backtrack 22

You needn't be fearful: I am not intending to drone on more than I should in my description of getting the miles between Vaucluse and The Blighted Isle clocked up. No three post spectacular this time, even though we enjoyed the transit north, it went well; in no small measure thanks to my care in planning our route back, but more so by Mme Melling's intelligent and creative disregard for said route when and where necessary, or when deemed desirable. 

Just in case you were not lucky enough to see the plan for coming back prior to its realisation, you'd better take a shufty at it now. You'll soon get the skeleton of an idea of what was entertained  by getting down your Michelin Atlas of France (A4 wiro bound naturally) – you will wonder at the originality of our use of the French road network to provide us with a relatively low-traffic-frequency-but-nevertheless-scenic progress to the coast in the north, the ferry and safe return to Bullsmead Court.

Notwithstanding the modest distance proposed for our departure day we made our characteristic early start, saving our breakfast appointment for St Victor. Alas! The coffee was like gripe water, and the croissants somewhat stodgy. I suppose we couldn't expect a third time lucky petit déj. Unimaginatively we had decided to simply retrace our steps from the southward journey in June, at least as far as Millau. We enjoyed it y'see. This time the side road to Vissec was just too tempting and we took it.

Ah! Vissec. Buried deep in the hills almost in the riverbed of the Vis, dry in the summer. Has its own cirque right next to the famous Cirque de Navacelles. Michelin p302. It had not changed a jot. That's the meadow in the village at the top of this post, in case you were wondering; it flowers up a treat in spring.

Almost primitive, we rented a run down but delightfully creaky maison (see left) and simply soaked up the nightingales, the lime blossom, the walks and the rushing waters where the river re-emerged. En famille. 2010. But only a week. Son-and-heir agrees that was one of the best rentals in our extensive rental history… I'm welling up… the village filled us with delight once again, quite delectable, I'm taking five to have a quick look at the album that covered that jolly…

(later……) Get me to show you m'snaps of Vissec and around. Limestone and water perfection. Flowers, cherries, butterflies, sheep in huge passing flocks, light, thundering waterfalls etc. But this is neither the time or the place. Oh my oh my. The Cévennes… what are they like!

We lunched at Nant. It was not a satisfactory experience. True, there was no rain but neither was there a plat du jour. We resignedly ate rubbery omlettes with overcooked chips – there was little else on offer it being Monday. And there were tourists. I mean, folk on holiday. With children! I assume most of them fast on Mondays. We did not linger. Arrival at Millau was far too early – we sat by the pool a while, it was hot still but cooler than Vaucluse at least. I feared the clammer of families after lights out in the hotel – so spacious and empty on our way down. We ate in town. Good. We returned to our accommodation and all except reception was quiet, although full to capacity. No complaints on that score. End of day one. Just 160 miles achieved. Tick! Got to pull our finger out now…

Three hundred and forty-five miles on our second day in transit. A bit more than is our Mode Juste. Atypically, we utilised the A75 autoroute (we've done it once before, check it out on the route attached herewith if your device and eyesight are up to it) and we did it under and through the first real cloud cover we'd seen in weeks. Breakfast as far north as St Eloy-les-Mines where we shivered! And then on and on through rather charming and often quite empty farmlands, until Amboise was achieved, and we had the chance to return to a favourite cave at Francueil to secure half a dozen bottles of Côt and tut-tut at the typographical dog's breakfast thereat, backtrack to Blérè to admire the Cher, a favourite and well frequented river in the past, with Montgolfier overall,  and to take our supper repast. Thus endeth the second day. Tick!!

Day three was Amboise to Yffiniac. Are you still with me? Nothing better to do? Oh well, read on if you have the stamina, but it gets no better I'm afraid. Two-hundred-and-forty-two-miles to the coast. Lovely weather, Good breakfast at Neuille-Pont-Pierre, stonking good baguettes at a lakeside picnic spot (no others in attendance, I do so hate to eat my sandwich in public). A good drive (my route once more proving top class) and affording us time upon arrival to perambulate coastwise and secure the only unbooked table in a really top flight creperie. Tick again! 

Where is this Yffiniac you may be asking. Well it is adjacent to St Brieuc, on the Brittany north coast… p78 Michelin. Oh and the legendary Bernard Hinault, the last Frenchman to win the Tour-de-France, in 1987 I think – he was born here. He won Le Tour five times in fact. Nicknamed the Badger. The hotel was notable for not sporting air-con. But a distant view of the sea over roof tops assuaged us. Quiet too, our side of the block.

