on automatic

And here’s what I else I love about the little Smart car we’ve rented: it allows you to switch back and forth between automatic and manual transmission. Though typically I do not mind manual shifting, when I am navigating inclines in places where I’m also searching for the right roads, while my traveling companion is comfortably taking one of his many cat naps – I prefer automatic.

This is to be the last day of the wet front passing through and so my plans are tentative – depending on the extent of the bad weather.

Morning, though, is set aside for the market.

The market rolls into Sorede twice a week and in my mind this should be a highpoint for us. Mediterranean markets are full of color and the foods are better than great.

But here’s the caveat: Sorede is a village. A small village at that. A place this size is going to have a market that suits its needs. Sorede’s market is, therefore, really small.

Unlike our farmers markets, French markets are only mostly local.





The produce stand will have local zucchini (three types!), local berries (the best!), but in addition, it may also have cheaper berries from Spain, and artichokes from up north, and avocado from across the ocean. There will be a farmer who brings his cheeses and sets up a small table, and there will likely also be a cheese vendor who sells cheeses from a number of producers of the region, or even from other parts of France. It’s a grand mixture of a person selling only a few small plants and another selling a cacophony of colorful blooms.

If you’re wondering why I am not supporting these assertions with numerous photos – well, it’s because like in the car, I get distracted when exploring new places. It may seem that I’m all the time concentrating on photographing things around me, but the fact is that I take photos only as an aside. And so, because I am not focused primarily on the camera, most often I leave the camera on automatic focus and I take a photo quickly, instinctively, without too much forethought.

Today, during some moment of distraction, the camera slipped out of its automatic function. I hadn’t noticed and kept on snapping under the mistaken impression that the camera was doing the thinking for me. I have a lot of out of focus photos from the first half of the day.

On the up side, it became obvious that the weather front was done with the rains. As we sat at a café and watched the locals come with their baskets to pick up their artichokes and berries and grilled rabbit, I unzipped my sweatshirt and relaxed. It may well be that we’ll get by on this trip without once having to regret not packing an umbrella.

We move seamlessly from a breakfast of pain au chocolat at the café bar, to a lunch of baguette and market cheeses, tomatoes and berries back at the apartment. We eat indoors. No one feels like wiping the outdoor chairs after the night rains.

Convinced that the rains are over and done with, I suggest a coastal trip south. We are nearly at the Spanish border, but even so, there are three coastal towns that lie between here and Spain and they all have great virtues:

The first, closest to us, is Collioure, a known tourist destination. I’d been there during my Languedoc stay four years back. I thought then that it was picture perfect – colorful, artsy (it was a favored spot for Les Fauves – painters who painted with wild brush strokes and vivid colors), nestled around a natural bay, sheltered by the lovely Abeilles hills and mountains.

The second, some five kilometers further south, is Port Vendres -- a now quiet fishing port.

The third is Banyuls sur Mer – a name that rolls out on the tongue in the most unFrench manner (its Catalan and you say the “u” like “oo” and the “s” is not silent). Banyuls is known for its fantastic wines, made from grapes that rise precipitously on the rocky soils of the surrounding mountains. The Banyuls wine that is quite special is a sweet red dessert wine. I love it quite a lot, though it’s not on my purchase list as no one I know in the States likes sweet dessert wines. Still, there are other Banyuls wines to buy. And hills Banyuls to climb.

With this trilogy of towns in mind and with a hiking guide thrown in the car, we set out for the coast.


Before even entering Coilloure, we park the car and walk along the rocky coast to admire the suddenly cliffy sea border.





Who would not find this enchanting? Well, there’s Ed.

As we drive into town, following a trail of cars and even an occasional bus, I notice that “tune out” demeanor that befalls him when he loses interest. Never mind that the place is so perfect that thousands drive great distances to see it.













Ed walks along dutifully and occasionally looks out with great longing -- at the clear waters of the Mediterranean.


