promenade

Even though I am so very far from the farmette and far from this week's Wisconsin weather (snow), I miss the spring that should be there right now. How long before the last snow melts? Before the ground is warm again? How long before the grass, so ubiquitous and green here, in Brittany, comes out of its brown hibernation back home? How long before I can plant? How long before I can sit on the porch all day long?

Too long.

It is to be another walking day for me, even as I notice that the skies are mostly gray. Except for a band of gold at the horizon.





The forecast says possible showers later on and so I decide to move quickly and to keep the walking down to a loop that can easily bring me back to town in case the rains come down.

So again, a small breakfast -- of honey cake (and I mean honey cake: the ingredients say 40% honey and 10% figs, with buckwheat flour, milk, eggs and butter making up the rest), an apple, and chamomile tea. I am saving the flower and propolis tea for home. Too special to fritter away on a rushed breakfast.






And this time, I head south. First, to town -- to ditch my recyclables. And to take in the town vibe on this nonmarket day. Then, on the quiet rural roads, toward the coastal path.






But here's the thing -- I have hit low tide again! You have to really watch the tides in addition to the skies to hit it right! I have yet to feel the full force of the sea. It's always on the retreat when I approach it.






Never mind: there is always the rugged Breton countryside around me.






This, too, is Brittany.






A year-round harvest of chou and a constant tending to the fields of artichoke.











My long loop brings me back to town. It is early afternoon, but there's  no rain yet. Should I eat now? Oh, the weighty decisions of being elsewhere, shunning routine, indulging in the trivial, so that eating or not to eating becomes the crucial issue before me. Nothing more than that.

I pass a creperie. Is it a good one? It's nearly empty now, but then, I am past the French lunch period. By 2 pm people across this vast country are digesting.

I go inside. There's a set three course meal for 10 Euro. And the buckwheat crepes sound so good!

I see that there is one other person eating at a booth in this rather austere space. A woman my age. We smile and there is a tacit acknowledgement that we are both the silent type. We will be friends in silence.

But I am not without companionship. The family dog comes over and sits stubbornly to my side.





Is he hungry? -- I ask the owner.
Oh no! Just old. And he doesn't hear well.

So I rub his ears fora long while and then ignore him. And at that point he goes to my other eating companion -- the woman sitting alone to the side. He fares better with her.  
Ah, so you're hungry after all! He may be deaf, but he hears that note of invitation. He returns and waits.

I eat my delicious creamy endive soup and then a buckwheat crepe with cheese, egg and salmon, dabbed with salad and the Roscoff onions. With a glass of Brittany cider. (This is one of the few regions of France where apples dominate. No vineyards here. None at all.)






Pooch likes the crepe as much as I do! Satisfied, he lies down next to me with that look of complete gratitude and contentment.

Me, I proceed to the last course -- a dessert crepe with a choice of toppings. That's not hard: local honey!






Of course, this is just lunch. I must think of dinner! And maybe a dessert? And a fresh baguette for the cheese back home? To the bakery then. As always, there comes to be only one bakery. Your favorite bakery. That's not hard. Mine will be the place where madame is so kind, each time asking me something about myself. Each time offering me the warmest smile. I see that they have a lovely Far Breton -- the pastry of the region. Sort of like a flan, loaded with prunes. Perfect.






So that should be the end of the adventurous part of the day. I should retreat now. Read, write -- all that, in my warm little house by the chou fields. But the weather flips on me. Or rather it changes its mind. Rather than raining in the afternoon, the sun comes out and the world takes on honey tones -- ones that become Brittany so much! A sunny day here is such a treat: it reminds you that even the most stern countenance benefits from a smile. So just before dinner, I go out again. In the direction of the coast, though taking a different set of roads.

And I discover the most delightful loop, taking me to the town park -- a gorgeous space, especially now, in the early evening of a full spring day.






Not surprisingly, the grandparents are out, walking their little ones.






Up and down the grand avenue of the park. And then all the way back to town.






