France 2014: Hike to Claviers

Every day, when we look out at the countryside from our terrace in Bargemon, we see the town of Claviers looming in the distance.  We learned from our home swap hosts that a railway used to operate in this area and passed through all the little towns like Bargemon, Claviers, Callas, Fayence and Draguignan.  The tracks have long been removed, leaving forested walking paths that lead from one town to the next.  It is only about a 4-5km to walk each way between Bargemon to Claviers, so we decided to give this a try.

On our first attempt, we tried to follow the instructions we were given but ended up totally lost.  We were doing alright at first, going down a rocky slope until we met a main road, looking for a water fountain, then recycling bins, then a bridge, etc.  Along the way, I was leaving "digital breadcrumbs" to help us find our way back, by taking photos of key turns, signs and landmarks.  We then spotted an old man walking along and made the mistake of thinking he must be going to Claviers, and followed him for a while.  It turns out he was not going to Claviers and therefore, neither were we.  We ended up in a farmer's field and luckily we were able to trot out enough broken French to ask whether we were going the right way, although we didn't understand much more after his reply of "Non!".  However, that plus the fact that the skies were getting ominous gave us enough cause to retrace our steps home to retrieve more detailed instructions.

It was not a total loss though because the path we took was beautiful and we ended up at a very scenic railway tunnel–just not the one leading to Claviers.  We wonder where this does lead, and will probably check it out on some other day.

 

The next time we tried this walk, we were armed with more detailed directions and it was a bright sunny day, so getting lost would not be as daunting.  We also used Google Maps on  our IPAD to confirm that we were walking in the right direction.   This time we were successful as we figured out where we "zigged" when we should have "zagged" the previous time.  It was at a junction where we turn right onto "Chemin du Plan" instead of left on "Route de la Voie Ferree".  Had we just looked up what "Route de la Voie Ferree" meant the first time, we would have realized that it means "Railway Line".

Once we were on the right track (pun intended), it was fairly straightforward to follow the railway road to Claviers.  There were still no signs pointing to Claviers along the way, so we had to take it a bit on faith.  We knew for sure that we were on a railway line, but were we headed towards the town we wanted?  Imagine our joy when after just over an hour of walking, we finally spotted the sign indicating that we had arrived in Claviers!  After turning that bend, we started to spot the buildings of the town in the near distance, including the iconic church bell tower that we could see from our terrace.

We found it exciting that when we looked back the other way across the valley, we could see our home village of Bargemon.  It looked so small, accentuating how far we had walked.  Just before entering the heart of the town, we found another railway tunnel and wondered whether that might lead to the next village of Callas.  We plan to drive to Claviers next time and check this out.   The old railway station for Claviers still exists and seems to be renovated into a private residence.

Although Claviers has some very interesting looking restaurants, shops and galleries,  most of them were closed (probably too early in the season).  Claviers is half the size and has 1/3 the population of Bargemon, which is why it seems like such a sleepy little town in comparison.  We found one boulangerie that was open for another 15 minutes before closing for the day so we rushed to pick up a cold drink after our long hike.

In the main square, we found the one restaurant that was open.  Luckily it had a nice patio and it was a pleasant afternoon.  We ordered a "side salad" that ended up being huge but really good.  It had lettuce, tomato, cucumber, olives and emmenthal cheese.  For our main we requested what seemed to be the French version of a banquet burger–a juicy beef burger with ham, cheese, lettuce and tomato, served on a toasted bagel!  The fries it came with were thin and crispy, as we like them.

After lunch, we climbed a small hill up to see the views of the countryside. Finding a big open green field with hills and little villages in the background always brings out the Maria from Sound of Music in me, so I had to do the requisite twirl.  Rich is getting pretty good at taking the selfie photos now, utilizing the height difference between us to highlight the scenery in the background.

We found one particularly scenic view, which gave Rich the opportunity to play around with the different special effects settings on his camera, including watercolour, painting and illustration modes.  Then it was time to make the trek back home again.  Both Bargemon and Claviers are set on hills with a valley between them, so there is a steep uphill climb both ways, making this for a good round of exercise.

