Into Italy

Since it is Canadian Thanksgiving today, let me start by saying "Happy Thanksgiving!". I don't know about the weather in Canada right now, but I know that the rain never affected us in France, where, like Camelot, it only rains at night. So, for a Thanksgiving treat, as we're rolling along the autoroute today, approaching Nice, what do we see on the road, but a car hauling gigantic squash - well, in Canada, we might call them pumpkins.

It is always fun to catch that first glimpse of the Mediterranean while driving the A8 to Nice.

After Tony drove for three hours we stopped at a rest centre, coincidentally overlooking Monaco and what to our wondering eyes should appear, but Oceania's Marina parked in the harbour opposite the Monaco Casino.

Then as I continued the drive and we crossd into Italy, the weather went to "hell in a handbasket" as the expression goes and the rain finally descended. Fortunately, with well more than one hundred tunnels, we spent a lot less time in the rain than in the tunnels - many of which were almost two kilometres - as we made our way past Genoa to Santa Margherita Ligure. This location was chosen because it not only got us well into Italy on our first day, but it allowed us to visit the picturesque village of Portofino. With some help from Emily (GPS) - she was once again off by 100 metres - we found the Hotel Tigullio and checked in. This photo was taken later in the day as we returned for the last time to the hotel.

After a brief freshen up, we left the hotel for Portofino, 3.8 km up the coast. This is a straight forward drive because the coastal road only goes to Portofino and ends there. It is, however, one of those harrowing drives with very narrow roads and zero visibility at most corners. We avoided smacking anything and had a nice rain free - almost sun - visit of Portofino.

I now know that if and when I purchase my first runabout, that this will be the boat.

This is yet one more incredibly photogenic village.

The panoramas in this blog, by the way, are courtesy of my iPhone - love it. It didn't take us too long to walk the lengths of Portofino- with almost zero other tourists - and we were back by 6:00 in Santa Margherita Ligure, for cocktails - always sounds so civilized. Next, we set out to further explore SML and find a restaurant for dinner. Even though we all know - thanks to grade 5 Social Studies - that Christopher Columbus sailed from Barcelona, what some might forget, as I did, that his origins were in Genoa - literally right here. So I guess this statue to the dude wasn't a surprise - and I'm pretty sure he was pointing to the Orient - WRONG!

Although SML is larger than Portofino, it still had a wonderful charm with many nice photo ops.

It didn't take us long to settle on a harbour side restaurant for dinner, close to other picturesque buildings.

We had a delightful dinner of pizzas for Jackie and Tony and Spaghetti with Shrimp - big honkin' shrimp - for Dawn & I. Once back at the hotel, everyone crashed pretty early, readying themselves for the next adventure in Cinque Terre.

Last Day In Cairanne

We know now after several days of dire weather forecasts predicting wet, miserable days, that the one thing we can count on is that no one can forecast weather in this region. Gotta love modern science! On a day that was to have no sun, lots of cloud and numerous thunderstorms, so far - and I'm starting this edition at 3:30 in the afternoon, so I be could be wrong down the road - we've had a fairly decent day, despite the fact that the winds are currently gusting at gale force strength (37kph) - well, up on the terrace it feels like gale force - out of the south-east. The French call this breezy. We took a final walkabout in Cairanne during our sunny morning and add these shots to our collection.

Our packing is in good shape and the car will just have to deal with it - pedal faster! I have to take a break now to get the churkey on, but will be back to sum up our stay in Cairanne. OK, I'm back. The "breeze" has continued - hurricane comes to mind. The good news is that there has been no rain, despite serious meteorological promises to the contrary. Maybe this won't be good news as we hit the road tomorrow. Anyway, we had a great Facetime with Canada and our French churkey Thanksgiving dinner was pretty decent, with shallot gravy and bearnaise vegetables.

So .... we're on to stage three of this journey, with a week in Italy. Stay tuned!

Gigondas

After an hour and a half deluge last night, the skies gradually cleared to give us yet one more glorious day in Provence. We hit our last market this morning in Ste. Cecile, while the skies were still clearing up and therefore the crowds didn't exist - a much easier walk that way. I thought these were pretty interesting fall plants.

