from Pierrerue: l’invitation

It’s midnight, Saturday. I’ve bunny hopped and discoed and cha chad at the Fete de Pierrerue and now it’s time to go home.

As I say good bye to the people at my table, Celine asks:
Will you come to the Sunday meal with my family?

I am flooded with good will and, soon after, panic. I had managed four hours of French conversation during the Fete, but let’s face it, it’s a lot easier to keep going when you have built in interruptions such as dancing and choking on a tomato.

And there are the obvious worries: what do I wear? If I overdress, I’ll look stupid. If I underdress, I’ll insult my hosts.

The gift, too. At home, there is no question: you bring wine. It is so much the norm that I think anyone who still neglects this custom must be doing it on purpose. But here, am I to bring wine to a family who has for generations made a business of it? Isn’t it like bringing chocolate chip cookies to a pastry chef? Here, I know you have perfected the art of baking Napoleons, but let me present you with some nice and chewy cookies from a recipe off of a Nestle’s chocolate chip package.

Marie-Rose offers to walk me to Celine’s house. Marie Rose knows that I cannot get the bread lady’s schedule straight nor swallow tomatoes properly and am, therefore, likely to lose my way even in this one street village. She is sweet to be concerned.

But indeed, I am thrilled to accept the invitation. It is both an honor and a pleasure for me. I will try hard. I will read up on the village life of a Catalan woman (see post below).

Sunday morning, I wash every last piece of clothing in case I decide to wear any of it. Then, off to the market. I pick up a good Muscat – the preferred aperitif here – and a bunch of roses. At 12:30, Marie Rose and I set off. I ask if she wants me to drive – Celine's house is at the edge of the village, a kilometer uphill, but she says no, it’s good for her cellulite to walk. It astonishes me that old-world Marie Rose worries about cellulite.



Celine and Pierre's home


Marie Rose does not stay – she has her own 92-year old mother back home to attend to. Inside the gate, Celine is waiting. Her daughter shows off their garden and we go inside. The table is set, le dejeuner with maman, papa, fille and fils (though fils will be late as his summer job down at the village café will keep him running until 3) and grandmere is about to begin.





I know, it was to be expected. The meal was wonderful, all four hours of it. Little pizzettes with the aperitif (I could have stopped right there, foodwise), salads, grilled meats and sausages (I had to try all four types), a potato cake (I had seconds), a tray of pastries (I ate the whole thing), melon with champagne (my cup runneth over), espresso.





Certainly, I walked away with a new and improved idea of what it’s like to live in this quiet corner of southern France. Myths got debunked, but my respect and love for this village remains firm. I am, however, completely set straight now on the following:

- not all French eat croissants everyday for breakfast. Those baguette slices from the previous night’s dinner? Perfect as toast and jam the next morning;

- five weeks per year are the French vacation minimum, but not all is taken in the summer. Take Pierre, Celine’s husband. He hunts wild birds in the winter, along with his pals. Three weeks needed for that alone;

- time may have stood still in the Languedoc (this region of southern France), but yoga has come to the villages, at least to the one next door. Celine partakes, along with a handful of other women. She shows us some poses, turns pink, giggles, trips and sits down. Forget the meditation part, she’s after the feeling supple and looking great bit;

- a small village is not one small gossip circuit. An example of how little is known about others: they tell me Marie Rose is the village traditionalist. She prays a lot and has conservative ideas. But they know nothing of my other neighbors, the artists, even though these guys have lived here for more than five years. Marie Rose, on the other hand, knows the artists, but isn’t quite sure what he does for a living. A policeman maybe? No one knows much of anything about my English landlady. Until this day, when I invited her in to look around, Marie Rose had never even been inside my little apartment (no love lost between the two women) and Celine and Pierre were stunned to know that my landlady was the owner of the well known restaurant, Pourquois Pas;

- it is true, however, that women hanging around village cafés in the afternoon raise eyebrows and that women on a Petanque court are a rarity. Celine’s older daughter summarized it thus: Petanque is boring. Why would I want to do that anyway?