France 2014: Road Trip to Chateaudouble and Figanières

Châteaudouble, a hilltop town just south-west of Bargemon which is perched at an altitude of 540m, is named after the two castle forts that were built in the 11th Century to defend the ancient village–Castel Diabolicum and Castel Duplum.  The one built on the top of the hill has only ruins and remnants of walls left to be seen. The second, built lower down, has entire structures still standing, including the tower called The Belvedere.

The steep, windy roads heading up to Châteaudouble lead to a spectacular tunnel, just before entering the town borders.  The tunnel was built by blasting a hole through the rocky hillside and it is very cool to drive through.  We wanted to get a better photo from the side of the tunnel leading into town and so we risked our lives (in my opinion) to run back through the tunnel and stopped on the edge of the winding road to get the shot.  It was only on the way back that we realized that there was a steep pathway down from the Belvedere Tower that led to the spot we wanted.  So we took that safer path on the way back.

Once we reached Châteaudouble, we had lunch at the restaurant Le Tour, which our research indicated would provide us with a stunning view from their terrace.  This was no exaggeration as the scenery was breathtaking.  It was a bit chilly and breezy to sit outside, but none of the diners including ourselves considered moving inside as an option.

To top off the gorgeous setting, the food was really good at this restaurant.  The bread was freshly made and served with locally grown olives.  We chose the 3-course set menu for 27 Euros.   Rich had escargot in a parsley, garlic sauce while I had the porcini mushroom soup with onions and crème fraîche, since mushrooms are apparently the specialty of this restaurant.  They rave about picking mushrooms fresh from the forest and feature it widely on their menu.  For the main course, we both had chicken breast stuffed with more mushrooms in a fois gras sauce.  I took mine with fresh garden vegetables which included tomatoes, beans and zucchini while Rich had fries which we shared.  For dessert, Rich was able to pick the regional specialty that he has been hankering to try.  Ile Flottante (floating island) is a meringue floating on crème anglais (a vanilla custard).  This didn't appeal to me at all, so I went for the apple tart.  Having such good food was a bonus since we went mostly for the view.

Although it was clear that the place to have lunch was at La Tour, I was mildy tempted to join the community sardine and fries barbeque in a park at the top of the hill, which was advertised for the date of our visit.  It would have been interesting to join the locals in this meal/picnic.

There was not much else to see within the town, but we did find the Mairie (town hall) and the church.  It was fun to wander around the narrow little streets, ducking under tunnels and archways.  Occasionally we would encounter a street where it seems like part of the mountain is sprouting out from the middle of the road.

Half way up the hill, we found Terrain d'Art, an outdoor metal sculpture garden by a sculpture named Za.  He is quite ingenious in using scrap metal and repurposing found objects for the creation of his whimsical creations that include bugs, dogs, robots, jazz playing musicians and more.  He gave us a tour and tried to explain what each sculpture was supposed to be, through French, hand gestures and sounds

On the way home from Châteaudouble, we made a quick stop into the little village of Figanières to visit Le Jardin des Senteurs, a pretty little flower garden several levels high, with nice views from a pagoda at the top and a cute little maze.  This was a very nice road trip a mere 30 minutes away from our Bargemon home.

France 2014: Road Trip to Sainte-Maxime/Saint Tropez

Our first day trip after arriving in Bargemon was to visit the luxurious beach town of Saint-Tropez, a popular destination for the rich and famous.  We thought it would be easier and more fun to approach Saint-Tropez by water and drove instead to Sainte-Maxime, its smaller sister town separated by a small gulf.  Sainte-Maxime is a pretty little coastal town in its own right, with sandy beaches, a harbour, wharfs, and boardwalk running along a spit.

From the Sainte-Maxime harbour, we caught a BateauxVertes shuttle, running every 20 minutes to Saint-Tropez, at a cost of $13.50 Euros per person for a return trip.  The boat ride provided excellent views of the coastlines of both towns, as well as the various sailboats, speed boats, tall ships and yachts that were on the water.

The harbour of Saint-Tropez is very picturesque with the colourful boats and storefronts, and several large but short round stone towers that could have been defensive lookout towers to support the Citadel up on the hill above. Alongside a stone breakwall is a cement pier leading to a lighthouse that provided  panoramic views of the area. Docked alongside the pier were a series of large yachts.

