When the Kentish Spring Distinguishes Itself

Cistus purpureus, rose Abraham Derby

A few fine days work wonders for the Weltanschauung, or would, were it not for the awfulness of the news.  I worked through the despair yesterday morning weeding out in the garden: nothing like a bit of labour to keep the mind from brooding, though it can hardly amount to a fitting tribute to the dead, maimed and bereaved.  So, herewith a small floral tribute.

It's always a joy to see the iris sibirica coming back into flower.  Ours are descendants of plants that my mother grew in Scotland and then in Maidstone, and, though their flowering season is sadly brief, they are a joy, both to the eye and to the principles.  One of the satisfactions of gardening is that scope it gives for sharing: it's so satisfying to pass on to friends splits and cuttings of the flowering plants that give one pleasure.  Which reminds me: must marshal a few bits to give to Miss tomorrow.  A few years ago, she gave me a sedum that gives us architecture and colour just outside the French widow [sic: ack. Hoffnung] off the dining room, and a darker iris sibirica that gives (I hope) pleasure to people as they walk by the front garden.

We seem to have 100% germination from the climbing yellow courgettes, so I'll need to get some wires up the fence to train them to, assuming that we can bring them on successfully and harden them off.  I've sown some dwarf French beans, and I think they too are germinating.  The onion sets are planted and the leeks are sown.  We're expecting a lot from our tiny veggie bed, but what the hell?  Nothing ventured.

I thought I'd booked the car in for some attention before we left Another Place, having failed to open the bonnet to refill the windscreen washer, and because of the failure of the choreographic tailgate opening procedure.  Taking the dealer at its word, one presented self and vehicle on the appointed date and time.  'Oh, my manager emailed you to say we couldn't do it today.'  Well if s/he did, s/he may have mis-transcribed my not entirely user-friendly email address.  Rather than inflict another round trip on Martyn, I booked a loan car this time, and took the car in early yesterday.

I had a call mid-morning to say that the reason I couldn't open the bonnet was that the passenger door has to be opened first.  (Not an option when one is parked against the wall in Another Place.)  Would you have thought of that?  Sensible, I suppose, since it prevents a passenger from opening the bonnet on the move.  As if...  Oh well, we live and learn (thank goodness!).   Come 17:15, I rang to enquire as to progress, to learn that the spare part needed would arrive this morning, so I got to hang on to the roller-skate loan car a little longer.  A SEAT Mii, it's a nippy, agile little car.  It is to all intents and purposes the same as the VW Up!* and the Skoda Citigo - which leads me to describe them as the Volkskodeat Upmigo...  Lively little car, though it did come with one of those funny things on the floor that you have to waggle back and forth now and then.  But it was good to get back into my own car, and to be wafted home in a degree of luxury and indolence.  And it had been reasonably well washed into the bargain.  And a modest movement of the foot under the back bumper now raises the tailgate, which comes in handy when both hands are full of Fortnums' best - or an art class bag in one hand, a computer bag in the other, and a canvas or two under the arm.

*the Up! branding may resonate badly with Scots of my age, that being the înstruction given prior to getting the hands  thrashed with the dreaded Lochgelly tawse.

Greenery and greenness

Daffodils in the Ardèche plateau

The beauty of the northern end of the Ardèche département is not to be understated.  I read subsequently that it has harsher winters than parts of the Alps at altitudes 500m higher.  Which may account for fields of daffodils in full bloom in mid-May.  All rather idyllic.  We stood for quite a while listening to cuckoos calling and just enjoying the clean air and huge panoramas.  The sort of view, really, that the camera can't hope to capture.  But that wouldn't stop me, would it?

Tea break in the summerhouse

Back here, we had a fine day on Sunday, so the grass got its first cut since our travels, and we we were grateful for the shade of the summerhouse when we paused for tea.  We gardened again yesterday.  Martyn edged the front grass and took armfuls of weeds out of the border.  I have tidied up the box bushes at the foot of the drive, and hauled out a hebe that had reached the ugly, leggy stage.

