Pilgrims’ Progress

Barcelonnette, France

From the foothills we climb. There are hills ahead of us, nay, mountains and we need to get over them to make it to Italy. We hope the vans are going to cope!

The morning’s drive is rugged. Desolate striped rock faces in black, white and brown, some smooth, some jagged, sprout olive orchards and grapevines. 
In the afternoon there’s a change to peach, apricot, apple and pear orchards, their luscious greenery covering an entire valley floor in a patchwork of different trees, spreading for kilometres of compass. Purple packing cases punctuate the quilt, perhaps a promise of the disappointingly-currently-not-flowering lavender rows which, in their green state, blend into the trees.

Then the real mountains begin. The ones that soar to over 3000 metres.
Pines replace orchards, wooden chalets replace stone homes, the thick grey murky stream we had followed all morning is replaced with crystal-clear glacial blue-green.
Paraponters casually stroll the thermals. We push upwards, passengers clicking cameras, drivers stealing an occasional glimpse of majesty.

Time on the road: need to check Jboy13’s record!
Distance covered: 171km

by….I think I’ll stop saying who’s writing – if it’s not me, I’ll let ya know
Nyons, France

Happy Birthday to Mboy-now7!

What a good place to request a chocolate cake!! Just a pity the fancy decorations melted on the walk home eh! Small price to pay for mercury hovering all day in the high thirties though, don’t you think?
And expecting this, we set out in the early morning for our stroll around the medieval town, Nyons.

The afternoon was devoted to keeping cool…perhaps predictably, given our current location, playing boules…and reading.

(I devoured Hugo Hamilton’s very clever tragic culturally enlightening family and language story “The Speckled People” – certain adult themes mean I’d recommend parents take a look before handing it on to their children to read).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY Mboy….
as dinner drew to a close you declared, “It truly was a happy day.”
And you were right.

by Rachael Nyons, France We haven’t exactly left France yet, but our tiny taste is drawing to a close. We were just contemplating (read: blog post author just grilled everyone for ideas <wink> actually, the contributions flowed thick and fast and ... [Continue reading this entry]

by Rach (hope you’re not getting bored with only one author!) Nyons, France It’s an ugly morning complete with arguing, skinned elbows and a route taking in every industrial estate in the south of France; even the sunflowers are sad, their ... [Continue reading this entry]

by Rach industrial estate just past Montpellier, France the wind still blows; not a whisper, not a howl, just sufficient to render the beach unattractive we move on the map indicates about 170km, not too far so we stop and shop, a whole week’s ... [Continue reading this entry]

by Rachael Narbonne-Plage, France

wind: blowing fiercely a-l-l   d-a-y   l-o-n-g demanding trees bow low, forcing sand along the beach, whipping washing to stand at attention completely U-P-R-I-G-H-T on the clothesline, never-a-moment-stopping hot ceaseless blast the mistral blows

It blows and makes a day at ... [Continue reading this entry]

 

“It’s going to be a great spot to catch the sunrise,” Jgirl14 correctly informed us before going to bed last night, and in preparation she set the alarm and kept the camera at the ... [Continue reading this entry]

by Rach hovering just above the coast near Narbonne, looking out at the Mediterranean Sea It doesn’t seem that long ago that we were desperately in search of sun. Today we, with the rest of the population in the south, looked ... [Continue reading this entry]

by uninspired Rachael 30km from Carcassonne “I don’t know what to blog about today,” I moaned. ”What do you mean? It was a beautifully scenic drive today!” Rob countered. ”It might have been, but it’s a bit boring to just write “Today the ... [Continue reading this entry]

by Rachael Cordes sur Ceil (we were going to go to Carcassonne today, but this place is so sweet, we stayed to take a wander and some photos, and add to our memory store) Maybe it’s because we’re here at harvest-time, ... [Continue reading this entry]