- It is also true that if you order a café crème (coffee with milk) in the afternoon, you will be pegged as someone with a weird digestive system. The French are absolutely convinced that mixing milk with coffee after the sun has passed its high point for the day will ruin you;

- A nap after a long lunch is a must. The grandmere, the fils and the papa all fell asleep before I left. That might lead you to believe that I overstayed my welcome, but no, I made every effort to leave when grandmere first let out a gentle little snore. But I could not do it. The women were engaged and engaging and only after a promise of future contact could I retreat to give them, too, a chance to exhale.

They tell me this part of the France is the last of the pays sauvage. I do not know how to translate it, but it does strike the right image: It is not wild, nor savage, or maybe it is both. It remains, most certainly unspoiled. Yes, they say that Johnny Depp bought a house near Montpellier and the entire province cannot stop talking about it. Over dinner, every day, in a leisurely way, until the last word has been said and the last sip of espresso finished.



along the road, back to the village

from Pierrerue: painters and parties

I went to Ceret in the late afternoon both because it is at the foothills of the Pyrenees and because it was once a place of escape for artists and intellectuals. They left traces of their work behind: Picasso, Chagall, Kisling, Cocteau among countless others. I wanted to see the place for myself to see what the draw was (besides freedom from oppressive and belligerent regimes).

Of course, I am curious about other stuff too. Ceret is just a few kilometers from Spain. When faced with a border, I want to cross it. What’s it like on the other side?

And so before proceeding to Ceret, I turned south, dug out my passport and recalled a few Spanish words I thought might be useful. Ola. Mui rico. They’re all greetings, or comments on food.

I must admit, crossing over to Spain was one of those bad decisions. I had sped south for two hours and was due back at Pierrerue before 8. My time was limited and should not have been given over to border towns packed with shoppers buying up tobacco and motorbikes and God knows what else.

The snaking line of traffic was discouraging and I was prepared to spend even more time at the border itself. Thankfully, the Spanish control person chose at this hour to take a nap and I was happy to see traffic whiz by his booth without him so much as opening an eye. I thought for a minute he may be dead, all sprawled out as he was and so I was relieved to see his stomach move up and down with some regularity.

Having snuck past that, I breathed a (premature) sigh of relief. Seconds later, however, I was pulled over by a very pleasant if official looking woman. I watched with envy as all others sailed through without attracting hers or anyone’s attention.

Where are you going and how long will you be there? She asked.
Ashamed of my reasons for being there (for the hell of it), I eeked out: twenty minutes.
Not staying overnight?
No…
And you are driving a rented car?
Is that it? Am I not allowed to bring in a rented car here? I should have checked. Still…
Yes, it’s rented. Listen, I can turn back… Interest in a peek at Spain was vanishing. I’ve been in Spain plenty. Why this detour? Foolish.
Just one more thing. How old are you??
Now that just gave me pause and so I asked –why do you want to know?
For the survey, of course. I am from the Tourist Bureau and we are conducting random surveys of visitors.
It seems prudent to disclose this information at the outset, but I am not here to make a fuss, so I tell her my age and drive on.

Reflecting that Spain is a pretty place even if this particular spot does not adequately display her splendors, I decide to at least find a café that would do me up a fine cappuccino. And I did find a restaurant off to the side somewhere, boasting fresh ingredients and Catalan food and so I ordered a Catalan Cream in addition to the coffee and proceeded to have a fine discussion on the merits of the Catalan Cream over the French Crème Brulee. The former, I’m told, has flavors of orange and honey and a richness that I am assured cannot be found in something as plain as a Crème Brulee, which, after all, is merely eggs, cream and sugar.

It was past five when I finally arrived in Ceret. That turned out to work in Ceret’s favor. The colors of houses, the dappled plane trees, the mellowness of a late afternoon light all made the town lovely to behold.










In the Museum of Modern Art, I saw a more somber story, of course. Artists escaping war and repression are inevitably going to work through their stress in their creations and indeed, Picasso’s gift to the museum was a painting depicting evil and Chagall’s magnificent painting on the theme of war could not be more moving in a very sad sort of way.

