Bobbing along...

Oct. 10, 2008, St. Cezaire, France (near Grasse)

When Mitch was teaching in England he had an adult student named Mrs, Adolph who was always impeccably dressed and spoke with a posh European accent... I was keen that we look as professional as possible for her so I never hung around to chat, but she was incredibly kind. She loaned us a cradle when Lochlan was born and gave both the boys lovely baby gifts. Mitch wrote to let her know that we were taking this trip, and although I still felt shy about imposing upon them, she wrote back warmly asking we'd like to come and stay with her and her husband Winfred in their home in the south of France. So here we are, and having a wonderful time. They have a beautiful home up in the foothills of the Alps just an hour or so from the glitzy Mediterranean coast. They have been so good to us -- they've heated up the pool for the children and we have eaten like royalty since we got here. After weeks in the tent, to be spoiled like this is bliss!

We went down to Antibes today to check out the English bookstore (!!) and have lunch outside in the sunshine. As we left our restaurant we passed an big fountain that is in the heart of every 'old town' -- apparently these were provided for the women to have a communal spot to wash their clothes. Although the human inhabitants of the town no longer used the fountain, as we passed by a pair of pigeons were using it happily -- not for a bath, but being modern birds, they were actually showering! The wife (?!) was soaking wet and hand obviously finished, then sat on the brim of the fountain watching her mate as h stood under the stram and lifted first one wing and then the other, looking very much like an old man soaping his armpits. The kids were beside themselves with laughter -- but we tried to be discreet as it was clearly a private moment for the birds!!

Many museums in France are free for children, which makes it so much easier to take them places as there is no pressured feeling of having to 'get our money's worth'. Although we had a quick walk through the National Gallery in England, the time we spent with them in the Louvre was really the children's first introduction to art in a big way. They were interested but slightly overwhelmed by the enormity of the Louvre, but when we took them to Salvador Dali's castle in Spain, they absolutely loved every minute of it. So while we were in Antibes we went to the Picasso Museum, which is housed in an old castle right on the sea. I was impressed by not only the art, but the way the kids were able to look at it with interest and intelligence -- this is education in a huge way.

And then there was simply the experience of wandering through towns with names that vibrate with 'chic', like St. Tropez or Nice. This is the glamorous side of Provence... I just love this country. Every few miles yields something different; we went through Cannes and the over-the-top elegance of the expensive streets where the Film Festival happens, but then within an hour we were back up in the hillsides above the sea, with the ancient road that Napolean took through the mountains cutting its way through the autumn splendour of the forests and hillsides above us.

We are so lucky to be living this life...


Oct. 13, On the water just off Isle de Port Cros, France

We are bobbing along on the brilliant blue waters of the Mediterranean as I write this, just off the Island of Port Cros. We have been fantastically priveleged and are out with the Adolphs on their boat. We docked here yesterday afternoon in the most beautiful and sheltered little harbour. It's a rough half-circle of sloping hills thick with old olives and other trees I cannot identify, but they are all gnarled and twisted, survivors of this tough, dry climate and the occasional roar of the salty mistral winds. Completing the picture is an old castle ruin overlooking the bay, which upon closer inspection is riddled with the marks of cannon fire from conflicts as recent as WWI. (Reading the sign, the French attribute the damage to the English -- which is a bit strange as they were both Allies, but some historical relationships never really change, apparently...).

The island is fiercely protected as a nature preserve: no fishing is allowed in a large swath of sea all around it, and feeding of the fish or the disgusting practise of boats emptying grey water and sewage while in the harbour is strictly prohibited. Rangers prowl the shores and patrol the waters during the summer months to keep visitors in line. No one is allowed to live on Port Cros except for the rangers and a handful of staff who man the few restaurants, post office and one shop, but there is an intermittant ferry service from the mainland, as well as a handful of people who spend a night or two docked in the harbour. Because it is so simple and friendly, Winfred let the children have all sorts of freedom and adventures... the boys launched the tender (a sturdy little dingy) and with Cachell as lookout in the prow, they rowed all through the harbour; around yachts and sailing vesels and big motor boats, all with the greatest of safety. They landed their craft into the little rocky coves, uncovering ruined cannons and finding all sorts of sea life as we kept a discreet watch on them with the binoculars! They would scamble up through the forest to the top of the hills... and then roar back down, move five feet down the shore, and repeat the process. We could monitor their process from the boat or dock but the sense of empowerment it gave them to be all on their own, rowing along on waters 15 meters deep -- a weather eye cocked for pirates on the horizon! -- has matured them before our very eyes.


