Each year a ‘wine and food walk’ is held - Les Sentiers
Gourmands en Clape Vigneronne and a group of us got together back in May. Given
that we had to pay in advance, the fact that it had been raining for two days
and was continuing, we turned up on the morning. And the rain stopped.
The walk is about 6 km long and starts from a wine cave in
Fleury.
We’re given a straw hat, and a pouch to hang around our necks
for our wine glass, cutlery and a booklet describing the wines and food at each
of the six stops.
What a great day …. food was delicious, so was the wine, and
a walk in the ‘Clape’ region was a new one for me. And we got to see a man and
his horse, ploughing between the vines in the traditional way.
So all in all a very good day. The menu was this:
Creamy cauliflower with shrimp coulis - Egg cake with mushrooms, meat juice vinaigrette, arugula and
olive oil - Salmon mi-cuit, broad beans, ham and fresh black basil - Caramelized belly pork with sage jus, potatoes and red onion - Franceline with duck fat - Cheese - Salted butter shortbread, white chocolate ganache, raspberry
and pistachio - Coffee
And delicious wines from 6 different wine producers at each
course – with a selection of sweet wines at the final stop. I’m not sure
the 6 kms would have walked it off …..
The "Fête de la Saint-Jean" (celebration of St John
the Baptist) is celebrated here on 24th June. Some villages built huge bonfires
that are lit on the night. These things sometimes take days of preparation, and
are huge. Bize had a beauty on the river bed, nearly a week in the making.
However someone thought it would be a good idea to get things underway a bit
early, and it was set alight in the very early hours of the Wednesday morning
before. So come daylight, all that was left was a group of pompiers standing
around a large smouldering mass on the river. Fortunately friends who live in
Agel had the same celebration and I joined them for the evening – a meal first
first, bonfire later. I have to say that their bonfire was a very
well-structured affair with most of the timbers coming from the roof of Bonnie
and Terry’s renovation project.
But Bize rallied, and in fact another bonfire was put
together and lit the following Saturday – a good night with live music on the
promenade, and a MONSTER of a fire.
A recent visit by friends Alan and Nicky (well back in June
actually) – who will soon be doing a house-swap with me for a couple of months.
As usual a good time was had by all, with good food and wine featuring heavy in
the five days they were here this time. And good timing it was too – as their
stay coincided with the end of year picnic for the walking group, as usual up
in the Black Mountains beyond St Pons de Thomières, on the edge of the lake of
Vésoles. And with the usual aperitif of Soupe de Champagne.
I’ve been absent from this blog for some time for various
reasons, and have now decided to pick it up again, but to do it a little
differently. I’m not really a fan of Facebook, but am going to have a crack at
Google+ which I’m still learning about. And I think I will find it easier to
post more frequently and perhaps just shorter snippets of bits and pieces. Especially
as I’m heading off to Australia for a while and will be on the move a bit. I’m
doing a house swap with friends for two months and am really looking forward to it.
Although I am leaving the Minervois behind at my very
favourite time of year – autumn/vendange. Only yesterday I saw the first of the
tractors with trailers with a tail-back of cars behind it, laden with white grapes. I’d heard
that it was going to be an early harvest this year. Nicky and Alan (my friends
who will be staying here) will need to be prepared to be held up on the roads for
at least the next couple of weeks.
So if you’re interested in following the new format of Bize
Bytes, it can be found here:
I’ve decided to revert back to this Blog format – which now
appears will automatically update Google+ anyway. So in effect, I’ll be posting here intially
and it will be synched to Google+. Yes, I’m obviously a little confused, but
seems I’m back to where I started ……
I’ll be copying Google+ posts from the previous year (with the
date of their originally posting) to bring this blog up to date.
It was only yesterday that I was reading on The Guardian UK’s
website about the plight of the flamingos in this area – more than 200 have
died down near Gruissan where there are many etangs (lagoons).
Here’s an
article and the video clip that went with it – showing the firemen to the
rescue.
And then today, I went with friends Miki and Ivan for a
drive to check out various parts of the region that are affected by the ‘big
freeze’ and we found ourselves involved in a bit of flamingo rescue ourselves.
We’d stopped to take photos at the lovely little fishing
village of Bages, right on the edge of the Etang, which was surprisingly mostly
frozen. Surprising because it’s very salty.
And it was in the low scrub at the edge that we saw this poor
bird …..
We didn’t get too close to him, but he was definitely alive,
just hardly moving.
I mentioned to the others that I’d seen the news item
the day before, and that it seemed that the pompiers were involved in the
rescue.