True, Picasso also left behind ceramics depicting bull fights, which were very a propos, this being a town that goes in for that sort of thing. And there was an occasional Dufy and we know Dufy can paint no evil, so that was a bit of a relief.

I also went to a bookstore and asked if they had any book at all that would help me out a little with the finer nuance of French grammar. I was tired of hearing myself speak incorrectly.

Ceret’s bookstores are a bit on the pretentious side. They have serious little volumes on art, philosophy and on the human condition in general. There was not a grammar book to be had, but I was assured that I would do well reading to myself the memoirs of a Catalan woman – something about having to leave home and suffering separation anxiety from the village of her youth. I was flattered that my French was pegged at such a level. Or maybe she wrote in a particularly accessible way. In any case, I have the book with me and will get to it as soon as the tempo of life here in the south of France slows down for me even more.






In the evening there was, of course, the annual Pierrerue Fete. I went down with great trepidation. I knew hardly anyone in town. Why had I thought this to be a good idea?

Madame Marie-Rose rescued me. Literally, she saved my life as I managed to, early on, choke on a tomato wedge and without her resounding slap on my back, delivered with the force of a woman who has seen death and would not like to repeat the experience just that evening, I would have been but ashes in the cemetery at the bottom of the Pierrerue hill.

The Fete itself was possibly the highpoint of highpoints. 160 people showed up from Pierrerue and its sister village just down the hill (Combejean). The village youth prepared and served the food, counting on a profit that would allow them to party to high heaven later in the season.



delivering

Of course, this being an intergenerational kind of place, on this night both young and old mixed, ate and danced together late into the night and I am told in July the old will again show up to the party of the young and, just as on this night, they will start with the slower dances, move right into a multiage bunny hop and wind the evening down with some hearty disco stuff.



my table



taking it in

Such an evening! I will long remember Celine* (my age) explaining across the table to Marie-Rose what life is like in America. Her daughter had done graduate work in San Francisco and so she knew the scoop. America, from a French person’s perspective: there is great concern that we do not use trains enough and that we lack bread stores in every village.

Celine works at the wine cooperative. Her father and grandfather were “wine growers” (vignerons). If you asked her if she ever thought about leaving Pierrerue she would laugh. Entre deux. Pierrerue is an entre deux village – it lies between the two: mountains and sea. It is, in the eyes of its residents, a perfect location, like no other on earth. They love this place. Me too, outsider that I am.

*where people have offered personal stories out of friendship rather of a service, I have disguised identifiers – the most obvious being names. I’ve changed most of them.

from Pierrerue: mirror mirror

I wanted to catch the 2:15 train to Montpellier. I worked hard to get stuff done, but in the end, even though I drove demonically to Beziers in the hopes of making it, I missed it by two minutes and had to settle for the 3:09. It is almost an hour ride from Beziers, which meant that it wasn’t until after 4 that I exited the train station of Montpellier La Roche. Late, considering I absolutely had to be on the 6:47 return in order to make my dinner reservation up in the little village just beyond Pierrerue.

Montpellier is a big city. And it is actually very pretty, all cleaned up and spiffy, with large boulevards, flashy modern blue and yellow tram cars moving along the main circuit, squares, parks, and I hear it has a fascinating old town.





I saw hardly any of it. Here’s why:

In my rural ramblings, I have been missing this one aspect of city life: the café. Village cafés are different. Oftentimes they are right in the midst of traffic, just so you can catch every single car and person that passes through. They are not pretty, they’re functional. A pastis or an espresso, a chat and you’re off.

Sure, they are good for people watching and especially of older men watching, as they are the most frequent habitués of the village café. This was taken yesterday, over a café noisette (forget about cappuccino at the village; the cappuccino to them demands whipped cream; most often, the café-bar has none and therefore will refuse your cappuccino request).



the men of St. Chinian




okay, the St. Chinian poodle could feel at home at any city or village in France


But there’s something about a grand outdoor café that a city provides, out there on the open boulevard or closed-to-traffic square, something that just cannot be replicated elsewhere – not on the corner of St Chinian, not on State Street in Madison. It’s certainly not better than the latter, it’s simply different and after two weeks of village life, I was hankering for an afternoon of that difference.