Gawking at the luxury yachts is one of the main reasons for visiting Saint-Tropez.  There were several docked in the harbour including a shiny black ship named Ulysses, a 56 meter Benetti super-yacht that is available for hire from Fraser Yachts in Monaco–if you need to ask how much, then you can't afford it.  Multiple deckhands were busy at work cleaning and polishing the hull until it was sparkling.  I could imagine that this was a never-ending job for them.  We laughed a bit at the over-the-top ornaments at the stern of the ship and imagined that this was something Donald Trump would like.  Another yacht was named "Lady Nag Nag" and we wondered whose wife, girlfriend or mistress that could be named for?

The port is bustling with a long row of shops ranging from tacky tourist traps to high-streeet stores, and restaurants that charge you an arm and a leg for the beautiful sea view.  We saw many women with big floppy hats strolling down the promenade while their husband or boyfriend followed behind, holding the leash of their little dog.  We even saw a father and daughter whiz by on segways.

We threw caution (and our wallets) to the wind and decided to have a nice leisurely lunch at one of these waterfront restaurants, called Le Quai, so that we could fully appreciate the Saint-Tropez experience. We were seated at a tiny little table barely large enough to contain our meals and drink glasses, with the chairs of the adjoining tables actually touching ours. You sit tucked in together side by side, facing outwards towards the street.  The plat du jour was a piece of grilled seabream served with a vegetable roll and white rice for 17 Euros (the price of many 3-course set meals in other places).  We enjoyed sitting there watching the people and boats go by, and made sure to drink every drop of our 9 Euro bottle of water before we left.

Rather than give more of our money to Le Quai, we had another idea for dessert.  We had previously spotted this soft ice cream vendor called Glaces Alfred that seemed to be serving soft ice cream of a quality and variety of flavours that we had not experienced before.  We bought a double cone containing chocolate and pistachio.  The chocolate was not like the soft ice cream of Toronto with vanilla ice cream tinted with chocolate flavouring–this was dark, firm soft ice cream that had a rich, high-quality chocolatey taste.  The pistachio was also very authentic tasting and for 3 Euros, this was one of the best and most unique desserts we've had so far in France.  We've tried to duplicate this experience in other towns like Cannes, but while there are many flavoured soft ice cream purveyors, so far no other has measured up to Glaecs Alfred in Saint-Tropez.  We may need to make a trip back just for the soft ice cream!

Back in the main square, we encountered musicans and dancers giving a performance.  As the band played, the dancers twirled and spun around while the tourists watched and took photos.  Then, just as suddenly it was over and the performers disbursed throughout the town, still wearing their costumes and carrying their instruments.

At the far end of the harbour was an art fair with paintings, sculptures and crafts on display.  One wildlife painter was in the process of producing a painting of a lion and it was fascinating to watch it come to life.  All the art seemed even more appealing when offset by the beautiful view in the background.

Saint-Tropez is known for its beaches, but I don't think we were in the right area or it is too early in the season, since the beaches we saw were practically empty.  We did see a couple of topless sunbathers, who must have been chilly since it was not that warm of a day.  I was prepared for this after seeing the representative mural in Sainte-Maxime of what it was like to lie around on the beach in this area.

A few blocks in from the harbour, windy streets reveal more restaurants, shops and art galleries.  Bridget Bardot is still an obvious influence in Saint-Tropez as her image is presented all over the place.  One restaurant had tabletops with mosaic backgammon boards on them.  We liked the store that sold funky patterns of shirts including skulls, puzzle pieces, and tennis racquets.  One artist played with the shapes of sailboats in his art.  He had one plate which looked like it had a face painted on it from afar, but up close, you could see three different sailboats.  There were also many cool sculptures that we could see through gallery windows although many of them were closed.

High up on a hill overlooking the harbour sits the Citadel that was built in the early 1600s to defend against invasions from Spain.  We didn't bother actually going into the Citadel since what we were really after were the gorgeous views from the paths surrounding it.  We could see the coastline, the harbour, the rooftops of the buildings, and the tall clock tower peaking up above the other buildings.