Two mobile phones have failed on me this year.  My late medieval Nokia lost its voice (though a mobile phone that no longer rings is no great handicap to me given my minimal usage pattern.    I shall hang on to it for outgoing calls using the unexpired credit on the old SIM card.)  I never quite got the hang of the subsequent Samsung, and did not grieve when it croaked.  The new iPhone (not the latest model, so free of up-front charge) is so simple to use that I have made a few faltering steps already, eg setting it up as a kind of personal wifi hotspot, which will come in handy on our travels.  I suppose that, with the passing years, I learn new things less easily, and am grateful for easy transitions: the phone works in much the same way as my tablet (which, of course, is also a recent replacement for my first one).  Next job: try to learn how to work the car radio and attendant widgets.

Back

Well, thank goodness the French electorate has better sense than its British and American counterparts. Not that we're out of the woods yet: Macron has yet to build a government from scratch, and that may involve some rather unholy alliances.  It'll be interesting to see how he does in parliamentary elections five weeks hence.  What's more, a number of commentators think Le Pen has been using this presidential as a dress rehearsal for 2022, and her vote this time was alarmingly large.  Interesting that Béziers, with its utterly toxic FN mayor, voted narrowly for Macron.  Lagrasse voted more decisively for Macron, but it wasn't a wipeout.

We left a couple of days later, taking three days for the return journey, staying overnight in the outskirts of Le Puy en Velay and Troyes.  The first day's drive was a delight once we had the ghastly A9 behind us.  We drove up the gorge of the Ardèche, where the road has been greatly improved since I last used it 35 years ago.  Viewing platforms have been built at the many belvederes, and we stopped at most of them to enjoy the spectacular views.  Martyn found us a route from the gorge to Le Puy that took in the fascinating Mont Gerbier de Jonc, one of the many volcanic plugs in the region, and the one on which the Loire rises.  Our route took us pretty much the length of the Ardèche and into the beginnings of the Auvergne, and for practically all the way, the scenery is superb, and highly recommended.

We saw rather more of the suburbs of Le Puy than we needed to.  I had not swotted up the location of the hotel on Google Earth as I usually do, and Dotty II, the built-in GPS kit, wasn't entirely helpful.  Still, we got there eventually, and the room, though tiny, was clean and quiet enough, and the free wifie was good and fast.  It helped that we were on the top floor, where the ceilings climb away into the pitch of the roof: the lower floor rooms must be pretty claustrophobic.  The restaurant attached to the hotel was perhaps just worse that the average C4mp4nil3, and the latter is already pretty dismal.  My pizza (for the place puffs itself as a pizzeria) was an object lesson in soggy bottoms, with too much cheese, some dismal smoked trout, puy lentils in single figures and a handful of wet lettuce plonked down on top.  Martyn's escalope milanese was more breadcrumb than anything else, and the pasta showed all the signs of having been reheated.

The following day's drive was also enjoyable, if less spectacular on the whole.  The views on the way out of Le Puy are impressive of course, and the Auvergne and Burgundy countryside are very pleasant.  We only had to use a short stretch of the A6, which was a lot quieter than I've seen it, and then struck off through Chablis country towards our next overnight stop on the edge of Troyes.  Before booking into the hotel we took a motor round the historic city centre which, having escaped the worst of the last two wars, still boast hundreds of timbered houses.  We couldn't find out how to pay for parking, so are saving a visit to the rather grand cathedral for next time.

The hotel was rather better this time - and I had studied how to find it without relying on Dotty.  The room was rather bigger, and even ran to two chairs.  The place has clearly been stripped down and redecorated in recent times.  (I thought it was a new build until I saw the plumbing under the basin.)  The wifi was adequate.  We had supper in an adjacent La Criée restaurant, which was good but a shade pricey for what we got.  I blame the subsequent indigestion on our having opted for pudding - we should have known better having had biggish sandwiches for lunch in the outskirts of Roanne. (Advice to tourists: from what we saw of Roanne, with the exception of the riverside, don't hurry.)