And sure enough, Montpellier has an abundance of outdoor cafés. Indeed, the focal point is a large square which, like in Krakow, Venice or any other large European city, has been handed over to the café crowds. And they are different than my wonderfully capped men of St Chinian. (Again, not at all better and hardly more interesting, just very different.) Compare and contrast.



St Chinian cafe




Montpellier cafe


But before sitting down for my coveted and adored cappuccino, I make the mistake of entering the Galleries Lafayette and trying on a beautiful blue and yellow scarf.

I look in the mirror and freeze.

Pierrerue does not have much of a mirror. There is something resembling one hanging in the bathroom, but the lightbulb there has long gone out and I haven’t bothered climbing up to replace it. And now, in the bright lights of the Galleries Lafayette I could witness the true state of my hair: under the influence of the southern sun, it had turned almost completely blonde.

That’s fine. I have no problem with being a blonde in the summer of 2006. The problem is that the roots, hidden there under layers of blondeness, are having a hard time catching up. Brown roots, a splash of gray at the temples and a mound of basic blondness. I can’t believe I have been out in public like this!

It is 5:30. I enter a haircut store conveniently positioned outside the doors of the Galleries Lafayette and tell the desk person: do something! Is there a product you can sell me? Anything!

She looks at me, spins around and runs off to get the manager. He comes to the front, looks at me, frowns, reaches for some product and proceeds to explain how I might use it and what I may hope to accomplish for an interim solution.

I lost him on step number 43. It could be that after going through this, I will wind up looking worse than I look right now.

I have a train to catch in one hour and fifteen minutes. Can you fix my cheveux in that time, please?




Jason's replacement in the background


Fifty five minutes, that’s all they needed. He painted and hummed so that my roots caught up to the rest of the south of France effect. She scrubbed, conditioned and conditioned some more. Want me to cut it too? Oh, go for it. Snip, snip, two minutes later she is done. My man Jason back home would be appalled.

Fact is, though, I can’t say I’d be looking much better after a Jason afternoon. And the price? One third that of Madison’s. I’m thinking: if I saved on hair by tending to it here and used the savings for airfare, could I make it to Montpellier, say, every two months and come out even?





No café this time. I ran in my flashy flowered sandals, without even pausing for an ice cream cone. But late at night, as I worked my way through the multicourse presentation of chef Frederic at my favorite village restaurant, I did think for the first time that I looked at least presentable. No little girl shoes, no denim skirt, perfectly styled hair with no dark roots. France is transforming me.

The night ended with cheeses and gratineed fruits.

from Pierrerue: two stories, one theme

First story:

Late in the afternoon I drive to the village of Olargues. It is in the mountains north and west of here. Even the cherry trees give up by the time you get to it. Vineyards? No, not that either. I see signs in front of houses announcing the sale of honey, so I guess bees like it up here.

Bees and the Committee for the Selection of the Prettiest Villages of France (if such a committee there is).

I have said this before: France ranks and rewards most everything you could imagine. Food preparation alone is eligible for rosettes, forks, torques, stars, young chef awards (Alain of Atmospheres in the Savoie won one of those last year), oh you name it, they give it.

And villages as well: that one is worth one flower. Another: two. Olargues gets three stars and a designation: it belongs to the elite group of “Prettiest Villages.”

Pierrerue isn’t even rated, that’s how insignificant it is in the eyes of the Committee for the Selection of the Prettiest Villages of France.

For Olargues, I think it has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Once adorned and adored, you start puffing yourself out (villages are like people in this respect). Flowers magically appear.









even in pretty villages, children play






And the tourists come. It is worth a detour, the books say.

Initially, I set out to disprove Olargues' worth. But I cave after I step into a bakery for an afternoon snack. They have the best madeleines in the world, ones that would make Proust jump out of bed for more. I mellow after that.





But do not misunderstand (Side Story follows): in my heart, I am with Pierrerue. Pierrerue cares deeply about keeping itself nice and tidy, even though it cannot compete with medieval villages perched on mountains. It cares about its one street. It cares about its Mairie, about its little church. And it cares about its garbage.