There are amazing views even from the cemetery which sits right by the water.

St.Tropez is a beautiful place to people and yacht watch, and if you want to spend a lot of money, the town can help you with that too.  It's too bad we didn't spot any famous people that we could recognize, but it was probably too early in the season for that.

France 2014: Bargemon Home Swap

The quaint little village of around 1500 people called Bargemon, in the upper Var department, is the location of our home swap where we will live for the next five and half weeks. Bargemon was fortified as far back as the 10th century and traces of walls or ramparts, huge archways that once held doors to fortified entries, ancient stone roads, and stairs still remain.  The larger archways have names such as "Porte de la Prison", "Porte de l'Horologe" and "Porte du Château", reflecting their original purposes.  The church dedicated to Saint-Etienne was built right into the defensive walls.

Today, renovated residential houses or apartments can be found that were also originally built into the ramparts.  The beautiful place that we are staying at is such a structure.  It is a unique experience to be living in a Medieval building that is many centuries old, with its large, wide, uneven steps on spiral staircases, rounded archways and doors, and solid wood beams still exposed in some of the ceilings.

Our place has a terrace with a magnificent South-East view of the hilly countryside, looking down into the valley and then up to the neighbouring town of Claviers.  It is a lovely spot for us to sit after a day of sightseeing, having a glass of wine, surfing on our IPADs or catching up on my knitting.

For such a small village, Bargemon has more than its share of fountains.  The oldest one dates back to the 12th Century and is quite rudimentary, while the later ones become more ornate.  Although compared to the gigantic, ostentatious fountains of bigger cities like Paris, these are all relatively modest.  Only a few of them have warnings that the water is undrinkable, so I assume that means the others are safe–at least I hope so, since I drank from some of them!  No ill effects so far.  The older fountains were also used for laundry or providing water for livestock.

Although we follow similar practices at home, since we live less than a block away from three grocery stores, staying in this small town allows us to live like locals by going on an almost daily basis to the Boulangerie (Bakery), Boucherie (Butcher), and the Presse mini market, so that we can have something fresh for our meals.  The other day, our pain au chocolat came straight out of the oven into our hands and then our mouths.  Notice though that they are all closed in the photos.  This was taken around 2pm in the afternoon on a Sunday.  We need to be careful about opening hours for shops and museums in the smaller French towns, since most of them take a long break for lunch (anywhere from noon up to even 4:00pm!) and close early on Sundays. The cafes on the main square that seem always open but we haven't had a chance to try those or the numerous restaurants yet.

From the tourist information centre, you can get a map of Bargemon that takes you on a self-guided tour of the historically significant sites of the village.  In addition to all the ancient fountains and ramparts, we passed by many other interesting stops.  The "Tour du Cours" is the last remaining tower that was part of the 16th Century "Porte du Clos" fortification that guarded the north part of the village.  Today it has been renovated into a residential home with a painter's workshop at the bottom.  The Chapelle miraculeuse de Montaigu is named after the a statue of the Virgin of Montaigu to which miracles were attributed including curing illness.  It is said that a shepherd once tried to remove the statue from its resting place against an old oak tree and was rendered immobile until the statue was restored to its rightful position.  The Monument aux Morts is a war memorial with plaques commemorating veterans of the first and second World Wars.  There is a also a plaque in front of the one time home of Jean Moulin, a high-profiled World War II French resistance fighter who was killed by the Gestapo.

There are three museums in Bargemon–one dedicated to Minerals and Fossils, one to the history of the typewriter, and the Musée Camos, named after ceramist and painter Honoré Camos.  So far we have only visited this last museum, hosted in the old Chapelle Saint-Etienne, which contains a very comprehensive history of Bargemon and is also used as temporary art exhibition space.