Going for a walk -- especially in the evening, or on a day off from work -- that's such a Polish thing! Or perhaps a European thing? Une promenade (fr), una passeggiata (it), spacer (pl)... Why don't we practice the art of the walk back home? We don't even have a good word for it in English. Let's go for a walk. How bland that sounds!

My promenade ends with flowers. And so does this post. Because this is spring. Brittany tells me springs is here.

the point is to walk

It is, hands down, one of my favorite things to do when traveling. To walk, to move, to see something new around the bend. City walks are great -- there's so much to see! -- but a good country walk has the benefit of quiet and of good air. I was raised believing that a hefty inhale-exhale of fresh air would clean the lungs and put you in good stead to face the future. It's almost automatic for me: when I step on a rural path and the breezes blow in from the ocean or the mountains, or the forest -- I take in a deep breath. Inhale, exhale.

And so when the skies dawned blue, with just a wisp of cloud at the horizon, I was in a hurry to walk. Rather than going into town for breakfast, I brewed my flower and propolis tea, cut into my honey spice cake (with figs!) and called it breakfast.






The most obvious hike from St Pol de Leon is the one along the coast: northwards, toward Roscoff. By road, it's an hour's walk. Along the coast -- at least double that.

You'd think that you don't need a trail marking for a walk along the coast -- I mean, how can you go wrong if the sea is to be your constant companion! But Ed and I did a five day hike along a different segment of the Brittany coast and losing the trail was a frequent and frustrating event, leading to retraced steps and lengthy delays.

Here, it's not quite so dramatic. You may lose the trail, but you'll pick up a road and eventually it all leads to Roscoff.

So, off I go, first on the road, to the sea.






And looking back, over my shoulder, I see where the fishing boats are kept.






Once I find the trail, I'm almost sorry to be off road. All those winter rains? They have made slushy mud out of the dirt here. Within minutes, I am splashed to my ankles (and beyond) in mud.

Must go on, must go on. I get a break when the trail goes down to the sea.






Yes, here are the grandparents, putting up with their grandkids on school break, while the parents work.






But the trai quickly veers up into the fields again -- artichoke and cabbage, everywhere the two Brittany cousins stand side by side. I am surprised how much human labor still goes into agricultural production here.The guy below is tidying up the artichoke bed by hand.






And now, finally, I come across the stone homes with the slate roofs and sure enough --  I am in Roscoff.

What can I tell you about this town: well, it's half the size of St Pol de Leon (so about 3500 inhabitants), but it feels busier. It's a more popular tourist destination (it's cute) and, too, it has a ferry link to the UK. Both for people and for agricultural produce. And if you asked Roscovites what the town is known for, probably they would unanimously proclaim -- onion johnnies! Not too long ago, French farmers would harvest and ship their very uniquely special pink onions (to a French person, every product grown in every region is uniquely special) to England, where they would go door to door, riding bicycles, selling bunches of these French gems to the bedazzled (so they say) English people.

Roscoff, is, of course, a fishing port as well. Here's a view of the old harbor, walking in.






And I happen to be here on market day. Half of the stands are the same as those in yesterday's St Pol de Leon market. Here are some mighty crabs though that just came in...






And, too, there is another prepared foods person, selling not paella and not chicken stew, but this:






But I'm not buying today. I walk briskly on, through town...






...until I come across a small card store. I look inside. There are racks of postcards, but they aren't the usual glossies. There are funky scenes of Breton country life and of colorful fishing boats and I'm quite taken by all of them. So I pick out a handful and I take them to Monsieur Louis who is sitting there, behind the counter.
He tells me -- you know, I painted the ones you chose. He shows me his originals.





I'm delighted. I tell him -- I like the joy in them!
I clearly said the right thing, because he smiles and digs out an article in the local press. It's about him and he shows me the title -- artist paints joie de vivre.
He says some niceties about my French and then mumbles -- I know English but I refuse to speak it.
Too difficult to communicate? -- I ask.  Oh, I guessed wrong on that one!
He is agitated now: No! I detest the domination of the English language! He is full of percentages and statistics about who speaks what and I am feeling apologetic about humanity out there even as, after all, this whole discussion started with a nod toward my French so that it's not clear why I should apologize for the anglification of the world at large. But I do. Because he seems so upset.