Here’s how I know: I had been environmentally friendly, I thought and I had been saving my little plastic bags from market trips and using them as trash can liners. True, the bags are small, but so is my kitchen trash can.

Because the garbage dumpsters are a bit of a walk, I pushed the limits: I filled the damn things pretty tightly before carrying them down.

Two days ago, a neighbor came by. She said she wanted to give me my allotment of garbage bags, courtesy of the village of Pierrerue.

As compared to the absolutely neat blue bags of garbage in the village bins, nicely tied and securely holding in all garbage, my little market bags must have been an eyesore. I cannot be certain, but I am thinking they had a village meeting. And someone had une idée: give Madame Nina some bags, call it an allotment and let’s see what she does.

I got the nudge. The bins are spotless once again. Even the weeds growing around them are inviting.



weeds and butterflies


Second story:

There is an old farmhouse outside one of the mountain towns just half an hour away from Pierrerue (that town’s rating: one star, which means it’s okay, but not worth a detour).

The farmhouse has been converted into an inn. I went there to eat dinner.

The owner, Monsieur Gilles, is an art collector and he displays paintings of local artists in a little gallery to the side. I was smitten by some pieces, especially those painted by a woman by the name of Pamella, so much so that I took a tiny something of hers home. Delighted with my appreciation of his collection, Monsieur Gilles took me around the inn, pointing out paintings that he had been especially commissioned to fit into some demanding wall spaces.

My mother does not like it that I am replacing the old stuff. She says the old decorations have been here for years! I tell her, that’s the problem: they have been here for years! (Monsieur Gilles is, I would guess, in his late fifties and so I am glad he no longer listens to his mother.)

Dinner was wonderful. The home made paté with Muscat jelly, the scallops with braised endive, the six cheeses, chocolate cakes, cookies, all of it fantastic (and all courses together, costing less than just one main dish at Madison’s upscale restaurants). Monsieur Gilles and I hit it off. I like the food, I like the paintings, what more can one ask of your guests. In return, he fusses and brings a shawl for me when he thinks the night air is getting too cool. Hearing that I was born in Poland, he puts on Chopin’s Nocturnes as background music.





And at the end, Monsieur Gilles snips a beautiful rose from the garden and brings it to my table along with the little picture done by Pamella. He presents me with both and tells me that my credit card isn’t going through the machine, but not to worry, if it does it does, if it does not – so be it.

He walks me to the car, plants a kiss and I drive away, puffed up and determined to wear something other than a denim skirt and a zip-up hoodie next time I go out.



a rose is a rose

from Pierrerue: drifting

You would think that I am supernaturally drawn to people who worry about food for a living. I seem to cross paths with them a lot, sometimes quite unintentionally.

Take, for instance, my (absent) landlord at Pierrerue. Would you have guessed that she, along with her Kenyan husband, runs one of the more successful restaurants down here, along the Canal du Midi? Indeed.

I stayed clear of the place the first week. I admit, I could not get myself excited about a place run by a pair of expats, basically from Britain. We all have our biases and mine run deep about the eating culture across the Channel.

But my neighbors here, at Pierrerue egged me on to try it. Phrases like “you have to” “it’s really wonderful” “it’s tiny, so book way in advance” kept coming up in idle conversation about the weather and so I finally broke down.

Booking a table for the evening around here means you show up well after eight or you are going to look like the biggest fool on the planet and you most certainly will be eating alone. Still, I was ready for a break at three in the afternoon and so I headed toward the Canal then, thinking I’d kill time biking around a bit.

The Office of Tourism at Capestang, the Canal-side town closest to Pourquoi Pas (the restaurant of my landlady), opened its doors again in the late afternoon, after a multi-hour lunch break. Perfect. I show up close to four and rent a bike.

You can return it tonight, by six – we close at six – or keep it until tomorrow.
I’ll be back in two hours. I cannot take the bike back to Pierrerue with me.

The path along the Canal is lovely. It strikes me as fun to follow it and get as far as the restaurant I am about to dine in. Can’t be too distant.