In the Camos Museum, the second floor (or première étage as it is confusingly known in France) is dedicated to the heritage of Bargemon.  There are human remains from an original resident of Bargemon dating back to between 3000-5000 B.C. Write-ups trace the history of the village from prehistoric times, through the Middle Ages, all the way up to recent past.  Pictures depict famous past residents of Bargemon, past scenes of the town including the old railway station, and various activities and trades of the people including shoe-making, olive oil, and raising sheep.  At the rear of the ground floor is a section dedicated to the art and artifacts of Honoré Camos, including a wax figure of him creating one of his paintings of chickens.  The figure was so realistic that I thought it was a man giving a painting exhibition and tiptoed around him so as not to distract him!

The front of the ground floor is used for displaying temporary art exhibits.  The current show called "Capitane de mon âme" by Christel Leleu-Ferro features paintings and drawings of former political prisoners including Nelson Mandela, Ai Weiwei, and Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma.

Everywhere you go around the edges of Bargemon, there are magnificent views of hillsides and neighbouring towns.  Imaging playing tennis or swimming or just walking around in the face of such beauty.

Bargemon is also an ideal location for taking day trips to visit other towns since it is about the same distance to the mountains or the coast and most destinations are about 1-2 hours away at the most (the time it used to take Rich to drive home from work).  Having a home swap in such a lovely location allows us to take a more leisurely pace.  If we don't feel like a driving, we can just hang around the town for the day, or go for a hike to the neighbouring town of Claviers, which we can see each morning from the terrace. 

France 2014: Onward to Bargemon

The most direct route from Lyon to Bargemon includes using toll roads and is supposed to take 3 hours and 55 minutes to go 423km.  The "scenic" route, taking the back roads, increases the time to almost 6 hours to go a shorter distance of 386km. When you take the toll roads, the GPS tells you something like "Drive for 90km", and then is blissfully silent for the next hour until the next step needs to be announced.  When you take the back roads, the GPS pipes up about every two minutes to advise you that you can drive for about 900 meters, and then you need to take an exit at the next roundabout.  It is an unending barrage of instructions that need to be paid attention to.

We had decided we didn't want to take the toll roads, both to save some money and to have a more scenic drive.  It was quite stressful though to have to interpret a new turn or roundabout every few minutes.  On one such occasion, we missed the turn and accidentally entered the toll zone.  This brought on a new set of issues when we tried to use our Canadian credit card, which was not accepted.  The lane that we chose was credit card only so we could not pay cash either and there were cars lined up behind us so we could not back up.  Eventually (after what felt like forever), an attendant came out, took pity on us and accepted our cash to process manually.  We have since learned not to try to use our credit card on the tolls, and to pick the lane with the green check-mark, which takes all payment methods (not the blue rectangle that means credit/debit only, or the orange T for those cars that have toll transponder).  But once we entered the toll, it was fast, peaceful driving on a straight stretch of highway for long periods of time.  We concluded in retrospect that this is worth it if you are going distances longer than a couple of hours.

We have found that in a roundabout, if you are not sure which is the correct exit to take, the best thing to do is to go around a few times (like the Griswalds in European Vacation) so that you can check out the signs on the exits again.  Making a snap decision guess and taking the wrong spike can sometimes lead to a very time consuming detour.   Sometimes it is difficult to tell whether some road is the "first exit" or merely a laneway into someone's driveway.  And often the signage on the exit indicated by the GPS has no resemblance to what the GPS sounded like it said verbally.

Several times the route that the GPS picked for us was blocked by temporary construction.  In this case, we had to turn the voice off, ignore the GPS and drive far enough away so that it would pick us a new route.  Otherwise, it continually tried to make us go back to what it thought was the best route, not realizing that the road was closed.

 As we approached closer to Bargemon, which is situated on a hill, the roads started to get more and more steep, windy and narrow, with barely enough room for two cars to pass each other.  We gave silent thanks to the fact that we stood firm on our request for a smaller car from the rental agency and refused their offer for an "upgrade". Sometimes the turns were so sharp that you do not see the vehicle approaching from the other direction until it is right upon you.  Already a nervous passenger under the best situations, I find these roads quite harrowing.  At one point I glanced at the GPS and realized that although it felt like Rich was driving at break-neck speeds for the given road conditions, he was actually driving only about 50-70% of the allowed speed limit!  Either the GPS is wrong, or these French drivers are really skilled and a bit crazy.  If we drove at the speed limit, I think we would lose control.   I made sure not to tell Rich about the speed limit, since I thought he was going fast enough as it was.