Well that's about it. The last few miles to Roscoff were taken at an easy pace, but with a diversion to Cairn de Barnenez where we did an hour or so walking round the headland opposite the Île Noire. Glorious windless cloudless and rather warm. It made us peckish…

So then a dash to the Surcouf restaurant in Roscoff for what we hoped would be yet another lovely fish lunch, but horrors! We got the table, and we got our first courses. But after that? Non! Problems in the cuisine I fear, much apologising (but no gratis glass of vino I noticed). We had to leave and catch the boat. No matter: I was happy with my dozen oysters and Mme Melling her pot of shrimps. 

Instead, we ate a bit more on the Armorique which glided across the millpond sea and allowed us to sleep off our fishy starters on the top deck in the sun or in the calm of our day cabin. Oh yes. And this pleasant return ended well too, with a delay of only twenty minutes before we got going, out of the muddle of Plymouth, driving on the left (mostly) and getting back to HQ before total black out. Success!

I am not a fan

If you preheat your oven at all – you know – when you are going to put some concoction in there to cook (even though your oven provider may say, if using the fan option, that you can bung your casserole straight in, cold…) well, if you do preheat your oven, you will most likely have experienced that blast of hot air in the face you get as you go to slip in the quiche, loaf tin or roasting tray . . . open the door…

Stifling: takes your breath away for an instant. If you wear specs as I do, the blast of heat can also steam one's lenses up instanta, rendering one unable to see anything in the oven anyway, should you be checking the progress of your cooking, rather than initially front loading your Bosch, Nef, AEG, De-Longhi or Aga even… exacerbated here at the home base by a busted interior oven light, but I am getting off the point. 

My point is: this blast of hot air in the face is the closest approximation I can drum up to illustrate just what it felt like in the last three weeks of our sojourn in Sablet 22 (Summer) if venturing outside of an afternoon, beyond the dark interiors of 1Rue FB, where we endeavoured to follow the advice to try and keep the house interior cool by closing shutters, windows, curtains against the oven like exteriors in full sun. The hair-dryer-blast of heat was not just in the face either, but overall. One felt that to linger in the heat out there was tempting the rendition of one's skin to something akin to pork crackling! Probably not unlike experiences you have had, dear reader, but I have to tell it as it was, and try to skirt round any tendency to exaggerate…

Even the locals opined it was rather warm and were dodging exterior work from about noon onwards, starting instead almost at the break of day.

As I say, we took the advice re shutters etc, but I cannot say the strategy was much of a success: the house, oven-like,  just got hotter and hotter day by day until the only place we could get relief from this, the hottest of summers the region has seen since records began, was in the air conditioned comfort of the motor. 

We had fans on day and night. We crawled into cold showers. And we watched the Tour-de-France, thank God, the best race since Bernard Hinault won in 1987. 

But does one come 800 miles south to sit in a darkened room in front of a TV set watching a bike race, FGS? Well, we did… it won't be happening again and that's a fact. Good race though, this one. Top flight. 

The real heat only got going after my senior bro left us to return to Blightey and we (returning from depositing the relative at Avignon TGV) had purchased a new TV as our Tesco cheap-job had finally decided enough was enough. So now it's our third TV in Sablet, the first was so small you could cover its screen with a snuff-hanky. The new acquisition allows one to read subtitles at least and has excellent picture quality. It doesn't eat dvds like the Tesco number (it doesn't have the facility). The new screen certainly made watching the Tour a considerably better experience out in France than heretofore.

We did get out to some extent; this post is really mostly an aide memoire to your author, of what some of those rather limited excursions were. We went out for breakfasts, early morning forays to markets, short walks and mercy dashes to boulangeries, Intermarché and the shadier café exteriors. We did eat out too where shade and tolerable heat levels could be reasonably expected, so we were not in actual fact in complete heat lock-down. But the last rain we saw in Fr was a short sharp downpour in Vacqueyras for brother Terry's benefit, just after lunch there, on 7 July. Rain. We sought it in vain after that. How we longed for it to fall. It didn't, not even on our return to Bullsmead Barracks, and then more weeks of hardly a drip of the eau de vie.

So: in no sort of order, here are a few highlights on Summer 22. In picture form. They are likely to be the last pictures I ever take in the S of F in the summer time. We just can't take the heat. 

Here are landscapes of the eastern end of Ventoux, the Caderousse barrage, Le Géant from Orange hilltop and a foray towards Les Dentelles above Durban, where we discovered we were where we didn't ought to have been as the tracks and footpaths up there had been closed as a fire precaution . . . we did not transgress again. Then there is a panorama from Richerenches interior square…

This was not quite all, and we ate at Roaix three times, under the white mulberry trees, of course we did, but bolted back home thereafter après, to get out of the heat . . .

