Dr Janet Hall

Sunday Market, Comic Street Opera in Collioure and a Family Reunion

Sunday Market, Comic Street Opera in Collioure and a Family Reunion
Dr Jan’s europe Trip June/July 2010

A lovely slow start to Sunday with a load of washing to dry in the sun on the terrace.
How soothing is the mundane after busy travel! Then the walk down to town to the market of produce and doo-dah/nic-nacs. There was a jazz band in the first square under the plane trees and market stalls spilling down the spill-way to the sea. We bought our provisions for the day including delicious cheeses and ham and foie grois and salad and the most wonderful cherries.

 Early for a beer at 10.45am, but hot enough,  so we sat down just in time for the street theatre comic group. Quite an experience to see these bizarre characters including a lady with a pram, a lady rolling a barrel, a ship’s captain, a diver in wetsuit with flippers and whistle-blower  and drummer for the background music. To our pleasure the lady with the pram began to sing a bit like Piaf and there was an enactment of…not sure because it was in French but gee the sound, energy and charisma was riveting.

Another look at the jazz band and we puffed our way back up the hill and stairs to home laden with our goodies for THE Sunday lunch –inside because it was too hot for the terrace, though there was just a zephyr of a breeze coming though the door.

After the siesta it was time to drive the cornice (“the narrow-winding death-road” where motorbikies dare to pass our car on the corners with no idea of what is coming around next) to the tiny Spanish border town of Port Bou to collect Catalina and Jack at the railway station.

We were amazed to find that in June,  Port Bou was virtually shut-down compared to the busy place we had previously stayed in for 3 nights in August, 2007.
Cat and Jack turned up fine which was a relief and we returned home to regale them with a supper of our lunch items. We welcomed them with a surprise – genuine French champagne served on the terrace.

The Balmy Sea Air of Collioure

The Balmy Sea Air of Collioure
Dr Jan’s Europe Trip June July 2010

We were pleased to see the sun out again on Saturday morning and we walked through the local produce market and down to the Tarn river to see the Old Bridge.  It was very picturesque.

Time to move on then to the very south of France close to the Spanish border in Collioure to meet our hosts of a 2 bedroom apartment. We are really looking forward to being able to stay 2 whole weeks in the one place and not have the stress of driving and finding places.

The place is a bit like a beachhouse at Anglesea if you get the picture of little nic-nacs everywhere and anti-colour coordination (mission brown and orange and yellow), but perfectly serviceable.
The most redeeming feature is a wide terrace with a view over rooftops way out to mountains where sits our very own castle tower. The sun is just now streaming into the living room through the glasss door as I type.

We actually arrived on the weekend of a town festival so there were a lot of people in the main town on Saturday night. We had a beer at the front of the quay and sat an purred as we experienced the ambience of what had been an internet picture. To the left a very old church on a point into the blue blue sparkly sea, in front a pebbly beach and to the right a chateu which had been used in the 13^th century as a summer residence by the royals from Majorca (John wants to know why they would come here?)

We walked the streets of the old town searching for an internet for John to access next-day  arrival details for his daughter, Catalina, and her partner Jack. This achieved we found a little restaurant with a menu and enjoyed Catalan-style cooking; Muscles and Ham entree for me followed by gambas and little squid and John had anchovies (a local speciality) and a fish soup. Guess what followed…of yes, crema catalan (which is really the same as the French crème brulee with the caramalised hard sugar on the top).

We went back to the terrace for my night-cap but then John went back down to the quay where there was live music and he enjoyed his Saturday night cigar and a brandy.

Toulouse Letrec was a Real Dude

 Toulouse Letrec was a Real Dude
Dr Jan’s Europe Trip June July 2010

Our breakfast companions were a couple from Belgium and also -can you believe it – a couple from Brisbane! We Aussies get around a lot. The breakfast room was bright and light though the meal light-on compared to previous bounty but that probably does us a world of good to slow down with food.

Our first tourist objective was to see the art museum of Henri Toulouse-Letrec. (It is situated inside an amazing building which is a really a minicastle next to the cathedral. It had been used as a self-built fortress by a dodgy Bishop who dominated Albi  but nobody liked him.)