Breakfast at the hotel was not great: the bread on offer was pretty dismal, and though the tea was fine, this was only because we'd taken our own.  After two longish days on the road, we opted for the quick route, so were at the end of the tunnel inside four hours, and over four hours before our scheduled departure time.  The choice we were offered was an immediate departure for an eye-watering supplement or a departure three hours later, for which, unsurprisingly, we plumped.  We drove to the signposted sortie and up to the barrier, which opened when we pressed the button.  We later discovered that we should have waited for someone to come out and get us to sign some form or other: we'd the devil of a job to persuade Françoise at the check-in desk to let us through, which she only did when a wee mannie arrived from the office with forms to be signed in duplicate. 

I occasionally have to remind myself, during the crossing in the shuttle train, that the experience is actually preferable to root canal extirpation, however marginally.  This time we were waved along to the single deck section of the train which is at least a bit less claustrophobic than the double deck part.  The ventilation is no better, however, so it was a pretty stuffy experience all the same.

Much as we enjoy our visits to France, it's always good to be home again.  True, the grass needs a cut and the weeds haven't taken a holiday. But quite a few subjects have come into flower while we've been away, and thanks to Celia's visits, the spuds are thriving and the containers are doing well.  A nocturnal visitor has, however, taken a fancy to the roots of the herbs in one of the sinks, so I've had to shove in a few stakes to deter it.  Seems to have worked.  If the blossom on the apple tree is anything to go by, we should have a better crop than last year, when we got precisely two Bramleys.  The Judas tree put out some timid flowers for the first time this year, but is still some way from rivalling the fine examples we met on our travels.  First colour is showing on one or two roses and an oriental poppy, and Martyn's plantings in the rockery are coming on beautifully.  Bedding plants are being a bit slow, but I think we shall have modest numbers of rudbeckia and gazania plants.  Martyn had to lift an epimedium (a 60th birthday present from Jane) during the work on the rockery, and it has split successfully into five nice little plants, one of which is already planted out.  Next job is to find spaces for all the stuff in the cold frames!

On the tenters

We're just hoping that dreadful woman won't make it the hat trick.  The pollsters seem to think not, and of course the French electorate has a long and noble tradition of putting a shot across the bows of  the establishment in the first round.  Well, to strain the analogy, this time they've gone rather further and holed the traditional parties of government below the waterline: straining it further still, said shot may prove to have been in the foot.  We'll have a good idea of the probable result soon after 8:00 pm.

Home from home, but not, we hope, for much longer

The village was looking pretty this morning from the route des poubelles: we had motored up to take a look at some of the wild flowers that are so impressive this year.   It was clear enough to allow us a glimpse of snowy Pyrenees, but they never show up well in photographs.  We have seen more poppies elsewhere: the amazing bank of them that I painted a few years ago has but a few blooms this year.  But the orchids are just lovely,   Even the dandelions are pretty impressive - I think the pale yellow one below is responsible for the tennis ball sized seedheads we keep seeing by the roadside.  Someone must have plonked down some hives up there: the bees were much in evidence. 

 

 

Our painter friend Josef has a magnificent yellow climbing rose in flower round the door of his studio, and Peter and Christoff's house is similarly decorated, but in crimson.  We even have a flower on the neglected little rose to the right of the front door here.  This helps to make up for the lack of imagination when it comes to the Toon Cooncil's approach to planting, which amounts to some sparse clumps of summer bedding.  In stark contrast, the village immediately to the north-east has really gone to town with plantings of flowering perennials: un des plus beaux villages de France has a lot to learn from its neighbours. 

All this botanising makes us quite eager to get back to our garden,, where we hope to find roses in flower when we return on Thursday - which might just help to take our minds off politics.

A new good address

We'd arranged on Wednesday for a survey of the house for evidence of lead, asbestos, termites and dodgy electrics, so decided to push off out and let him get on with it.  (His report crashed in electronically  this morning - 60 pages of it - and although there are no signs of termites or asbestos, one window frame has lead paint, and the electrics are a bit sub-standard, as we knew.