I shall now turn my attention to trying to convey the nature of our return to The Blighted Isle in my final post on the subject of the Sablet Sizzler, but don't look for it too promptly as I have to be in the mood and right now I am not in that mood, so there you go…

(it is now available under the title backtrack 22—ed)

summer heat muse

The 2022 second visit to the S of F was as if to an kiln. That's how it felt, heatwise, for the last three weeks at least – so I take as my inspiration for this revue the Wall of Pots featured at Poterie-de-Crestet, an emporium that has supplied us with crockery, pots and pitchers, both functional and decorative.  

BBC Radio 4 regulars may recall a comedy series entitled Fags, Bags and Mags that ran some years back (it reappears from time to time as a repeat). The series centred on a suburban open-all-hours corner shop owned by a bloke called Ramesh. He and his business partner prided themselves on stocking the widest range of chocolate bars, crisps and snacks and proudly constructed their shopping feature Wall of Crisps (this should be pronounced with a strong Indian accent, replicating Ramesh's verbal references to the shop's principle feature). The expression has subsequently entered our family tradition (you know the sort of stuff families get into, language wise) and which we may vary and apply to almost any arrangement/display of products on a wall that we encounter – the one that sticks is Crestet's Wall of Pots. Riveting stuff. That is what we call the Crestet place now: Wall of Pots. Here is a picture of said wall:

Even in this year's extreme heat, we found ourselves going in there in our never -ending quest for black domestic crockery. In vain, as usual (we are after something in particular, I won't detain you with what that was) but they do have a lot of other ceramics you know. What is pictured above is very much the no-go area. Some concrete in there aussi. Not nice. Nevertheless, once again we came away with another irrelevant but splendid unglazed addition to our very own Wall of Pots, another irrigation pot (you bury them in the ground or in your planter leaving the top accessible, fill it with water, which then gradually seeps through the porous terracotta to keep the soil and your plants' roots nice and moist over periods of time – you replenish the water as and when, obvs). We bought the item purely for its aesthetic appearance – and something to hold the terrace door open, if truth be known. 

We haven't bought anything off the Crestet Wall of Pots mind, not our taste at all. But the stocks of other stuff in front of said wall-and-no-go area always commands our attention to see what's new. You can buy anything that is made of clay and been through a kiln at Crestet. From complete outdoor kitchen sets through to bad taste frogs, rabbits, buddhas and kitsch windmills; most of it (hem-hem) rather vulgar, but quite a lot that we do like, the utilitarian stuff in particular with its own natural aesthetic. A lot of it is Spanish in origin Mme Melling informs me. Rustic fare.

Fact: if Poterie-de-Crestet was down the road in Devon we'd have bought loads of the terracota sort of stuff for the garden by now. Some humdingers here: some are even frost proof! But we would want the big stuff: couldn't carry such items all the way back to Blightey. And no doubt we'd get charged import duty anyway (Brexit dividend). Sod it. 

Visitors to 1rueFB will have noted with concern the number of pitchers, pots, planters and jugs there are littered about the place. No garden you see. Not exactly a Wall of Pots, rather Pots on Wall – but we are fond of them. They give the place style and as you know we are rather stylish people…

Apologies for boring you about bloody pots FGS…… but this is my post and I'll do what I like. The new pot is the one on the right here, the one with a lid but sans handles. The pitcher dates back to our first days at 1rueFB. Got three of those. Or is it four? The five pots below date from when we fondly thought we could sustain lots of plants on our terrace… lavender, rosemary, that sort of stuff… fools that we were. A couple of the lavenders saved from desiccation now thrive at Bullsmead Towers, as if you had the slightest interest in such information. See snap below…

 

revue: last of the great rains?

       

We arrived a bit early in Millau, coming over the hills after overnighting in Périgueux and accompanied by some inclemency: I remember being confined to the motor for our sandwich stop (chicken-salad-mayo), vivid lightning illuminating Rodez prior to that, plus accompanying precipitation of commensurate weight and wetness thereabouts, we almost had to pull over. So then, on arrival we went straightway and fuelled up the wheels and, for the second time this year, took our summer passenger to inspect the Viaduc de Millau, from underneath. It's quite high y'see; still the tallest bridge in the world at the time of writing, I am given to believe. I expect the Chinese are working on changing that. 

