barbara pletz blog: July 2011

Thursday I drove to Bize Minervois to visit an Australian woman who has lived there for several years. She has a lovely home which uses the original barn of a village house as its beginning structure. She has a Gite (great place that can sleep 10) which was the original village house. We had a nice visit and her sister joined us for lunch.
Bize is a very charming village. It is on a river that they partially dam in the summer to create a swimming hole. They seem to have a lot going on in the village – I’m going back next weekend for a small concert at a little winery that also sells some really nice art work.

On Saturday the weather finally warmed up. When I got up this morning there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and the sun was more intense. Although it was Saturday, and the beaches are bound to be crowded, I decided today was a day to head to the beach.

Here is "my" car. It is great for driving through country roads through the vineyards and on the narrow village streets.

This is the swimming hole in Bize

. Next time I'll take my suit.

The beach scene.

The tacky-looking tourist shops and restaurants by the beach.

I usually go to Cap d’Agde which is pretty much directly south and about a 20 minute drive without major traffic. Apparently a lot of other people had the same idea – the traffic was awful. I ended up going to a different beach than the one I usually go to as there was a little less traffic when I came to a Y in the road.
The day was beautiful and the beach nice and sandy. It was very crowded with it seemed all French. Didn’t hear any other accents. I rented an umbrella and chaise lounge – splurge but I deserve it. Read my kindle and got warmed up before taking “the plunge.” Yikes!! I guess because the weather has been so cool the water is really cold. It felt more like an Alpine lake than the Mediterranean – not that it’s usually like the Caribbean. I did manage to swim a bit and sort got used to it but couldn’t stay in to long at a time. So I went in several times – just for briefer periods than usual. By afternoon it did seem a little warmer.

After lunch. It was realyy yummy. Note the bucket for shells. They also give you a whole roll of paper towels.

Going to the beach here doesn’t fit the stereotypical picture of summer on the Mediterranean that you see in Travel & Leisure and such. It is much more tacky and crowded. But the swimming is great, the sun is hot, and it is close to my village.
The beach town had lots of tacky stores selling beach junk, bars, and restaurants. I chose one that was a moules (mussels) place and it was great. The deal is you go up to the bar, order what you want, and pay for it. Then you take your ticket over to the serving counter. For 11 Euros you get a big bowl of moules with your choice of sauce, and frites. You can make repeated trips for refills on the moules but I was fully satisfied with the one large bowl.

Angel and Molly - there is a bit of competition between them. Mainly over Molly's dog bed. Angel prefers it to the one I got her.

Jake - he's an old guy.

Most of the week I’ve just been hanging out around my village. It’s been quite restful and easy to get into the pace of life here. Walking three small geriatric dogs is a bit of a chore. It is more like dog dragging than walking but we are managing.
I just wrote the paragraph above and was thinking about the slow pace of life here and how quiet it usually is – then I heard sirens and loud motorcycles. About 100 motorcycles in a procession came by – obviously on some sort of an organized ride. Expect the unexpected!

The view from Abeilhan looking north.

Here come the motorcyles!!

I’m back in France. I’ve traded houses and cars again with Mel & Sharon Goldstein who live in a small village in Languedoc, very near Pezenas, in the south of France.

I flew into Paris on Tuesday. I brought my little dog, Angel, with me as I am staying for 3 months. It was a very long flight for both of us. I guess because I was flying on “miles” United routed me first SFO to LAX, then LAX to Chicago, and then Chicago to Paris. I decided to splurge and take a taxi into Paris rather than the train as I thought the train would take longer and be more of a hassle with my large suitcase, very stuffed backpack, and Angel in her carrier. Wrong! There was terrible traffic and it took well over an hour.

I stayed at a great little hotel “Grand Hotel DeChampaigne” that I discovered last year. For the price, ambience, and LOCATION, it is the best deal I’ve found in all the times I’ve stayed in Paris. It is located on the Right Bank, one block from the Seine, and directly across from St. Germain. It is so central you hardly every need to take the Metro. Easy walking everywhere.
This time, though, I didn’t do too much sightseeing for two reasons: 1) it rained the entire two days, and 2) Angel and I were both really tired from the long flight – thank heavens going home is a non-stop. Mostly I just walked around the “hood” by the hotel which is very nice. I did check Hotel Crillon whose bar was highly recommended by my friend Tony Wernert. It is located on Place Concord and is very, very upscale. As recommended by Tony, the bar was quite lovely and they even give you a hugh serving of nuts and potato chips (which I restrained myself from eating).

Thursday we took the TGV to Montpellier. Angel much prefers the TGV to United Economy class even though she was happy to stay in her carrier most of the time. I rented a car in Montpellier and headed toward Abeilhan. (The car rental was only for a couple of days as the Goldsteins loaned their car to some friends who were going to a wedding out of town.)

