the Maurice Ravel Academy:

The huge waves from the Belharra Reef are next - they're truly gigantic and hard to believe but they're here.. just a few kilometers south of St Jean de Luz:

Chistera

The fastest of all the ball games played in the Pays Basque is Pelote Basque. All the rules and variations are spelled out here.. When played with the chistera, the ball has been measured at speeds of 250-300 kph (155-185mph), which makes it the fastest racquet ball sport in the world.

Paddling one of these Polynesian pirogues in the surf looks like it could be fun!

112. A word from your faded correspondent

24th January 2011. Ac-tor Simon Williams, writing in the 'Delhi' Telegraph over the weekend about Biarritz, talks of its faded gentillity.. Just as it's "known" that Venice smells*, so it seems to be received wisdom among travel writers that poor old Biarritz is akin to an old lady living on her memories.. a little down at heel, some flaky paint here and there, roots showing and in need of a discreet makeover. Nothing could be further from the truth than this.

* There's absolutely no truth in the oft-reported 'fact' that Venice smells..

OK, like all ladies d'un certain âge, she has had a past.. but the Biarritz I know is sparklingly clean, bright and has s-t-y-l-e in spades. "Faded gentillity..?" Not even close. I'd take the Grand Old Lady of the Pays Basque any day in preference to some soulless, style-free, modern high rise resort (the holiday equivalent of a blonde bimbo). If bimbo is what you want - fine - but not for me.

Hotel du Palais (right)

Simon also waxes lyrical about the Hotel du Palais (no surprises there; mentioned before here), the Café Jean (now closed) - we prefer the Bar Jean and finally he recommends a visit to Cazenave in Bayonne (yet another favourite of ours). 

I can't fault his choices at all! (he must have read this blog!)

Here's a view of Biarritz through Spanish eyes..

However, I would take issue with his fatuous claim that "Biarritz is a bit like Cornwall in the summer, only warmer.." That statement could only be true if you accept that Hull resembles San Francisco - because they both have suspension bridges..! He was going so well until then too! Apart from that, Simon, a good column..!

So... marks out of ten? Let's be kind: "Royaume Uni.. neuf points!" 

A quick dose of "Father Ted" is called for..

111. La France profonde

22nd January 2011. Very cold out on the river this morning in a double sculler with a very strong downstream current.. the temperature must have been hovering around freezing. I came back with hands like a bunch of bananas! We did 10km and that was enough to be honest. (Running total 392km) Note to self: don't forget the gloves next time!

In writing this blog I've made the odd reference here and there to La France profonde (deep France). I think it's worth explaining a little more about this idea before it slowly disappears, submerged by the relentless tide of progress from modern Europe. I exchanged a flurry of emails yesterday with C from Tiens, a new start-up online magazine about SW France. I soon recognised that she and her husband P are a couple of kindred spirits in that what attracts us to this blessèd corner of France is not the glitz of the coast or the bright lights of the ski slopes but rather the timeless appeal of la France profonde. 

What is la France profonde I hear you ask..? It's difficult to pin down exactly but you'll know it when you see it. It's that moment that stops you in your tracks when you realise that you're seeing something that's been done the same way for generations and that the chances of seeing it anywhere else in western Europe are pretty slim. You could say it was contact with the real France. Or maybe it's the France of our imagination - as we'd like it all to be without it being a pastiche of the France of Robert Doisneau. Certainly in England, the baby was thrown out with the bathwater a very long time ago and a kind of mindless banalisation of life has the country in its thrall. There are two very different connotations to being described as a peasant depending upon which country you are in - France or the UK.

Perhaps a few examples of la France profonde. During a long-ago visit to France (~1970) I stopped for petrol at midday in a sleepy little village in the department of the Ardèche.. I stepped out of the car into a wall of heat, and all was silence apart from the chirruping of the cicadas. An old lady well into her 80s appeared and she proceeded to untangle a strange (to my eyes) contraption which was the petrol pump. It was old and tall with a graduated glass cylinder sitting atop it.  She started pumping a long handle to and fro and petrol appeared in the cylinder and began rising up it. When the level reached 10 litres, she inserted a long rubber hose into my petrol tank, turned a tap, and petrol flowed, as if by magic, into my car. Simple, bomb-proof and effective. While she repeated this process enough times to fill my tank, we had a chat about where I was from etc and in the course of this she revealed that she'd never seen the sea and, what's more, she'd never been out of her department of the Ardèche! That was my first encounter with la France profonde.

Another was the time when Madame and I were en route to the Pays Basque one summer and somewhere in the region around Poitiers we pulled off the autoroute for lunch. We found a small village where there was just the one restaurant and we were the first customers. Sitting down, we chose the 3 course set lunch menu which was ~£11 or so. Things started happening in that wonderfully pre-ordained way that lets you know you are back in France. Everything was comme il faut (as it should be). A generous serving of rabbit with prunes in a rich red wine sauce (I remember it well!) and a couple of glasses of red put smiles on our faces again. While we were sitting there, two young lads in their early teens came in and sat at a nearby table. It transpired that one was the waiter's son. The two of them sat there and ordered their 3 course lunch from the main menu - no sausage, beans and chips from the children's menu for them or whinging with curled up lips that they didn't like this or that.. No, they just sat there and worked their way  through all 3 courses. I remember thinking that there are two Frenchmen in the making there.