The sky was darkening to a gun-metal grey as we drove up and under the bridge and a brisk wind was beginning to bluster as T and I alighted to admire the boiling sky overall: air prickly with electricity, whilst a continuous drum-roll of thunder overhead added to the general ambience. A wall of rain arrived at pace – we fled back into the horseless carriage to dodge the fiercest and heaviest downpour I've experienced in France (and we've had a few). The viaduc de Millau almost disappeared. The motor was rocking! Impressive hail too: Mme Melling was fearful that we might be sustaining dent damage to roof/bonnet, the windscreen could be at risk… luckily these fears proved to be groundless but clearly the viaduct was not a structuree  affording any shelter whatsoever. We wondered what it was like crossing the bridge on the A75 through all that, up there, several dozen metres above us. 

Anyway, we enjoyed the experience (I think); when the perturbation had mostly passed we went on to visit the base of the highest viaduct tower which now shone like polished steel (but is concrete) while the river revealed so much H2O had just been dumped on the area that it washed out a sewage treatment works up-stream, hence the uncharacteristic tint of the mighty Tarn waters. Plus a bit of a whiff – luckily (thankfully) not extending to the town of Millau itself.

We eventually located our recently upgraded out-of-town hotel (after quite a lot of confusion, dissension, and even one or more unkind words) which proved to be, we thought, rather good (previously we've stayed in Millau centre but that hotel proved to be unavailable this time). 

Apart from another downpour while we ate evening-pizza in town, that was it. Until the next day, that is…

Our progress through the Cevennes, on roads we haven't graced since the last century (mostly the D999 and MM reminds me we were on some of these roads when we holidayed in Vissec back in 2010) was punctuated by a moderately aggressive thunderstorm; we had to don waterproofs to get to where we took our breakfast, in the shelter of the ancient market colonnade in Nant. It was raining and thundering last time we were here, way back, when the son-and-heir was but knee-high-to-a-grasshopper…… we were camping! Honest! 

Once satiated by the consumption of good croissants and coffee, we returned to the business of driving on, gaining more and more sunshine as we twisted through the hills – but always ahead of us was that pewter coloured storm complex, moving east. We never caught it up again but witnessed roads fringed with hail drifts, roads deep in stripped off leaves and huddles/collections of anxious growers reviewing the damage to the vine crop and (Mme Melling opined) working out what their compensation chances would be from the Fr. Govt. 

We got a good sit-down lunch at St Victor (see snap below) and noted the restaurant's Routard 2022 approval addition since last we patronised the place. . .  that's brother T in the blue shirt in the picture below, by the way. St Victor features elsewhere in this blog of course… but then you'll know that won't you?

Sorry, no pictures of the hail drifts, leaf strip etc etc, I didn't think you'd be interested really… you aren't are you?  Well, if you are, below is the route we took from Millau to Sablet . . . You'll need your Michelin Road Atlas to make sense of it of course, but you'll have that to hand no doubt…… Note that our breakfast at Nant doesn't feature: that was one of Mme Melling's diversionary delights where she takes us off piste. Usually with most positive outcomes, I have to say…

revue: (formerly cider to sablet)

The temporary post that graced this spot (formerly entitled cider to sablet) has now ceased to exist so if you did not suck it up while it was the hot gossip of the airways dear reader, you missed it. It's no good moaning about it, I gave fair warning. 

As predicted in that posting, Mrs Melling and Mr Smith did proceed (to France, yeah even unto Sablet-in-the-Vaucluse) not withstanding the madness of going when the whole of Europe was expecting to get toasted both sides (it did). It was (as I suggested) at a time when many a road user was ruefully reflecting that if they could afford to fill their fuel tank at all (be it petrol distillate or gasole), they could well have achieved a doubling of the value of their vehicle on the road, given that its fuel indicator was showing F.

I did reproduce our anticipated way forward to Sablet. And our way back for that matter, although we changed that completely and returned another way entirely. I won't detain you with the detail… but we came home on schedule and my senior sibling did risk all to travel out with us, and he returned by poor man's TGV at the beginning of July. Successfully and without mishap.

The title of the former short-lived post? That was an allusion to the export of five (5) litres of Sam's Dry Cider to Sablet in a ubiquitous Bag-in-Box, (they call 'em bladders down at Sam's in Winkleigh). It got drunk. Very refreshing too:  holding its own against the local rouge at the very least…

Right then. That has cleared the ground for my Revue (or review if you prefer) of this last visit to Sablet in the summer season: the last, because dear reader, I declare here and now that I will not entertain another visit to the S of F if heat of that extreme is forecast expected or becoming the norm. It was hot. I mean really hot. Night and day. We fried. 

Enough already.