We then thought we'd go and visit Nick Thompson at Domaine L'Ameillaud, but alas we needed an appointment on Saturday and found no one home. His vines had some fairly impressive colour in them.

Our principle objective for the day was to eat and visit in Gigondas, but before that, we made a stop at Vignerons de Charactere in Vacqueras. The tasting room was crazy busy, so we moved on. Next stop - Gigondas.

Given last night's atmospheric conditions, we were't sure that we'd be eating outside today, but after a short walk in the village we arrived at L'Oustalet for lunch under the plane trees.

The last picture is especially for Carole, as she had the picture of her trip last year seated here in her yellow pants. L'Oustalet has never disappointed us and this was no exception, with courses like this risotto starter

or this main course of guinea fowl

or this dessert of grilled figs with anise toffee snaps.

Jackie drank Gigondas rose while the rest of us had a fabulous 2011 Gigondas Longue Toque.

That last wine led us to the Longue Toque winery to buy a bottle or two, where we encountered Jasper the friendly Dutchman who gave us a wonderful introduction to the house of Gabriel Meffre wines - which, by the way, include Fat Bastard, available at the LCBO. The wine boutique is on a nice piece of property looking up at the Dentelles, with picnic facilities on site.

The car got a little heavier and my wine cellar has been restocked courtesy of this visit.

We spent the remainder of the daylight hours on the terrace enjoying the fine day. Boy, are we lucky! Tomorrow will be slower with the main order of business being packing for our trip into Italy. Argh!

Another drive in the Hills

Last night was pretty loud after an evening of loud jets zooming overhead, only this time it was thunder. It rumbled up the valley and down the valley and right here, but no rain fell. In the end, we were left with no rain and this view off the end terrace.

The weather continued to threaten north of us, but at the end of the day, no rain had fallen. We started off the day at Auchan - again - and I finally got my altered pants, plus a few other goodies. Then we got gas,right ahead of this cute number.

Things are never dull in France. Next, we headed up country to Barroux, for a walkabout we didn't have on the last visit. This chateau, prominent from the 12th to the 16th century, is not open to the public, but did afford many memorable views.

The next picture of Le Barroux is probably one of the best shots I've taken, illustrating the diversity of the countryside here and in particular, the changing colours in the vineyards at this time of year.

The next shot also shows how this terroir morths from vineyards to olive groves.

After driving through Malaucene, staging town for the nasty bike ride to top of Ventoux, we took another quick peek at Crestet, before backtracking up the valley to Suzette.

This road quicky takes you into the heart of the Beaumes de Venise wine country, a cru village most famous for their sweet dessert wine, Muscat de Beaumes de Venise, but also a noted red wine area.

It's always interesting to us how many of these perched villages look so much better from a distance than up close. Of course that distance view is what brings the visitors. This is not unlike Suzette, on the road from Malaucene to Beaumes de Venise, which has a great backdrop of the Dentelles, but ends up as a pretty insignificant stop along the windy road - and once again their restaurant was also closed. To appreciate the Dentelles, one should drive up the private road to the Domaine Coyeaux. This steep climb quickly affords you the best view of the back of the Dentelles you will ever get. It also gives you a nice vista towards Mt. Ventoux, if the peak is visible, which it wasn't in this pic with Jackie and Dawn.

By this point in the journey, no restaurants appeared open and we were hungry, so we zoomed back to Cairanne. After a quick lunch we - sans Tony, who preferred to stay planted on the terrace - went back to Orange for some last shopping in Provence. Tonight we had a dinner of duck, which was preceeded with foie gras, accompanied with a fig sauce (on right) for Tony and I, once again.

The girls have now opted out of this experience. The boys ruled at cards tonight - must be the lack of foie gras - but we know that all that could change tomorrow.

Nyons

Today the planets were aligned and the world was as it should be. The significance of this comment will become clearer later. It was another beautiful, hot Provencal day - October 9! We headed off to our second favourite market in the area, Nyons, after posting my box of goodies to Canada. Despite my efforts, it came in a little overweight, so we'll see if that has an impact later. We discovered, thanks to a discussion with Lilian in Nyons, that it is cheaper to purchase your own box and have it priced at la Poste, than the way we did it with their packing materials - good to know for another time. Live and learn!