 


Even the anchovy shop fails to rouse him. (Collioure is well known for its sublime anchovies.) There is no point in lingering. Too many tourist trappings. Too many people. Within an hour we were out and heading south.

Port Vendres is entirely different. Empty, quiet, without the fuss of tourism. We walk along the water’s edge and admire the fishing boats, at rest now, with colorful nets piled to the side.









And this is when I noticed that the hills to the west were no longer shrouded in cloud cover. Indeed, the day is rapidly growing warm. The weather front has moved on.





A few more minutes at the port, watching the men fish. And talk. And talk some more...














...and we drive south once more. No great distance – just a handful of kilometers. Banyuls sur Mer. Not nearly as crowded as Collioure, but still keeping an eye toward tourism – with a bayside line of cafes and restaurants that may have great visual appeal if you love that post card look. I do. Ed does not. But it hardly matters. We’re here for the wine and the hills.

We find the winery that I pick out rather randomly from a quick Internet search of preferred Banylus family-operated, small producers – Domaine du Mas Blanc.









I could spend a few rhapsodic paragraphs on how wonderful it is to taste the wines here, but perhaps you do not want this amount of detail. Still, it is a delightful experience and I buy three bottles to take back to the States. My little carryon had in it not only all the clothes that I need for a three week trip, but also a folded up nice big duffle bag to fill with wines and send through on our way back.


And now it is four, and the sun is out, and we are at last able to do a hike up the beautiful hills and mountains to our west.

We have a trail guide and so we more or less know where to begin. In the hilly, colorful outskirts of Banyuls.









The turn off path is hard to find, but local residents help us and very quickly we are out of town and climbing the rocky path toward the ridgeline.





My camera is functional again and I am enchanted with the views. I’ll put up just a handful for you to consider:










If you stay with the trail, within a short distance you will be in Spain. We don’t quite do that. The trail is marked well enough, but we are stupidly without water again and going forth for more than a couple of hours is foolish. You start to wonder if sucking on baby grapes or even the vine leaves will give you that needed burst of moisture.


 



Still, it is a most wonderful climb. And you have to admire the history of winemaking in this region. How terribly difficult it must be to harvest these grapes that grow on steep, rocky ledges.





At the summit (these are small mountains – around 2000 feet) we give a wave toward Spain and turn around to head back toward Banyuls.


 


The sun is out, Ed is feeling bouncy again, the breeze is steady and cooling -- there could not be a better way to spend an afternoon.

We approach Banyuls with a sprightly step. In the town, we come upon a man who is singing and Catalan flag waving on his balcony perch...





We shout greetings and walk on. I’m thrilled that we are so close to stores with water. Ed, forever his own person, is, however, sidetracked by a bakery. Will you share a flan? – he asks. Yes, but only after drinking at least one bottle of water.





On our ride back to Sorede, the car is on automatic and I am alternating between bites of flan, sips of still water and sips of the perfectly thirst quenching citrus Perrier. Almost as good as lemon Klarbrunn back home.

The edge of hunger has been well treated by the flan. But I push for dinner nonetheless. We return to the very simple Chez Patou. It has a separate menu page which lists Halal dishes and so we think it must address the needs of an immigrant population. I know that Perpignan, the district capital just 25 miles north of Sorede, has a thriving north African community.

I like the creative waiter who adds tables on the sidewalk, and his wife who helps out when she is not affectionately holding their daughter or talking to their son.





I order a dish they call “Sea and Mountains” (the sea is the mussels, squid and shrimp part, the mountain is in the sausage and chicken), Ed has the spaghetti with seafood. Each dish is cheap and satisfying.





We sit outside and watch the night seep in. The village may well be at its loveliest now.

We make our way back slowly. Walking on automatic pilot now, because that’s what you do at the end of a good day and a full meal.

bread and water

So, which of the two village bakeries do you like better? - we ask our landlord. Why waste time on the lesser baguette, if there's a better one to be had. The bigger place – he tells us. We shop there on Sunday. It’s good.