After an hour, I reflect on my progress. I’ve bounced around rocky and rooted terrain and still, I see nothing. But it could be just around the bend. ...lying 'round the bend, my Huckleberry friend... Let me keep going. I'll hustle like the winds on the return trip. Worst case scenario, I miss the return time, leave the bike at the restaurant and return it tomorrow.




bucolic, fragrant, but slow going




encountered: 2 women, 1 French poodle


Finally. I see it. I climb up on the bridge along with my Mr.B substitute and study it. There used to be stables here a long time ago, along this lonely stretch of the Canal. Now food is served to weary travelers like me.





Mercifully there is a country road that winds back to Capestang so that I can put a little zip into the return trip to town and make it to the Office of Tourism just seconds before closing.

Madame is back!
What’s the big deal? A welcome that is disproportionate to the event. Did she think I’d fall into the Canal?
Madame walked away with the keys to my car! I would not be able to get home tonight if Madame did not return.
Oops.


The Pourquois Pas is indeed lovely, inside and out. Choose between a meat dish or a fish, but the rest is up to the chef. I am given an asparagus mousse and a guinea fowl, followed by cheeses and a flourless chocolate cake.

I talk to Kirsty throughout the evening and it is evident to me that the Purquois Pas will not be around forever. Steve, her husband, is a drifter, like I am. Raised in one culture, transported to another, finding a home in a third. …two drifters, off to see the world… She worked the barges for tourists … barges, I would like to go with you, I would like to sail the ocean blue… he trained as a chef. They met here, but are not ready to call this their final adventure.

There are people like that – who are always considering other possibilities, always rearranging their lives because something comes up that is worth stepping out of one’s routines for. There are people like that, I just don’t know too many.



night drive back

from Pierrerue: the thrill of color

My neighbors across the alley are artists. She paints, he sculpts. They aren’t the first northern French types to have settled here, in the south of France because of its climate, its light and its colors.

One hundred and one years ago another painter did the same and he brought with him a bunch of others and before you knew it, you had a movement. I am thinking of Matisse and the Fauves and their love of the light and colors of the small Mediterranean port of Collioure.

I am a fan of Matisse and the vibrant colors used by the Fauves, even if they did sort of displace my adored Impressionists who came before them. I mean, I do get that painters (people?) have to put forth new ideas through their art (their life?) and that to propose something new, you sometimes have to throw some punches at the old stuff.

My neighbor dabbles in the Fauve style. She says it is extremely difficult, but I think she is just saying that because I offered to take off her hands the wonderful little painting she did of Roquebrun and she is hesitating to part with it, claiming that great toil and sweat went into doing it. Perhpas. I do not argue with toil and sweat.

Yesterday, I went to Collioure, perhaps to get my fill of Fauve-like colors and perhaps to demonstrate to my neighbor, the artist, my deep appreciation for the Fauve style of painting. I am trying to stay in good with the artist couple, not only because of the painting issue, but because whispers of letting me stay in their beautiful little over-the-garage apartment next summer have been floating about and I want those whispers to become shouts and promises.

It’s a bit of a drive, as Collioure is just at the Spanish border. Even hopping onto the 80-plus mile per hour superhighway for a short stretch does not reduce the driving time much. It’s easily two hours each way. But, oh, am I glad I went.













Of course, tourism is a big thing there now, but we are still in the early days of June and so the cafes are less crowded and the little beaches have only a small number of bathers – enough to provide people watching opportunities, but not enough to make the pebbly bays appear overrun by humankind.

The cafes spill out onto the beaches and I have to think that they are, later in the season, filled with foreign tourists who sit and count the number of women tanning their breasts just before them.

Here is one café that I especially liked as it seemed to require that you wear yellow and blue to sit on its yellow chairs underneath blue umbrellas.











In the picture above, the woman in the denim skirt looks like she is eating jeune peche (yellow peach) ice cream. Fitting , given the color scheme.

I took a photo of where their gaze may have been directed to – or at least of one subject, a beach couple, clothed, but still doing the French thing.





I also visited the tiny Museum of Modern Art here, but of course, all the great works of Matisse and Derain have been moved to Paris, which is understandable, but still a shame since they fit into this world of bright yellows, blues and reds.

