Modest changes

Ever creatures of habit, we took a favourite road yesterday past the much-painted (by me, anyway) Château de Durfort, Vignevieille and its vegetable patches, then up to the hills above Bouisse.  The terrain gradually changes from craggy garrigue and vineyards to rolling pasture where sheep, cattle and sometimes donkeys graze.  A pair of donkeys, one black and one white, often graze near the viewpoint above.  No sign of them yesterday: they've probably given up on us, since we always forget to take a bag of carrots with us.

Donjon d'Arques, interpretation of.

Up there, one can sometimes get fine views of the Pyrenees, though yesterday's were rather hazy in the still, silent air.  Down the rich red hillsides to Arques and its Donjon, then on up to Limoux for pizzas.  We decided last time that we'd had too many indigestible meals at the Grand Café in the town square, so swung round 90° widdershins to Le Concept.  They classify their pizzas as les blanches and les rouges, which use crème fraîche and tomato base layers respectively.  Crisp bases, extremely copious toppings.  Doubtful arithmetic, though: the change came back 10€ short, quickly remedied.  Service otherwise brisk and friendly.

Lunch was accompanied by a couple of big parties nearby: one extended Spanish family, and a table of boisterous (and somewhat boozy) bikers, who rumbled off in due course across the pedestrian-only square on their Harley-Ds etc.  The one Kawasaki in the gathering looked decidedly limp-wristed by comparison.  More curious vehicles on a side road off the Carcassonne road.  There appeared to have been some sort of autojumble, but there were a couple of fine old cars on display.  One was a Zedel:  I had to read up later, never having heard of such a thing.  The company was founded in

Neuchâtel by one Ernst Zürcher (the Zed bit) and Hermann Lüthi (the L bit).  They eventually moved manufacturing across the border into France to overcome tariff barriers, and to get access to skilled automotive labour.  The Zedel was parked next to a coachbuilt Daimler, and curiously both were right-hand drive.  Also on show was a pretty ancient motorised bicycle, unearthed, by the rusty look of it, from a dilapidated rural barn.

Home for a rest, then off up to Kate and John's for apéritifs with some of their neighbours.  A cheerful gathering: nine of us with, most of the time, about ten conversations going on.  Jacquie, whom I've met a few times on walks, lives much of the year in Aix-en-Provence as, coincidentally, do the other French guests, he originally from Lorraine, she from Lagrasse.  It turns out that the premises on the Promenade where Jacquie has created an art gallery out of a former garage once serviced gentlemen before it changed its target market to motor vehicles.  Well, well: the things you learn!