But on Monday, it’s closed and the other (the lesser?) is open, having, instead, a Wednesday closing date. A chance, then, to compare and contrast.

Ah, Monday mornings in France. They never really burst forward with gusto. Stores open slowly. Some don’t get going 'til the afternoon. But we can’t be slow on this day. The big front that has been in the weather forecast since last week is due here by noon. We have a few hours of good weather. We need to hustle.

But the first stop for us is not the bakery. We’ve been waiting for the Tourist Office to open (it’s closed on week-ends; surely not a good idea from the standpoint of the tourist, but a fine idea if you want time off, like the rest of your country men and women). I need maps. I need information. I need schedules.

And now onto the bakery. There the needs are more basic: pain au chocolat and baguette.

And here are three lessons to be learnt from this brief stop at the bakery.

First of all, even if bread may be good elsewhere, pain au chocolat may be a different story. (This one was superb; the other one was merely excellent.)

Secondly, there are many varieties of baguette these days. It’s sort of like pasta types. They multiply. You have to compare a spaghetti noodle to another spaghetti noodle and not, say, to a tagliatelle. Our baguette is less chewy, but maybe we asked for the wrong baguette?

Third – there’s the matter of madame behind the counter. In the smaller bakery, madame has a sense of humor as spirited as Ed’s and when you put the two together, it can be like watching a good tennis game.





Okay, baked goods in bag, we cross the river, back to our apartment. On the way, we note
that our neighbor has a sign out: cherries and apricots for sale. The garage isn’t really a garage, but a place to sort their harvest of fruits.





We buy what have to be the tastiest cherries anywhere – firm, juicy – they are fantastic! We eat too many – somewhat fearing the consequences, yet incapable of not reaching for one more, and another... Oh, and the apricots! Freshly picked – we’re offered firm ones for later or ready to eat for now. Ready to eat, of course. We eat those too.

Breakfast is on the patio. I miss a good espresso, but one must make do.





And now we’re off. We want to explore the coastline to the north of us. The beaches vary and I want to find the stretches away from the holiday towns. Quiet places that, at this time of the year should be quite empty (the beach season here is very short: July and August – the traditional French vacation months).

We drive up to Saitn Cyprien – a small town with the second largest marina on the French Mediterranean. I’m keeping an eye on the clouds. They’re dense around the mountains to the south, but so far, the coastal lands are dry.





As we get closer to the town port, you can almost feel Ed's pulse quicken. Put him among sailboats and the usually quiet guy churns out stories and facts sheets without pause.





We come to a sailing school. EFV (Ecole Francaise de Voile) – we’ve seen these on the Brittany coast: places where small and big people learn to sail. On this day, several school groups are out for a sailing class. It’s part of the curriculum. You live on the coast, you learn water sports.

I love watching these little kids in their little sailboats. Like in a storybook where a young child finds a mast and sticks it onto a small tub and gets going, these kids, too, perform nimble magic in these simple vessels.










One group is out already – towed toward the open seas by the instructor...





...then another.... Oh, oops, one boat gets tangled in there and ends up drifting backwards. Shrieks and peels of laughter. An instructor to the rescue. Slowly they untangle. More laughter.





The waters are calm here, but I am impressed by the fact that they’re heading out to sea. The skies are dark and the winds are kicking up the typically gentle Mediterranean. Ed tells me anyone can learn to sail in several lessons. Having watched kids do this up on the northern coast, I know they can already right tipped boats and get themselves out of tricky situations. I’m thinking how cool it is to get kids excited about the outdoors. We watch for a little while longer and then head back to the car. It’s not raining yet, but the clouds are voluptuous and their reach now is beyond the mountains. We can’t have more than a few minutes left.