And while I was walking along the dock, keeping one eye on the children and the other on the crystal blue waters beside me, I saw an octopus!! Of course I called out excitedly to the others and soon we had a contingent of French gathered as well, who estimated that "la poulpe" was probably at leat two kilos; he was a big one! He swam around obligingly, stopped and splayed on the sea bed so close that I could see his beady little eyes as well as the mildly repsive swelling and compression of his gill sacs, and then swam again, actually cresting the top of the water like a dolphin. It was 'fantastique', as the French kept exclaiming! There were dozens of other fish lazily swimming by as well -- the protected waters mean they have no fear, and an occassional illicit bit of bread tossed in the water brings them flocking in the same way it attracts pigeons on city streets! There were no big fish like sharks or dolphins to be seen; the Adolphs have not seen dolphins in the area for over ten years as the traffic on this part of the Mediterranean has become thicker and the boats larger.

Caelan is piloting the craft as we are underway now, under the watchful eye of "Capitaine Winfred". I can see grottos in the cliffs -- no putting to harbour on this side of the island..
*

Oct. 15


I had to stop there, as the speed the boat was allowed to go as we circled the island was limited to only a few knots per hour (so as not to disturb the fish), and although the waters were not exactly choppy, they were full of swells that rocked us this way and that and kept the little (16 metre) boat from holding a straight course. Typing got more and more difficult, and to my embarassment, my tummy started to protest as the waves churned up the spicy gazchapo soup we had eaten for lunch!! I had to lie down (although I stayed above deck), and I must have dozed off a bit until the whine of the engines accelerating woke me. We were out of the protected waters and as the boat gained speed, the ride smoothed out considerably. I was just drifting back to sleep when Cachell and Dagmar were suddenly shouting excitedly; they had spotted dolphins off the bow! It was so exciting -- there was a whole family, leaping joyfully over the swath of foaming water in our wake. Their silhouettes continued to dance and twirl on the skyline as we pulled further and further away. The very fact that we had no expectations of seeing them made the sighting something I was truly thankful for.... although we didn't realise till yesterday that we had spent Canadian Thanksgiving out on the sea!! We certainly couldn't have asked for a better way to spend a holiday weekend -- and even without the awarness of official Thanksgiving, I had found myself thanking God for our good fortune every time we saw a different type of fish, or heard the children cry out in delight over some new discovery, or simply sat in the soft twilight, drinking rose and listening the gentle lap of the waves against the hull.

Life on the road...

Oct. 10, 2008, St. Tropez

We've holed up in a rented mobile home-style "bungalow" in a campground overlooking the Bay of St. Tropez. Sounds glamorous, eh? And it is -- if it wasn't for the beautiful cork tree swaying over our little terrace, we would have an unobstructed view of the Bay, with all it's yachts and sailing ships. On the other side of the tree there is a view of rolling hills, fields of grape vines, and more forests of gorgeous dome-shaped pines and more corks trees. But to tell the sad truth, what interests me most about this place is our little rented trailer that has the unparallelled comforts of a heater, lights, a warm and private shower, a toilet with a seat, and chairs!! Although back in Canada we have the equipment to camp with reasonable comfort, it's been a bit more of a challenge over here where the limits of first our luggage and then our vehicle mean that we are pretty much roughing it!!

It wasn't too bad in the beginning -- after our tent fly came off in rainy Wales, keeping our gear dry was the main concern, and anything after that was a bonus. Then when we landed in Switzerland our car was a little bigger, and it felt like luxury until we arrived at the campground and were informed we could not keep the car next to our tent; it had to remain in the parking lot almost 1/2 a kilometre away. This was nothing short of a catastrophe as I did all our cooking out of the back, and we perched on the bumper to eat (we discovered early on that picnic tables are not supplied in European campgrounds). Without the car, we also had no way to store our food (remember, coolers are North American inventions, and we wouldn't have room for one in the vehicle, anyway). I went off to my conference that first day in Switzerland, and when I got back Mitch had splurged and purchased a folding picnic table for a ridiculous price (I think it worked out to be about $150 Canadian). It seemed like heaven, even though it only had seating for four (thankfully the kids are pretty skinny!).