Henri was the son of a Count and was particularly close to his mother, whom he painted a lot.
The exhibition was absolutely wonderful and had so many of the paintings and posters that exuded his inimitable style and used such amazing people of the streets of Pigale in Paris and the Moulin Rouge. My favourite was of a demi-nude woman sitting on her bed. I bought this as a postcard as well as a mousepad ofAristide, the man with the red scarf. Mousepads are great souvenirs as one gets to enjoy the art whenever one is at the computer!

An interesting thing I read was that Henri was an alcoholic and had to take a little rest in a special rehabilitation centre. My John reminded me that absinthe was the drink of poison then and drove many folks quite mad and was actually banned.

We then went into the huge cathedral and started a tour using audioguides but we kept getting our numbers out of order and were looking at a statue whilst getting told about another. There is just too much to look at in this cathedral and too many people looking at the same time as us.
Actually we are very lucky to be here in early June as the high season in August must be an absolute bunfight!

We really enjoyed walking the streets backing the cathedral where there are still so many old houses which have been lovingly restored.

Then it was time for a serious lunch! Our hostess had given us a recommendation which was in a delightful green garden setting – full of guests at 1pm and they were flat out! We were so lucky to get the remaining 2 seater however it was in the sun. And we had to wait for 20 minutes to order a beer and another 10 to order the meal.  

We started to get fed 45 minutes after we sat down but oh it was well worth it. I said I thought I was dining in a Michelin restaurant which can cost $150 a head. But this was only about $24 each for 3 courses. We were able to move to under the abundant plane tree foliage in the shade just as the main course came because most of the folks had left. I had the chevre chaud and salad, then my favourite duck confit leg (and fat chips cooked in duck fat and oops-that dangerously gassy cassoulet beans again).
John had an entree of white sausage (actually quite a delicacy) and white cod lavished with spinach sauce. We both managed to squeeze in freshly cooked crème brulee which John rated a 10 out of 10 (compared to the cheap and nasty cafes where you get one that’s turned out of a supermarket packet).

Somehow we found our way home for our siesta and when we woke found that there had been a drastic change in the weather and it was raining. So we stayed in for the evening which was easy relaxing after such an intensely stimulating morning and lunch. John actually watched The Simpsons in French on TV!

Of Castles and Witches Hats

Of Castles and Witches Hats
Dr Jan’s Europe Trip June July 2010

Thursday was our day to drive from Pezenas to Albi via the magical castle at Carcassonne.
This castle is a reconstituted structure on a grand scale to show how it would have been in the 14^th century. The architect’s first name was Viollets and he added the witches hats on the top of the eroding towers.  You approach it through a massive gate and cross a dry moat into the interior approach through winding streets lined with tourist shops and restaurants and up to the entrance of the actual castle.

We sat through the introductory film which was in French but had subtitles that we could roughly translate in our highschool French so we enjoyed it and learned a lot. Then we walked all around the extensive ramparts and rooms and had fabulous views of the valley around.

For lunch we sat inside as the weather was still coolish and we were very ready to sample the regional speciality – Cassoulet (which is white beans and a bit of pork sausage and duck). It was very tasty and vey filling (what isn’t in France?) but did have some abdominal repercussions over the rest of the day and evening. I’ll leave that there…

Sadly we followed the wrong signs and had a long deviation until we finally reached Albi at 4.30 but were welcomed at our BnB which is a mansion!  We lugged our cases up the 2 sets of stairs to find the room spacious and comfortable and the greatest  bonus of a all being a balcony with a view across the rooftops to the grand cathedral on the horizon.

We walked into the old town about 7pm and came around a corner to be confronted by the amazingly huge behemoth of cathedral – it looked like a giant slug that was about to pull up its legs and come to get you! Actually it is the biggest brick cathedral with the biggest wooden organ in the world – that’s pretty big! Inside it is painted entirely and the ceiling has paintings done by Italians which look like they were done yesterday rather than in the 1500s. It has the creepiest pictures of the damned going to hell – glad that’s not us!

We had a quick drink and shared a plate of charcuturie and went home to sit on the balcony and enjoy the sun-set over the cathedral. John enjoyed a cigar and was in heaven. We still wonder how the evening star appeared almost immediately over the cathedral?  Must have been meant for us.