Just a little further north, we find the strip of undeveloped beachfront. Vacation homes along the Languedoc coast are deliberately built in clusters, leaving long stretches of unencumbered land. You can park the car anywhere along the road and take a path to the sandy beach. We do this now, in search of a spot for a quick lunch. It’s completely empty here – no doubt because of the uncertain weather.

We settle in, take out the baguette, the cheese, the apricots and watch the wind ripple the waters as they come ashore.





It appears that we are on the brink of rain, and yet we seem to be moving always just ahead of the front.





We are windblown, but dry. And still we continue north, as if fleeing the weather, but really just taking a further look up the coast, all the way to the Etang (Lagoon) de Leucate – some forty kilometers (25 mi.) north of where we’re staying.

The lagoon is long and the wind here is just terrific for a windsurfer. And we see not a small handful of them, racing like demons against the backdrop of oyster beds and wind generators.









So beautiful to watch. And funny, too, since the lagoon is surprisingly shallow. When the sails flip over, the men (they appear to be all men here) are only waist deep in water.



We turn around and head home.





And now, finally, the rain trickles in. It never quite pours. It remains gentle enough for me to get out and admire an apricot grove.









And gentle enough that when we reach home, we can go out without an umbrella. To the bakery, again, where Madame is out of baguettes (not an issue for us as we have fragments of ours still, even as others are deeply shocked and disappointed), but there remain the palmiers and apple pockets.





Ask her for the big one, Ed nudges.
Monsieur, I’m going to give you the smaller one – she says it in brisk French and she points to the smaller palmier.
Ed appears chastised.
Madame’s face eases into a peel of laughter as she reaches for his coveted big one.


In the evening, we walk through the light drizzle up to the square. It’s quiet now, not at all as busy as it was on Sunday. Yesterday, the waiter at Chez Patou was setting out extra tables. Today, people are choosing to stay home.

There is a set menu for 12.50 Euros (nearly $15, tax and tip included). Three courses. I choose the charcuterie plate because I know that Catalan sausages are like no other. My dish is loaded with patés, hams, sausages, pickles and onions, slices of raw fennel, and sweet melon on the side.





We drink sangria tonight. It’s ever-present here and deliciously fresh. For a second course, I hesitate. Is the pasta and seafood good? The waiter grins – well, my mother is cooking it, so yes, it’s good. He glances over his shoulder.





It’s also abundant!

We stumble out after our meal, not noticing anymore if it’s drizzling.

different rhythms

James, our landlord, tells us – you know that in the south, there is the siesta, when everything shuts down for lunch? Well, in Sorede, the siesta is rather long – from noon to five.

What a schedule! You work in the morning, you break until five and then you pick it up for a couple more hours (shops close at seven).

I say to Ed – it’s like an agreement between the residents and the shopkeepers. You limit your shopping to these short hours and we’ll give you good service then.
Until Walmart comes along and offers longer hours and cheaper prices.

No, there’s this loyalty going on. People can go to the supermarket outside of town, but they wont neglect the local store, because they value their small shops in the village.

Ed’s not convinced. He’s got the entrepreneurial blood. I have this idea that we can function well despite it.

But this schedule does mess with our typical routines. If I write in the morning, then, when I’m ready to go, at around noon, we face a sleepy town.

And so we do things differently.

Early in the morning, Ed suggests a swim in the sea. Why not – it’s the best way to avoid crowds.

The drive to Argeles sur Mer (on the Mediterranean coast) is delightful...





...and short. Ten minutes and we’re in the town itself – predictably a touristy one, with the trappings of a vacation destination (though no big hotels here – the Languedoc coast is spared the Riviera nonsense north of here). We drive the narrow streets, getting lost, getting found, getting lost again. Finally we meander toward the beach. Truly hard to miss as it extends for a long stretch up the coast.

The “sand” is really coarse here – tiny pebbles rather than the powder one’s used to. And at least now, at 8 in the morning, the place is nearly empty.