Heading south on the TGV

Angel's train ride

Downtown Abeilhan

Neighbor's chickens

and geese

As I was speeding along A9 peage, I thought every had been so easy, but then I saw a sign saying “Bouchon” which means cork but when used on a freeway sign it means traffic jam. It was the worst one I’ve ever encountered. Many emergency vehicles passed on the right including numerous ambulances, police, and rescue vehicles. I saw at least one helicopter lift off. We were stopped over 1.5 hours when someone (police?) cut through the chain link fence on the right side of the freeway to permit small cars to exit. I escaped and just let my trusty TomTom GPS guide me home. When I’d encounter a new traffic jam going though towns (as many other A9 escapees were doing the same thing) I’d just head down a very rural road (like going through a vineyard) and Ms. TomTom gave me new directions.

Mel and Sharon took me to my favorite restaurant “L’Asparagus” for a very nice dinner. They left in the morning and I settled in with Angel and the Goldstein’s two dogs Jake and Molly.
I was planning to head to my favorite beach to go swimming in the beautiful Mediterranean as soon as I got here but the weather is unseasonably cold making the beach seem much less beckoning. So I’ve stayed close to home going into Pezenas for groceries, etc. I love Pezenas. Unfortunately didn’t take my camera so no pictures yet of this beautiful medieval town.
Today is Tuesday. It’s still cool and a few raindrops. Hopefully it will heat up within the next few days and I’ll get some beach time.

Last weekend was the Feria!! My favorite Abeilhan celebration. This is a three-day event and combines carnival (like throw-away money games, mechanical bunking bronco), food and drink, musical entertainment, and bullfights. It is a big deal for the locals – I suspect I may have been the only tourist.

I went Friday night and watched the Toro Piscine which they have all three nights. A red metal bullring is set up attached to a big truck. In the truck are all the bulls that will be used over the three days. For the Toro Piscine the participants appear to be local teenagers and “twenty-somethings” - probably about 12 of them at a time and several bulls (one at a time). Last year there was a plastic swimming pool in the center – not this year. Instead there were several towers of tires which the kids knocked over now and then. Otherwise the event consists of them teasing the bull who chases them and then to escape the kids either jump up the side of the ring or hide behind one of the numerous metal barrier used to give bullfighters protection when needed.

Afterwards I watched the entertainment which was a Flamenco group from Spain – 3 women, a male singer/dancer, and a guitar player. They were quite good and very traditional. The only part I didn’t get was a couple of numbers in which two of the women wore very tight white jeans and matching (also very tight) jackets. It might have been more attractive if they hadn’t both been a little hefty.

On Sunday the main event of the Feria takes place – a REAL bullfight. At least it is a REAL FRENCH bullfight with is different than a Spanish one. I guess there are a few bullfights in France where the bulls do get hurt but not in these Feria type local events. In the ones here, no one hopefully, bull or person, – gets serioiusly hurt. This year a couple bullfighters probably got their pride injured and one bull cut his nose running into the bullring side.

There is a small set of bleachers for the fans and also a band (which included a drum set, a couple of trumpets, a trombone, and a tuba). I was sitting next to them so it was particularly loud. They play some familiar tunes like “Those Were The Days My Friend” and then when the bullfight starts they crank it up with “Torreador” from Carmen. Only one of the bullfights had anything resembling a real bullfighting outfit. The others were dressed in regular clothes – jeans and short sleeved shirts. For at least two of them the shirts didn’t work to sell as the buttons popped open and also the bull’s horns caught on the shirts (not a good thing for the bullfighter). The bull’s horns have some sort of tape on them which I guess offers some protection from being gored.
Each of the bullfighters got his own bull to fight. The bullfight consists of passes only. There is no real sword and there are no piccaderos (sp?) like in Spain and Mexico where the stick the bull with darts. Also the bulls are a lot smaller than the Spanish ones. It is still pretty exciting.

A couple of the bullfighters were very young and looked like they had just graduated from Toro Piscine. One young fellow had a very close call when he fell down near the fence while being chased by his bull. The other bullfighters came to his rescue by distracting the bull with their capes. The fallen bull fighter climbed out of the ring and didn’t return. I think he may be changing his career path.

Sunday night I went to the Feria dinner with Suzette and her daughter Mariel who is visiting from Paris. We had a very nice time although they were the only ones I could talk to as no one else spoke English and my French is so limited to things like “nice to meet you”, “sorry”, “my name is”, “how do you call yourself”. I couldn’t even use one of my other standard phrases “where do live” since they all live here! Most exciting things was I got the two cheek hello kiss from the mayor who must have thought I was a local too.

One funny story: Suzette’s English is pretty good but now and then she gets a word mixed up. When she asked me if I liked what they were serving for dinner she said it was a “donkey leg”. They might have some pretty strange stuff (e.g., they have horse meat in the butcher stores) but I didn’t think she had the correct for the main course. I made her understand what she had said by making a donkey “heehaw, heehaw”. She was very embarrassed. Main course was actually grilled duck breast. Funny thing was that if she had just said “canard” I would have known right away.