So a phone call was made, and all the details taken, and we were told
that someone would be there to arrange a pick up.
But five minutes later, down the road a bit, we came across
a van with the back open, full of flat-pack cardboard boxes, and one made-up
box. I commented that they looked like the boxes they were rescuing flamingos
with - in the video I'd seen, so we stopped. And sure enough they were members of LPO (Ligue pour la Protection des Oiseaux
de l'Aude) – the local bird protection
society.
We showed them where the exhausted flamingo was, and
he was promptly picked up, packed away into a box and taken away to recuperate.
Lucky bird!
Here’s the movie I
took – I had to mute the sound in the first half of the clip as the noise of
the wind on the soundtrack was dreadful.
And here’s some other photos of around Bages……
We spotted a flock of flamingos flying across the etang - so not all of them are in dire straits yet ....
A few more of different parts of the Canal du MidI....
Miki and Ivan - near Le Somail
Ventenac
And lastly some of Lac de Jouarres. The wind whipping across here
was unbelievably cold and strong – evidenced by the build up of frozen ‘icebergs’
on the shore nearly a metre high. Felt like we were in the Arctic.
And I know we’re so much better off here than most of the
rest of Europe (we've still got those bright blue skies every day!) – but I’ll be so glad
when things warm up a little. Above zero degrees would be nice.
There’s a change
coming at the end of the week and it can’t come soon enough. Though I’m a little
worried at what I might find when the fish pond thaws. I can no longer see
anything through the ice. Fingers crossed ….
I
was talking to someone today who said an old man in her village had only ever
seen the Canal du Midi freeze over three times in his lifetime. It’s certainly
frozen now.
At Le Somail. Someone's thrown a brick onto the ice (bottom rhs) - to check the strength of it I guess!
While huge parts of Europe (including most of France) have
been suffering record-breaking freezing conditions, here in this region we’ve just had
the bitterly cold wind but no snow. And it’s been howling for days now, with
not much relief in sight. Though we have had wonderful clear blue skies, so there is that to be thankful for.
Here’s the four day forecast – those winds of 75 kph and
gusts of 110 kph (and chill factor of -10) are freezing.
And they're a little destructive. Well, they have been in my
courtyard, anyway. Yesterday it blew down the dividing fence, taking my planter
boxes with it.
So I’ve rolled up part of the bamboo fencing, as it’s not going to
stay upright for long in this wind. Perhaps now’s the time to consider putting
in a more permanent structure - some posts cemented into the ground or
something …..
This is the longest cold spell I’ve experienced since I’ve
lived here. We’ve had snow before but it’s not lasted more than a couple of
days. And my fish pond has only ever had a thin layer of ice on it, and that’s
not lasted long either.
At the moment, the ice is about 2 – 3 centimetres thick
and the fish are looking rather lethargic.
Some of my plants are looking
decidedly unhappy – parsley’s a goner I think.
But what seems not to be suffering at all – and in fact is
looking really good is my wattle (acacia) tree. It’s just about to blossom.
Here’s a photo of it taken two years ago, weighed down
heavily with snow.
I don’t know what I was thinking of, planting a wattle in a
planter box – so back he went into the ground. And it’s never looked back.
A
bit spindly, and tied to the upstairs balcony with a bit of rope – but doing a
good job of creating a bit of summer shade for the courtyard.
In about a week or so's time when it's fully out, it's going to be a picture ....
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And because I’ve been spending rather a lot of time indoors
until it warms up a little, I’ve been trying to tidy up my photo folders. I’m a
little lax when it comes to culling and categorizing. So I’m posting a few totally
random ones that I stumbled upon which I quite like ……
At a vide-grenier in Argeliers last year - a pumpkin seller who was more than happy to pose and have his photo taken.
Newly pruned plane trees - Argeliers
A carving set no home should be without.
The shoe van that comes to Bize about once a month and parks up for the morning on the Promenade.
The famous Blue Champagne ("La Soupe") being made in my kitchen by the lovely ladies of Bize. I had Christmas drinks at my place before I went to Australia - this brew had a total of 8 bottles of sparkly (there were quite a few of us!) plus all the other goodies. Delicious.....
Just a gorgeous window ......
And this is one of my favourites. I took it on a group walk late last year - from the hills behind Bize. It's looking south to the Pyrenees. I used the maximum zoom of my little camera and stitched a few shots together, so they do appear closer than they are. They're actually at least an hour's drive from here, and can only been seen on clear days.
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