But the water is bracing. And the drop here is quite significant. The water is absolutely clear, but within a few steps your feet do not touch the bottom.

We take the plunge.

Women can swim topless you know.

Ed has heard me say this, but he doesn’t really believe it until we notice an older couple settling in – both in bottoms, both without the burden of a top. Further down, a young man is airing his bottom.
Now that's unusual -- I comment. No one will say anything, but on public beaches, you're to keep your bottoms on.


Slowly people trickle onto the beach and claim their favorite spot for the day. With friends, with children, settling in, picking up the thread of an interrupted conversation.





Ed and I walk up the beach to where there is a small commotion.  Swimmers, in warm suits, doing laps as part of the Catalan Triathlon. We join the supportive onlookers.





It always strikes me as remarkable how sporty the French are – especially when you leave the big urban centers. They seem to love to watch sports and they equally love to participate. And they do so well into their older years. On a Sunday, the roads are always dotted with cyclists of all ages, racing at speeds I would not regard as normal. Here, too, dozens and dozens of men and women are racing in and out of the water,  some of them dragging a bit, but still going back for that extra lap, as if the idea of not finishing hasn't occurred to them.






Walking back to the car, we pass a small group of men and women of various ages being coached in some jumping exercise.





A Sunday morning in the south of France.



We can’t linger too long as we are to meet with James (the landlord) and go over the details of our rental. (He and his wife packed their bags some six years ago, left England and moved to Sorede with their two sons.
Was it a hard adjustment? Ed asks.
It took a good year to get comfortable with it. Our boys are now fluent in French, but my wife and I are still struggling, though we can get by now with basic French.
What made you do it?
Well, the climate of course. And wanting to experience a different culture...)


It’s noon when we settle in for a breakfast on our patio. Pain au chocolat for me, baguette and cheese and tomato for Ed. The weather prediction was for some showers, but they’re staying away somehow. The air is warm, pleasant.

We can’t help but take a nap right after.

In the evening, we walk to the village just to the west – Laroque des Alberes. Past olive groves and vineyards.









The vineyards of Languedoc dominate the landscape further north, but even here, they appear as a surprise around a bend or up a hill side. But the grapes share space with apricot and cherry trees. This is fruit country alright. And we’re in the glorious season of perfect ripeness.


The village of Larocque is even smaller than Sorede. There is a tower in the old quarter up the hill...





...and from here you can see the dark clouds over the Pyrenees, the flat plain of the Rousillon and finally the sea itself. Pretend this is your panorama: looking south, then west, then north, then east.

















We stay a while, hoping that the rain keeps to the mountains.

It does.

We walk down the twisting street, quiet now, except for the occasional parent taking a child out for a walk...








Back in the Sorede, we sit down for a meal at Ma Maison. We take a corner outside table and watch the place slowly fill up. But even though there are a couple of empty tables still, monsieur, the extremely efficient waiter, starts to turn customers away.

Why? I ask.
Oh, we have a Sunday crew in the kitchen. They’re working at full capacity now and they want to go home soon. It would be unfair to them to bring in more customers.

Across the street, a waiter at another restaurant has an entirely different idea. His small eating establishment fills up as well. As potential diners show up, he brings out more tables to seat them, putting them out along the sidewalk, in front of garage doors, anywhere at all.





The village of Sorede will support both eateries – one can contract, another can expand. Everyone seems content for now. And more importantly, there’s enough good food to please the patrons.

I start my meal with the local anchovy dish. This is a Catalan specialty and I am a real fan of the Mediterranean anchovies – packed in olive oil, not nearly as salty as the ones we eat in the States – they are a delicious starter.





The loup de mer follows...





... and we finish off with a trio of wonderful ice creams – dark chocolate, cassis and of course, the local apricot.





Again I am delighted with the cheap house wine of the region. Ed tells me it’s all subjective. In my head. But each time he tastes the wines here, he nods. Not bad, he’ll say. I don't disagree.