This new sense of comfort again rubbed off fairly quickly -- there was absolutely no shelter from the blistering heat or pouring rain in Lugano, it was really not much better than a gravel parking lot, and all for the bargain price of $75 per night. (At least the toilets had seats and were reasonably clean!) We had respite with our friends in Berlin for a couple of weeks which was a big relief, and then our next camping spot in Aachen, Germany, cost only 7 euros! Yeah! That kind of price was why we were camping! And it had not only grass and trees, but a picnic table!! Yahoo! Sadly we were only there for three nights before ending up at a site in Paris. It was very conveniently located for access to the city, and it seemed quite pretty as it was in an old apple orchard and there were still many gnarled old trees, laden with fruit. Sinister truths were slowly unveiled as our first day there passed, however... while there was a toilet or two with a seat (the rest were squatters), Cachell and I preferred to use the stall that was literally swarming with spiders and their broods than to face the horrors of the others!!! Fortunately, the lights didn't work in the shower stalls so we could just whip in and out and not look too closely! Then there was the internet; we paid a hefty 20 euros for two hours of internet connection, only to discover that it could only be accessed near the front office (again, a substantial hike away)! Nothing daunted, Mitch set out with the computer while I tucked the kids in and then followed him. By this time, it was pitch black, and the old orchard which had a tatty beauty during the day took on a much spookier aspect in the dark! I burst into a run down the last tunnel of trees, and was relieved to stumble into the light of the cluster of buildings at the front of the compound. I couldn't see Mitch anywhere at the picnic tables outside, so I ventured into the only open building... to be greeted by total silence and then a virtual roar of interest from the clusters of men drinking inside (women clearly being in short supply). I fled, all dignity abandoned, as well as all contact with home!


Happily, after our respite with friends in Spain, we found an excellent campground in the South of France. It was right against the Mediterranean. and we could walk through the camp and end up on a beautiful and incredibly long expanse of warm golden sand. 'Les Sablons', as it was called, also boasted two water slides, five heated pools (alas, none of them hot tubs!), tennis courts, archery, and the essential (for a French site) 'bouladrome'. The showers and toilets were nice and clean, if a little chilly (they were open to the sky), and because it was finally the low season, we had lots of space to ourselves and the price was reasonable. The cout d'etat, however, was the fact that the site was sprinkled with various mobile homes (like the one we're in here) and permanent tents, all of which were being packed up for the winter. These provided us with all sorts of treasures in the form of discarded and slightly broken bits; we are now the proud owners of a large umbrella to shade our picnic table from sun and rain, as well as a second little table which makes me almost feel like I have a kitchen (hurrah for duct tape -- it can mend most evils!). Of course, these new acquisitions (as well as a case of wine) mean packing up the car has become an act of great skill -- and like all such artistic endeavours, it is never carried out without a certain amount of cursing and banging! The kids and I have learned to find comfort in being so tightly packed into our seats that we have no wiggle room... fortunately the scenery is distracting!


The downturn in the world economy has forced us to get more and more inventive as we find ways to cut costs even further. This means that I handwash all our clothes and linens rather than spend 18 euros (almost $30) to wash and dry a load in machines. Although this does make my hands ache and is pretty unpleasant when the weather is chilly, I can't help but feel an affinity with the generations of women before me who had to do this onerous work without the benefits of running water or lightweight travel fabrics! Our other big savings is made by cooking the majority of meals ourselves on two little gas burners. Although these are a bit tempermental (so far my eyebrows have not been singed off, so that's positive!), and there is a definite hassle factor in trying to provide balanced meals with no refrigeration, they do have advantages. We may not be Diner's Club members, but we have dined in castles across Europe, on meals whipped up in the ruins of "the butteries"! And shopping for fresh meat and produce every day helps us understand on a much deeper level how the locals live -- deep freezes full of food and 4-litre milk jugs are purely a North American phenomena.

The good thing about life in our tent is that it forces us to interact with all sorts of people and make new friends. We spent an evening with some Dutch families drinking coffee so strong I was trembling all night, and the past week swapping stories about life on the road each night with another Canadian family and several bottles of the local wine. Our Paris site provided great comic relief in the form of the cleaners... I was pretty excited to see them (!!) and I happened to be washing clothes in the "sanitary block" at the time, so I watched them with interest. First they stood outside, smoking their way through several cigarettes and talking non-stop, before finally butting out, sighing, and retreating inside (each went a different way). The woman near me then unlocked a cupboard, sighed, took out a rag, sighed again, and flicked it around the sinks. Overwhelmed by the tedium of her work, she then returned outside for another three cigarettes, before retrieving her rag and setting off for another round. Later that day, with some concern I checked on our toilet stall -- but I needn't have worried, the spiders were still cavorting along the walls, undisturbed by the flick of any rag... .