As always, when passions soar, it's best to change the subject: do you know of a good sea food place where the locals eat?
But I can't win. He tells me the name of one and asks me if I know what that stands for and I'm thinking -- it's probably the name of a local poet and I am going to show my ignorance of French-Breton culture if I say that I don't recognize it. After all, there are so many streets named after poets around here... let me guess that it's a poet. So -- is it a poet?

Another wrong calculation. It is actually a pirate who steels for his king and I get a lesson on this as well and before I make any more wrong guesses, I best be off, in search of his favorite seafood place. Which turns out to be closed for the day.

Never mind. There is an immensely popular spot (called La Bonne Etoile) just up the street and they have a good deal on a set lunch menu and so I eat a salmon salad, a fish of the day and I finally finally I have my morning coffee, even as it is now past 1.





On another day, I'll come to Roscoff to take the boat out to the islands, but for now I just want to keep on walking and since Roscoff is at the tip of a tongue that juts out to sea, I can stay on the trail along the coast and then eventually turn inland to return toward St Pol de Leon.

And I remember this about the northern Brittany coast: the tides here are tremendous. Your entire view changes, depending on when you look out toward the sea. We're at low tide now. Can you tell?






Here, the coastal walk is easy and mostly along a quiet road. But when I turn inland, I get lost on the many many rural roads and paths that cut through the landscape. (And in Roscoff, it is a slightly different landscape. Remember? They're all about onions here. Planted, of course, by hand.)






And as we get closer to Saint Pol de Leon, we're back with the chou. For this farmer, it's in the form of cauliflower.





I completely mess up with the trail home. It's hard to understand how I manage to do this, but after an hour or two of walking, I am nearly back in Roscoff again. It's time to get off the paths and stick to rural roads. Walking in circles is only fun if you don't have a destination in mind. I have a destination in mind: home.

On a quiet country lane, I come across three Breton lads. They have slingshots and they're practicing firing them but they pause as I approach them. They see my camera and ask for a photo. I oblige.





And they're curious boys so they ask where I'm from, and I tell them, and of course, they are surprised. You just don't expect to find someone from "north of Chicago" on your path through the chou and onion fields in early March. So they ask me how I like Roscoff and I shower the superlatives and here's the thing -- they say thank you! Instinctively. Thank you for saying nice things about our town. How many spunky kids out for a good time would think to say that? I wanted to find their parents and tell them what a good job they're doing in the rearing department, but thought better of it. The boys seemed concerned that I noticed their slingshots. Maybe they would not have liked parental notification on that score.

And now I am almost home. I can see the towers of St Pol de Leon churches. The last hill, the last farmstead...






Home. And it is almost evening, though you can hardly tell. Even though they don't do daylight savings until the end of March, they are at the western most edge of a time zone (Poland, on the other hand is on the east of it) and so the sun even now does not set until close to 7.

I eat a supper of bread and cheese and then I go out again. Just to take in the warm evening colors. And here, I can show you my little white house at the edge of the chou fields. Mine is the one with the rounded roof, next to a neighbor who has an even more modern structure.






I'll leave you with a photo of that flowering cabbage -- the Breton cauliflower. Because every day should have flowers in it, right?

rekindling a lost love

Sometimes a song sticks in your head because something about it is fitting. And then you hum it to yourself over and over, even though the lyrics in their entirety resonate with your life not at all.  It's sort of like singing somewhere over the rainbow because you happen to see a bluebird fly by.  My song du jour is Far Away (the Boys and Girls rendition) and the lyrics that bounce around in my head go like this:

I will live my life as a lobsterman's wife
On an island in the blue bay
He will take care of me, he will smell like the sea
And close to my heart he'll always stay

I will bear three girls all with strawberry curls
Little Ella and Nelly and Faye
While I'm combing their hair, I will catch his warm stare
On our island in the blue bay

Far away, far away, I want to go far away
To a new life on a new shore line
Where the water is blue and the people are new
To another island, in another life.