The scenery was definitely beautiful on the drive, when I was brave enough to look at it.  Thanks to my intrepid husband's excellent driving, we arrived safely in Bargemon.

France 2014: Eating in Lyon

Although Lyon is known as the gastronomical capital of the world, we did not pack clothing fancy enough to try the really high-end restaurants.  We decided instead that we would try to experience an authentic Bouchon, which serves very traditional Lyonnaise style of cooking that is centuries old.

At our first restaurant, Café Comptoir Abel, we knocked several items off the list.  We ordered the Quenelle de brochet en gratin maison, which is a mixture of creamed pike combined with bread crumbs and a light egg binding, poached and then served with a creamy crayfish flavoured sauce.  While it was good, the flavours did not knock my socks off as I expected.  I think I liked the one that our friend Dave once cooked for us better.   We liked the second main course which we shared–filet of beef with morel mushrooms in a peppery cream sauce.

For appetizer, Rich ordered the Lyonnaise salad which consisted of greens, bacon, croutons and poached egg.  This was really good and I regretted not ordering one myself since Rich would only allow me so many tastes.  The bacon was appropriately crunchy while the croutons were freshly made, the egg was more like hard-boiled than soft poached (the way I like it) and there was a nice garlicky dressing.  But then, I did not do too badly myself with a huge piece of delicious fois gras on my artichoke salad that had greens, peas and tomato. 

Our next meal was at Les Paves de Saint-Jean in the Old Town and I was determined to get my own Lyonnaise salad this time.  Unfortunately it was not prepared quite the same way as the previous one and I did not like it as much.  The basic ingredients were all still there, but instead of crispy bacon, there were chunks of pork jowl, the egg was soft-poached and gooey, and the croutons seemed like they came out of a box from the store.  We did a bit better with our main courses, as they both came with Dauphinoise potatoes (scalloped potatoes with crème-fraiche) which are common in this area.  Rich had another local speciality, which was a Lyonnaise sausage covered in a baked brioche.

After several nights of eating meat (including the bacon in our "salad"), we decided to try the mussels at Bleu de Toi in the Presqu'île district near our hotel.  The mussels are prepared in an unusual fashion in Lyon, as many of them come with a thick cream sauce.  Rich got the Roquefort sauce and I got the "Blue de Toi special" which was a mushroom flavoured cream sauce with chunks of mushroom and onion.  Both were "lick-the-shell-clean" delicious.  The fries in this part of France are not to our liking as they are thick and not that crispy, while we like ours thinly cut and really crispy.  But dipping them in the sauces made up for this.  I was delighted to get an actual all vegetable salad with our meal that came with lettuce, cucumber, tomato and corn niblets.

On Sunday, we stumbled across our first local Farmer's Market (first of many to come as we travel through France). There was so much good looking food that it was too bad we were staying in a hotel without even a mini fridge to store perishables in.  Basically we could only buy what we could eat right there on the spot, which ruled out the roast chicken on a spit with roasted potatoes that Rich really wanted.  Now we are on a mission for the rest of the trip to find another roast chicken!

What we were did manage to consume were some crab and shrimp fried dumplings, a container of cherries, a cheese sausage and some very unusual flavours of macarons that included flavours like Roquefort and hazelnut, fois gras, tapenade and tomato confit.  We tried the first two flavours–they were strange but good.

Because we squeezed in two days of planned activities into one (see previous blog for details), we decided to leave Lyon one day early.  This would save us a night of hotel and allow us to arrive sooner in our home swap destination so that we could slow down the pace a bit.  The plan was always to visit Les Halles of Lyon, the massive covered food market that hosts over 60 vendors.  Despite indications on the internet that this market was open 7 days a week, we found out that only about 5 stalls were actually open on Monday mornings.  We did manage to pick up a couple of croissants for breakfast and a smoked Lyonnaise sausage to eat later, but our dreams of feasting ourselves and stocking up with groceries before heading to Bargemon were thoroughly thwarted.

We must come to Lyon again some other time so that we can try a higher end restaurant and visit Les Halles when the stalls are actually open.