The more challenging aspect of life in our tent is that as the weather becomes autumn, even the sunny south of France suffers from chilly mornings and short days, which make typing and homeschooling a little tricky! But Paris cleaning ladies stiff or stiff fingers on cold mornings help us appreciate the luxuries of home... or little shacks like the one we're in now. The next time you put a load in your washing machine or dishwasher, think of us... we're thinking of you all with love and affection.

Bon soiree.

Vignettes de Provence

Oct. 9, 2008

Sur le Pont d'Avignon,
On y danse, on y danse
Sur le Pont D'Avignon
On y danse, tout l'heurant

We have based ourselves in the Provencal town of Avignon, and our campground is on an island in the River Rhone, right across form the walls of the old town and with a splendid view of the fabled "Pont D'Avignon" made famous by the French nursery rhyme. From this delightful spot, we have been perfectly placed to day trip to all sorts of interesting places, none more than 20 km away, and each one unique and absorbing. Every day brings another amazing 'field trip' -- we're all learning so much, and then every night we come home to the lights of the Pont twinkling across at us.

Pont de Gard


Another bridge, this one is on a stature the little fabled one can never match. In our day of disposable everything, you only have to look at this huge structure to feel ashamed. This is merely a portion of a 200 km aqua-duct that the Romans built to move water through this part of the Empire. Pont de Gard was under construction as Jesus was teaching the word and dying on a cross. It is absolutely immense; three tiers of soaring arches high across a gorge. The river below is now sluggish and only half the width it clearly used to be -- but what an amazing place to kayak, or in warmer weather, to dive and swim. (The signs forbid diving within 200 metres of the site -- as Mitch said, they don't want blood on the bridge!)

The walls of the arches alongside where we could walk were at least free of the spray-paint that so many other historic sites in Europe sport, but what tickled the kids was the ancient graffiti carved into the huge blocks. The dates we could read were from the 1700 and 1800's -- but I am sure there have been 2000 years of messages and love notes scrawled into its supports.


The Roman Theatre at Orange


Wow -- this place has seen the drama of many lifetimes and incredible history played out on it's proscenium -- literally. Every Roman town on the outposts had a triumph arch, a marketplace, and a theatre for entertainments. At the height of the Empire, there were 300 entertainment days set aside every calendar year -- 200 of those were dedicated to theatrical events! Actors must have been better paid then -- and there was certainly less time spent selling shoes or waiting tables and more on stage!! Women were accepted as performers as well... but then as the Empire declined, theatre became more and more about spectacle rather than literary celebrations, and women's role on-stage became more and more tawdry. Eventually, theatrical exhibitions were pretty much porn, the art form was disbanded, and the theatres deserted. (Hmmm... this kind of makes a person wonder about the state of the American Empire if we think about the content of 'modern' culture in terms of television, film, and computer games these days... we're no longer a culture that values literaure, either...)

The theatre in Orange became an army garrison and prison... till the Goths invaded and totally sacked the place. The ripped out all the tile and statury, and stole or broke everything of value. The remains of the theatre would probably have gone the way of all the others in the area, except that when the Religious wars started, they used the 30 meter stage wall as a fortress, eventually building their houses right up against it, all the way to the top. You can see the holes they gouged to drive beams for floor supports in -- it's pretty amazing. So the drama of real life preserved the dramatic venue; when they decided to restore it in the 1800's, they had to rip out over 40 buildings till they uncovered the wall itself. The amphitheatre was only a shell, so it is a restoration (of course, that 'new' work was carried out about the time the Father's of Confederation were forming the country of Canada!). The theatre wall remains intact -- the only surviving Roman proscenium wall in Europe -- and they use it to stage theatrical and operatic works every summer. The bones of the place simply vibrate with drama... it has been witness to the joy and tragedy of mankind through the ages in reality as well as fiction.


The Barry Troglodyte Ruins



What a word: 'troglodyte'. I like to say it over and over... it just rolls off the tongue. Although the troglodytes weren't trolls or orcs or other spooky creatures, as we approached the troglodyte village, with soaring rockfaces looming on either side, it was easy to imagine a club yielding ogre lurking behind every tree. 'Troglodyte' means simply 'cave-dweller'. There is evidence that this area and it's caves had been occupied for over 4000 years. 4000 years!!! It's impossible to fathom that much time.