(I know one Ocean commenter will appreciate the reference to a lobsterman's wife, as she is that. Me, I'm sort of drifting in "where the water is blue and the people are new"  lyrics.)

*****

I wake up to a day of pink clouds and, at least initially, faintly blue skies between them. This is the view toward the fields in the back of my small house.





Yes, this is Brittany. I'm dusting off an old love here. She was my favorite. She was to be the place I would covet, long for, return every chance I got. But, I turned my back on Brittany when Ed and I discovered Sorede in the south. And now that Ed has had his fill of Sorede (and I surely will never go there alone), I am back, courting my old flame, my Brittany, begging for forgiveness, proclaiming my loyalty henceforth. And admiring her beauty anew.

At first Brittany pouts. That wisp of blue sky? That was just at sunrise. Quickly the clouds take over. And this is not uncommon here. Sorede does, in fact, have more days of sunshine. Indeed, when Aurelia parked her car in a lot by the St Pol de Leon swimming pool, I asked if that was an indoor pool because there were quite a number of cars there. She had laughed -- we could not have an outdoor pool here. Even in the summer, it can be quite cool.


If I strain my neck, I can see the sea now from my little house. But as the clouds take over and the color of the sea fades to that of the sky, it becomes difficult to distinguish one from the other.





There is, all morning long, a threat of rain. And by afternoon, the threat is realized and it rains. And rains. And rains.

*****

Even had it rained in the morning, I would have hiked to town. Tuesday is market day in St Pol de Leon. I surely want to see that. And, too, I want my morning cafe-croissant.

And so I head out. My little house is on the outskirts of town (whereas the one I was to be in was smack in the center), but in St Pol de Leon, this hardly matters. The town is small. It's twice the size of Sorede, but still hardly more than a village. At last count, there were about 7000 Saintpolitains (that's what residents here are called) and the number is steadily declining. (I note that the owners of my first problematic rental and, too, of my current little house are both of the younger generation and both of them live in Paris.)

I walk to town between the stone homes and the fields of harvested chou. Classic Brittany: stone walls, artichaut and chou.  Chou means cabbage. And there are many varieties: chou blanc, chou rouge, chou fleur (cauliflower!), chou frise -- in the grocery store, they're all lined up for you, one next to the other. So, my walk to the center ( a mere ten minutes or so) is past this:






And as I get closer to the heart of town, I come across other familiar sights: the decorative lace curtains in doors and windows.






The hearty Bretagne folk, pausing, of course, to exchange greetings and stories from the week.






And everywhere, there is that stone: the building material of choice here for hundreds of years.






Let me give you an overview of the main street in town and then we'll scoot right to the market.






....where they're selling, well, cabbage.






...and another Brittany favorite: crepes. Either sweet or buckwheat. You buy them by the stack. For future use.






I leave the market for a little while. I want my coffee. There is a lovely little bakery -- I had purchased bread there last night, and I go there now because it has a few tables -- perfect for a cafe creme and morning pastry. What to eat? Oh, easy -- I want what she's having!






Heaven on a plate. (With a light almond paste inside and almonds on the outside -- mmmm.)






I spend a while at the cafe. It's a warm room with a friendly staff. Madame remembers me from the other day, frantically buying bread and asking about WiFi; they in fact have it and she tells me I can surely use it now. I smile: no no, not necessary. During the day, I am cut off from the rest of the world.

Other patrons? Varied. Since it's a school holiday, there will be the child and parent. And this lobsterman, who comes in dripping with water, even as he is clad from head to toe in rubber garb. He comes in, shakes his wet hand with this person, that person and sits down to read the paper and drink his coffee.