The drive out the back road from Cairanne over the switch-back roads and along the edge of the L'Eygues Valley to Nyons is my favourite drive in the area. I like the way the road hugs the hillside and gives you regular vistas of other great wine towns like Visan and Vinsobres. It was apparent that the vendange continues from this shot just outside Cairanne, but there aren't nearly as many tractors on the road anymore.

Within minutes of arriving at the Nyons market, Jackie had made her first purchase, a nice leopard jacket. She's not making her packing challenges any easier.

Once again, we discovered a lighter market, vendor and buyer-wise. I thought it would be interesting to see how many vendors show up in the middle of winter. One vendor we were very pleased to see today was Vivian. Within seconds we snapped up her unique sundried tomatoes. I guarantee you that this product is one of a kind - we've searched high and low for alternatives. It turned that the weather had kept her in bed the last two Tuesdays. It's such a French thing - don't show up when it doesn't suit you. In any case it will be our one and only visit with her this year, so we will savour every delicious moment of her tomatoes, done with just the right seasonings and oil. Sounds like an ad for KFC.

We've been visiting her stall in various villages since 2002. We hope she continues next year.

After returning to Cairanne, we walked down to the Tourne au Verre, now also calling itself the Bistro of Cairanne since it's new management. We were happy to fit in at least one visit and are also happy to announce that the food and service is as good as ever. As we sat on the terrace, Dawn and I had our second beef while in France and it was actually very tender and juicy. I guess the Revolution in France continues, because now it appears we can count on their beef, avoided at all costs on previous trips.

To take it easy on our new arrivals, we had a slow remainder of the day and with the heat we didn't feel like doing much anyway. Fortunately, the breeze continues. Tonight we had to retreat to the courtyard to escape the heat for cards and aperitifs. We were very nice to the guests this evening as both Tony and Jackie won games. While we were playing cards, the "Boys" from Orange Air Force Base - might be girls - in their Mirage jets zoomed us on a regular basis. Sorry Claude.

While all the zooming was going on, the sun was setting in a unique manner. I'm not sure that this picture totally captures the effect.

Jackie & Tony Arrive

The warm wind continues and today was actually beyond warm - we thought it was summer again. On our way to the airport, we stopped at Auchan to pick up a pair of pants that I was having shortened. The lady never showed, so we continued to Marseilles. While waiting for Tony and Jackie to arrive I started played with a new photo app that I had downloaded before leaving home. It was called Snapseed by Google and I remade the following pics taken earlier on the trip. Interesting!

This app could be my new best friend. Anyway, Tony and Jackie arrived from Amsterdam on time and we quickly headed back north. I thought a quick stop at Auchan would solve my problem with the pants but alas, no one was home. Gotta love France! Back at Cairanne we had some lunch and then gave the newbies some down time. Actually, I appreciated it as well. By dinner I was prepping the foie gras I had purchased for tomorrow while making Rahmgeschntzeltes mit rosti for dinner tonight and Dawn had stuffed zucchini flowers for an appetizer.

We spent some time on the sunny terrace before retiring to the dining room for dinner, mindful of trying to get Tony and Jackie on the French clock. It was of course an early evening.

Another walk through Vaison la Romaine

The wind began to blow this morning after yet another Monday night of rain. Fortunately it was a sirocco verses a Mistral and the wind was warm, coming off the Sahara. Although the day was a little dull, the rain did not return and the delightful breeze continued. Once again we were at Tuesday, which meant a trip in to the market at Vaison la Romaine. It was a pretty easy walk as either the time of year diminished the number of merchants and patrons, or the potential of bad weather did.

We are becoming pretty good shoppers at these markets. We walk the entire length of the market casing product quality and price and then go back to what we like the best. We found one stall where a lady was selling very nice breasts, er, I mean figs. Actually her breasts were selling the figs, as they were really hangin' out there on display. Having tasted the figs I would have to say that her breasts are delicious. Did I say breasts? What we didn't like so much was that the space normally occupied by Vivian, our olive and sun dried tomato lady, was empty. Je suis triste!

It's always interesting to note what the French Anglicize and what they feel obliged to change. Here's one product everyone will recognize despite the name.

The rest of the day was spent prepping for tomorrow and I packed the one box to be mailed home. Tomorrow it's back to Marseilles.