This particular village had been vastly improved upon... the natural caves which would have been a haven for prehistoric man had been enlarged over the years, with little sleeping benches carved out of 'rooms' at the back, and fireplaces and chimneys created in many. We even found a primitive toilet! (SOme things haven't changed too much over the years!) Eventually they built house fronts upon the caves, so they were a strange mixture of columns and arches -- in an odd way, it reminded me of the false second-storey fronts you sometimes see on shops along Main Streets in small town Canada.

Of course the children had an amazing time running from one 'house' to the next -- there were dozens of caves in the settlement, and they had obviously not been vacant for too many years, as some of the chimneys were still black with soot. It felt so primitive and other worldly that it was almost like a physical slap when I crested the hill they were built into and saw below a huge nuclear energy station spread across the valley below and filling the hills with belches of steam. There it was -- man's acheivments through the ages, in a bizarre juxtaposition right in front of me. I wondered if thousands of years from now someone would stand in the same spot and marvel at the ingenuity of present-day man -- or if the decaying nuclear plant will have dissolved all that exists around it. It was a chilling thought, and I was happy to go and find my family playing in the caves below... they seemed warm and cosy in contrast with the sterile chill of the nuclear plant.


Lavendar Fields


Provence is famous for it's lavendar, and I would have dearly loved to see fields of it in bloom... but we would have had to visited much earlier in the year. I was still keen to see the fields, but no one seemed to be able to tell us exactly where to go to find them. We went to the "Musee de Lavande", and while it was very interesting, with its large copper vats they use to distill the oil from the flowers, it was not fields!


A little disappointed, we travelled up the road to visit an Abbey that was in the neighborhood. That road was enough to curl anyone's hair! It wound it's way up a gorge through hillsides dense with trees and rocks, so we were surprised to turn a (rather sharp!) corner and see that along the valley fields had been hacked out of the forest. We were speculating on what they could be -- they didn't quite look like vineyards -- when the sun peeked out through the clouds again, and we saw the silvery purple shade of the plants. "Lavendar," we all exclaimed at once. Although the flowers have finished blooming this late in the year, the plants still give off a lovely smell and aroma, and even from a distance they were beautiful. The proceeds from the crops fund the Abbey, which houses an order of contemplative monks. Of course the monks of the contemplative order don't actually do menial work -- they spend most of their time in their little rooms, writing and reflecting -- and I wonder if there are still lower orders of 'worken monks" to tend the fields, or if these days the labor is carried out by hired hands. There were signs posted about asking for silence in many languages... and it did seem almost sacriligious to even speak around the beautifully simple old stone buildings, or even in the fields further away. I felt more contemplative and a much greater sense of God there that I had felt at any of the big famous churches we have seen along the way... and my little brood were scandalised when the silence was suddenly broken by laughter and chattering, and we saw a tour group obviously made up of high school students come milling out of a building, destroying the serenity of the moment . Some things are hard to teach... .


Chateau des Baux

I don't know what exactly I expected from Provence, but the fantastic rock formation and small mountains have been a delightful shock. One minute we're in rolling pastoral wonderland, with olive groves and vineyards and unexpected fields of pumpkins or sunflowers, and the next we're clinging to the edges of our seats as Mitch maneuvers the car up hairpin switchbacks and steep road punctuated with roundabouts. It's crazy and marvelous!!


With our little 5-seater van and a great driver like Mitch, we can go pretty much anywhere these winding roads take us. When we invited the Candian family we met in Avignon to go with us to see the Chateau des Baux, we had no idea how hairy the roads would be. Fortunatley, they are from BC and used to mountains, so even though they were driving a large camper, Robert managed to navigate the roads without much difficulty.

Perched on top of a mountain ridge, the drive alone up to les Baux de Provence was worth it. How the settlers of the town ever got up there, let alone built a settlement, a castle, and fought wars, all without the aid of modern machinery is baffling!! The ruins of the old Chateau still cling precariously to the cliff tops -- as we went out onto the site there were signs everywhere warning of danger in high winds; it would be easy to be blown right off!

Legend -- with some historical backing -- attributes the formation of the castle to Balthazar, one of the Magi, and the crest for Les Baux contains a large star. All these tangible links to Christ seem to stir my faith in unsettling but positive ways... and it was difficult to not believe in God as I stood there on the top of that windswept mountain with the beautiful south of France and the sea beyond stretched out below.