Okay, time to leave. That threat of rain is not to be taken lightly. Yesterday's storms are still in my head. I'd like to stay dry for as long as I can. Time to pick up a baguette, a bag of meringues and to set out.






I'm back at the market now, not to look, well -- only a quick look. For instance, at the small handful of lobsters and crabs,  and at the bucket loads of shrimp and langoustines...






...but really, I am now in the buying mode. I pick up a honey cake (did I tell you about Brittany honey? They say it has the distinct flavor of the sea...), and an herbal tea made of local flowers and propolis, a few stalks of endive and, too, a portion of prepared chicken stew. If there'll be rain, I wont feel like searching for a place to eat. At every market I've ever been to in France, there is always a stand where you can pick up a container of prepared food: either paella or stew. Today I find a stand selling aromatic chicken tagine and couscous. This will be my supper.






One last glance at the market, at the kids who amuse themselves as grandparents -- the baby sitters of choice during school breaks -- shop...






And then I do a quick side step to the tourist office for maps and another side step to the super marche for a six pack of mineral water and a bottle of rose wine. Along the way, I pass a garden square which speaks to the fact that spring has come to northern France.






(People back home -- take heart! Surely yours is the last snowstorm of the season!)

In that small square you'll also find a statue. If I had to pick an icon for Ocean, I would consider it.





It comes with a stone at the side, engraved with the words -- celui qui regarde passer les autres. One who watches others passing by.   Ocean words.


And now I return toward my small house by the fields where a new crop of cabbage is being harvested, even as the skies release the first drops of rain.






*****

I spend a leisurely afternoon reading and watching the French news on TV. I know I can read about the crisis in the Ukraine on my computer, but I want to improve my French vocabulary and so I listen to the French voice-over of the Putin press conference.

I have a flashback then to the words of a rather nasty commenter to my Friday post. I almost never post nasty comments, or comments of people who have a history of being disrespectful, but I published that one because I thought it spoke to the odd notions people develop about countries that they have never been to and that they do not really understand. The commenter admitted as much. He wrote something to the effect that he doesn't "get"Poland.

And I'm thinking now how I lived in Poland in the years when it was recovering from the most brutal attack at the hands of our western neighbor: Nazi Germany. And, too, I lived in Poland in the year when the Soviet army marched into Czechoslovakia to the south. And now, here I am, about to go back to Poland as the Russians mobilize forces to the east, in the Ukraine.

Historically, has the Baltic Sea (to the north) been Poland's calmest neighbor? Imagine living in a country where no century passes without a stormy threat to the west, or south, or east. Or north, really, because the Baltic Sea is never fully calm.

I'm remembering, too, the short bus right to the plane that brought me from Poland to France. A young mother was explaining everything around us to her very young son. And he is delighting in all of it: the bus, the planes and now he points to a military helicopter and he is excited because he knows the world for it! Helicopter! Her mood changes. She frowns. And she tells him -- you don't have to get excited about that. I don't like it. It's a war helicopter. Boys, playing their war games.  The boy looks crestfallen at her suddenly dampened enthusiasm. After a pause, she smiles again and points to the Wizzair plane we were then approaching.

Poland is scarred by centuries of invasions. Of war.

I continue to watch the news. You don't need a huge vocabulary to understand what's going on in the Ukraine right now.

*****


It's nearly six and I notice that it's not dark yet. And that the rains have settled into a fine drizzle. That's walkable! I have a jacket! I need a gaze in the direction of the sea. Brittany is the province with the longest coastline. It is cabbages and artichokes inside, but it's all about the ocean at the edges.

So I walk toward the water and I take note of how wet this winter has been and how wet it remains today. Wet artichoke fields, spilling out to the gray ocean waters. (This part of Brittany is just where the English Channel stops and the Atlantic Ocean begins.)










It's an invigorating (if somewhat damp) walk. A wonderful encounter again with the Brittany that I once loved and am prepared to love again.

*****

I end the day with a hearty bowl of chicken tagine. With bread and cheese and a glass of rose wine.