Well, what do do when surveyor-dodging?  We went up to Azille, where a neighbour is exhibiting in a little gallery-cum-café, and established from its web site that it would be open at 10:00.  We got there about 12;10 to find it hermetically sealed.  So, that's one exhibition we'll miss.  Lunch and culture plans thus scuppered, we had lunch nearby at the Guinguette in Argens.  The Guinguette is welcoming and informal, and we like it, but could have done with a bit of sun - we were each buttoned to chin as we worked our way through a house burger (me) and a plate of grilled cured belly pork (him).  The kitchen proper has a regular front-desk bell to summon the waitress; the grill station has a squeezy toy pig, a couple of oinks from which achieves the same.  Good fun, but within an hour or so I was thinking that the proximity of a lavatory might not be wholly inappropriate.  Soggy chips and rather much salad to blame, I guess - or perhaps the pink mayonnaise on the burger bun.

From there we ambled along to Carcassonne, visiting the beaux arts museum for the first time.  It's not bad as provincial museums go, but full of rather dingy landscapes and portraits, and very few household names - I spotted one each of Courbet, Corot and Daubigny, and didn't much care for any of them.  Friendly staff, though, and an interesting building, and the paintings and so on are quite well displayed.  Back in the centre in search of a café, we happened on neighbours Anne and David who were just finishing their lunch, so sat and had a soft drink with them for half an hour or so, heckled by some arse on a public address system, and an odd miniature bus that bumbled round the square advertising a disco...

Next day, we'd arranged to meet Martin and Patricia for lunch in Gruissan for a change, so the next job was to find a restaurant.  I asked a few friends for recommendations, and got several.  Martyn, meanwhile, found a well-reviewed place on the waterfront in a quiet corner of the port.  Quai 17, it's called, and the booking process, reception and service were exemplary.  The menu is limited but good, though the arrival of all three courses on one tray at the same time gave it something of a hospital-like feel!  The lids on main courses kept everything hot, though, so no harm done.  M and P were on good form, though by relying on electronic yellow pages, finished up in a suburban lotissement rather than on the quai.  We'd researched on Google Earth etc, and found it without difficulty (said he, smugly).  One odd extra diversion was a small group of hearty, if pallid, young fellows stripping down to their knickers and clambering into wetsuits at the diving school next door.  (One's trunks advertised luridly coloured Haribo sweets.  I shall not stretch the analogy.)

We don't think we've seen such a display of spring wild flowers hereabouts before.  Carpets of aphyllante, banks of poppies, more broom than is helpful to those of the hay fever persuasion and occasional clumps of asphodel that remind me of Guy Fawkes night sparklers.  We'd thought of going out and botanising this morning, but the sun remaining very shy, we've stayed in and cooked instead.  Leftovers casserole for lunch (the last half of the remaining pork fillet, done with sundry veg).  Siesta, this pm, I rather suspect.

Creatures of habit? Us??

We took a ride up into the hills this morning to enjoy the wonderful views of the Pyrenees from the road between Bouisse and Arques.  Though there's a lot of cloud around today, the views of snowy summits were superb, and the spring flora en route were charming.  Lots of aphyllante again, and cowslips, dianthus, cistus and so much more - even a few pyramid orchids.  The beech foliage is quite beautiful at this season.  I think it may have been the ubiquitous broom that got my nose running and my eyes watering, however.

As for the fauna, a pair of partridges scuttled across the road in front of us at one point, and our old friends the black and white donkeys were grazing by the roadside up near the panorama.  Yet again we'd forgotten to take a bag of carrots with us, but then, we hadn't seen them for a couple of years.  They, like we, are looking a bit older than when I took this picture five years ago.  We paused again to watch and listen to the lambs where we saw them last year, not pausing too long to wonder whether last year's are now eaten or hogget....

The hard frosts have done quite a bit of damage to the vines.  Up at Laroque de Fa, whole vineyards are without foliage (serves them right for voting for Le Pen in the first round!), and along the road here at Borde Rouge there seems to be a lot of frost damage too.  Our friends at Camplong seem to have been spared.  I suppose the low-lying vineyards in the river valley are frost pockets.

We're somewhat on the tenters as we await Sunday's second round in the presidential elections.  Just hoping that the French electorate has more sense than the kamikaze Brexit and Trump tendencies.