Afterwards, I drove up the coast where the winds gust like crazy and provide yet another opportunity for French men to show off their athleticism. There is, not surprisingly, a popular wind surfing spot here and I watched for a while.








…and no, I was not tempted. Frankly, I found the following much more appealing and I made a mental note to soon return to a beach just to sit and engage in the art of doing nothing.



my speed

from Pierrerue: into the swim of things

It is morning. The bread lady comes. Marie-Rose runs to tell me, anxious, because last week I missed the delivery and everyone felt awful. To compensate, I buy way more bread than I need for the day.

You are going to the beach? The bread lady asks.

Now why would she say that? Ah, the shorts. No woman ever wears shorts here. Unless she is going to the beach.

No, no, I am going to Roquebrun. After work, this afternoon, I am renting a kayak and doing the rapids on the river Orb. I hope I will see you tomorrow.

Indeed. I have done a lot of kayaking in my life, but never on rapids.

The set up is well orchestrated. You rent a kayak or canoe (the difference amuses me; the boats are identical, only the paddle varies) for a half day or a full day. A van drops you and your boat up river (twice the distance for the full day) and you paddle down. Simple.

Except that there are rapids.

Here are two bins for your belongings. Put your things in the little one and put the little one into the big barrel. Shut it tight. Double protection.

Protection from what?

Do people roll over?
Yes, all the time. She looks surprised that I should ask.

I notice children are required to wear helmets. Why aren’t adults given double head protection? Our heads are bigger, there’s more to crack.

Are the rapids treacherous?
Medium. The bigger ones are on the full day.

Of course, the French bike up hills and mountains. What is medium to them is horrifically insane to me.

And what valuables should I put in my double bin protection? I took only my car keys and a ten Euro note, just in case I get stranded and have to bribe someone to help me out.

There is, however, the issue of the camera. And here is a cautionary note: you should not go solo in a kayak through rapids and expect to take photos. There you are, scraped and pounded from all sides by boulders, sprayed by water so that there is as much in your boat as outside of it – what does not belong (apart from, arguably, you)? The little Sony digital SLR. Especially outside its double bin protection.

But, I am stubborn. I want pictures. And so what follows is a combination of pulling up to the shore for a minute, paddling upstream to reconsider what just happened, finding quiet spaces, intersperesed with not a small amount of risk taking, whereby, through a series of rapid maneuvers, I quickly unscrew bins, take out camera, snap like crazy, throw it back inside, seal the damn barrels shut and continue, all in the space of 2 seconds. And so, I am able to indulge my stubbornness.



all is calm, views are grand



looking up...oops, heading into the bridge




troubled waters




the plunge


Foolish? Perhaps.

But oh, the rewards!















I had chatted earlier with someone who had done rapids and his advice was to paddle backwards and survey the rapid before you go in. Wonderful advice. True, in the end, I would conclude that the only way to survive is to paddle furiously right into the swirling mass of water and rock and hope for the best. I became quite good at the “paddle furiously into the swirling mass of water and rock” bit.

Indeed, my proudest moment happened when I approached a series of sharp bends between boulders. To the side, three young men were bathing. One was climbing out on a rock and I noticed he was completely naked, deeply tanned buttocks and all. This is France. I had encountered here and there the occasional swimmer, topless even, but men somehow managed to keep their skimpy pants on up to now.

As he sprawled on the rock, letting the sun dry off various parts of his magnificent body, he watched me approach the S curve. I plunged, back paddled, turned again, plunged and came out right side up, with only the usual tub full of water inside. The young man stood up and applauded. Well done, he shouted. I felt alive!

[Of course, ten minutes later, I wedged my kayak between two rocks, sideways and watched in horror as torrents of water came gushing in. The muscle I used to get me out of that mess needs at least a month’s rest.]

So why did I do it? Why risk losing a camera, nay, my life (okay, perhaps not that) on a brilliant Monday afternoon?

For this, the moment where I pull over to a shallow area, get out of the boat and, in shorts, tank top and running shoes, lie down in the water and watch the ripples form around my shoes:



bliss




watching fools rush in




at the end, Roquebrun