Then, when we arrived here in 2007, we took the car for its Contrôle Technique (MOT for British readers) at a garage out in the sticks. While waiting for the car to get through its examination, I spotted a flyer pinned on the wall advertising a Bingo night. What caught my eye and made me smile was the second prize: half a pig!


Le porc Pie Noir
du Pays Basque

This (left) is the Iberian pig that's to be found in the Pyrenees and northern Spain. Very hardy, somewhat picky about his food, the pig is remarkably well adapted to an outdoor life in the mountains. Its lean meat is a feature of the celebrated Basque ham from the valley of Les Aldudes. Since 1991, a regional chain was established with a quality approach to obtain an Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée (AOC).

M and Mme D in the gîte also contributed with their very traditional custom of keeping a couple of pigs for fattening up on corn and killing them (txarriboda) in the winter months. The annual slaughtering and butchering is an occasion for friends and neighbours to pitch in and help and the whole process of converting a large 200+kg porker into sausages, hams, joints, trotters, fillets, boudins noirs (black pudding) takes around three days. If you have no idea what a 200kg pig looks like, this picture (right) will give you an idea!

Madame's Tante S and her (now late) husband live in the Jura (close to the Swiss border) and it was their 50th wedding anniversary one summer in the mid 90s. They'd decided to have a celebratory dinner and had invited a representative from each part of the extended family (to keep the numbers down to a manageable level) and so we came to be invited. We'd planned our annual visit to the Pays Basque such that at the end of it we could drive up & across to the Jura to arrive in time..

We wanted to avoid the boredom of the autoroutes so we thought we'd simply "straight-line it" across France - going by the Départmentale roads - thus seeing a bit more of the country. After driving all day on lonely roads through mountains, forests and villages we stopped overnight at a village called Bourganeuf  (between Limoges and Clermont-Ferrand) which is as near as dammit in the centre of France. We quickly dropped our bags in a 2* "Logis" hotel in the centre and then went out for a swift leg stretch before dinner. 

We returned to the hotel and went into the cosy and heavily beamed dining room. Looking around, it was clear that this was la France profonde. After browsing the menu for a few minutes I realised that this was somewhere that took its food very seriously indeed. All the classic dishes were there. Madame often says that food is the second religion in France but I'd go further than that and say it's the first - as more people go to restaurants than go to church. Looking through the wine list I couldn't believe what I was seeing - most of the wine was priced at somewhere between £200 and £800 a bottle.. There were some fabled wines there that I'd only read about - Château Palmer, Château Gruaud-Larose, Château Haut-Brion and Château Yquem - and this in a un cheval village in the middle of nowhere.. 

Here's a film that captures something of la France profonde:

What does la France profonde mean to you..? Don't be shy - send a comment..!

The circus is in town.. a vast red and white tent, surrounded by a village of colourful caravans, trailers and bright lights, the Cirque Amar has suddenly materialised between the old ramparts and the Avenue des Allées Paulmy. 

I've always been a wee bit intrigued by the roaming life of circus people. They inhabit a slightly blurred and mysterious part of the spectrum - lying somewhere between those of us who live more or less conventionally in houses or flats, and those of a gypsy or nomadic persuasion - from respectable baby boomer retirees with their Camper Vans, through plush caravans towed by slightly dodgy Mercedes vans, to the real thing: gypsies in horse drawn caravans who cook on open fires and hobble their horses on grazing land.. I don't understand how these last two groups survive in the increasingly joined-up world of today. Think car insurance, taxes, health issues, an address for mail - but maybe they don't bother with any of this.    

24th January 2011. I read today of the passing of Major Richard Winters retd.. He was a great American hero.  RIP Sir. 

110. Anyone for logs..?

20th January 2011. Went out on the river in a coxless quad sculler this evening - it was very fresh. (weather forecaster-speak for cold..) Did 10km. (Running total: 382km)

Two years ago, over the night of 24th January, Tempête Klaus dealt a devastating blow to the forests of Les Landes between Bordeaux and Bayonne, in SW France. Winds gusting up to 175kph (110mph) howled out of the Bay of Biscay and rampaged acoss the coastal forest, knocking down hundreds of thousands of trees and power lines, blocking roads and isolating whole communities.

This video gives an idea of the devastation caused by the storm:
Each time I've driven by these stockpiles of sawn logs en route north to Bordeaux, they were being continuously sprayed with water to stop them drying out prematurely and splitting in the intense summer heat. In the past I've googled without success to try and find a link to them but I later found the name of the stockpile as "L’aire de stockage de Solférino". Apparently Solférino holds 700,000 tons of wood. The one below is just one of what looks like about 5-6 similar huge piles.

There's been a permanent wall of logs stacked along the dockside in Bayonne ever since, clearly visible from across the Adour, and they're being continuously loaded onto ships for export but the stacks of logs seem never to diminish in size.

The news story featured a gentleman who owned some 300-odd hectares of forest and he said that the price of his wood had dropped from 30€/cubic metre to 4€..