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le Puy de Dome
Well actually, it's a photo of a cloud. This is the mountain that apparently has a fantastic view from the top. We'll take the guidebook's word for it. So, where was I? Oh that’s right, the best meal in the world, prior to heading to the Massif Central region. Well, the Massif Central is supposed to be, you guessed it, massive. And it would have been, if it wasn’t completely covered in cloud. We headed first for le Puy de Dome, one of the mountains that is supposed to be great to drive up for a fantastic view, but unfortunately the view would have been to about three feet in front of us. So we ditched that idea and instead headed for the town of Mt Dore, a cute little ski town, but of course being only just the end of summer it was refreshingly quiet. We stopped off for crepes and coffee, and then picked up a couple of items that will be most useful for the next year and half in Samoa - a ski jacket and a fleece. Well, the jacket
was 39 euros and Ed needed a new one so it made sense, sort of. We then did a great scenic drive through some fairly impressive mountains (without clouds), on our way to our next stop, the Dordogne region.
After arriving very late at
Sarlat-le-Caneda, we checked every hotel in town and eventually settled for the only (very expensive) room we could find, and raced into town to catch last call for food. We woke up the next morning to discover the reason we’d had so much trouble finding a room was that it was market day in Sarlat, and everyone within a 20 mile radius had turned up to flog their wares and produce in the centre of town. Now that we had time to appreciate our surroundings, the town was stunning - according to the guidebook, Sarlat ‘possesses the highest concentration of medieval, Renaissance and 17th-century facades of any town in France’. We wandered some fantastic cobbled laneways, crept under archways and gazed across grand squares at the cathedral and other impressive buildings. The market is also recognised as one of the best in France, and the region is famous for foie gras, walnuts and truffles. So we resolved to try something of each while we were there. We managed to find two-in-one at the market, purchasing a bottle of truffle and walnut oil to bring home. We also picked up some supplies for lunch and went zooming off to explore the
Dordogne
The Dordogne River region, stopping at various points along the picturesque Dordogne River for some tourist-brochure photos and opportunities to consume local wine and cheese.
That night we went for the trifecta in a local restaurant, ordering snails, foie gras and walnut cake (yes I know foie gras is cruel and awful, but it’s not something we’re likely to be able to make a habit of, and it tasted pretty good!). I let Ed get stuck into the snails, having tried them on a couple of occasions previously and not having been overly impressed.
The next day brought more sightseeing through an area that holds some of Europe’s most important prehistoric caves (guidebook again), and some of its cheesiest prehistoric cave tourist sites. Fake woolly mammoths aside though, we did learn some interesting stuff about prehistoric humans and their lives, and about the communities in the areas right up until a couple of centuries ago. There was a great site that was like a stately home except carved into a cliff side for protection, although it contained an incredibly disturbing exhibition on torture through the ages which left Ed and I feeling quite unsettled for a while afterwards. Not only because
Dordogne
Looking over the river valley from the village of Dome of the graphic descriptions and drawings of techniques used, but also because of the difficulty comprehending that human beings could (and still do) seemingly quite comfortably actually do this sort of thing to one another. Our final port of call that day was Rocamadour - an amazing village tucked into the side of a cliff that was long the site of pilgrimages, and which is best described by just looking at the photos below. We chose not to copy the pilgrims and walk up the hundreds of steep steps to the cathedral on our knees. It was tiring enough on our feet.
Now for the rugby instalment. The following day we arrived in Moissac, a small town that acted as base camp for the Fiji team during the Rugby World Cup. The team was staying in a hotel that used to be a mill by the riverside, and the town itself was quite sweet. We met Peter, the high performance manager (my old boss), and he took us on a tour of the hotel. A state-of-the-art spa set up had been installed in the bottom of the hotel just for the team’s recovery sessions, including all sorts of enormous
Spa
This is the fantastic spa, surrounded by the pebble pathway with jets for shooting water at your ankles Swedish showers - some cold, some hot and cold with jets from the sides, and even one giant bucket of cold water hanging from the ceiling that you tip over yourself. There was also a sauna and steam room, a spa with a view of the river, and the best bit, a pathway of pebbles that you walk along to massage your feet while jets shoot cold water at your ankles. I think I might need a bit more than a hot and cold shower to recover if an All Black decided to tackle me.
It felt pretty cool waltzing into the ‘team and officials only’ section of the hotel, passing the media and others who were stuck outside peering in. The players were relaxing and having lunch, so Ed and I went round saying our hellos and then joined them for lunch - some of them I knew from Fiji and some of them were overseas-based players I hadn’t yet met. It was also great to catch up with the management team, colleagues I hadn’t seen since May.
That night we managed to line up the best accommodation of our trip. A friendly local lady, Valerie, was
Moissac
Looking across the river to the hotel the team was staying in offering B&B accommodation in her apartment; she’d never tried this before but was doing so just for the rugby. We were her second guests, the night after our friend Bruce from Fiji had stayed there and recommended her. Valerie lived in a top floor apartment up a winding staircase; the apartment was beautifully decorated and had a spare room for us. She was a local social worker, and spoke only slightly more English than I did French so was happy to let me prattle on to her in French. The apartment was right in the centre of town, and provided a great base for exploring the local streets. The town had keenly adopted the Fijians, with signs in all the shop windows welcoming them and banners and streamers in Fijian colours decorating the square.
We had initially been going to help out in the family centre at the Fiji team’s hotel, but as it was so early in the tournament there weren’t many family members around yet, so we were free to head off to explore Toulouse, the pink city, a 45 minute drive away. Toulouse is a university town and has some great laneways and small streets with
Moissac
The abbey cloisters pokey cafes, alternative shops, and interesting characters populating them. We explored as much as possible on foot, paused for a coffee and then headed across the river to check out a photography exhibition in an old water tower.
The next morning we paid a quick visit to Moissac’s 7th Century Abbey, before bidding farewell to Valerie and the town. Our last day in France, we had decided to just make our way to Toulouse and do some more wandering before the rugby match, but then realised we hadn’t yet visited a winery. Not really being the season, most wineries weren’t taking drop-in visits according to the tourist office, so we thought we would see if we could just buy a bottle or two from one to take back to Samoa. We picked one not too far off our route, and eventually pulled up next to a lovely farmhouse with views over rolling hills. After initially thinking no one was home and almost leaving, the winemaker eventually emerged from somewhere and merrily invited us into his house - “Ah, you’re here for a tasting, come in, come in!” He sat us down and produced four bottles of wine, three reds
Our winery visit
Ed thoroughly enjoying the moment and a rose, and then chopped up some goats’ cheese explaining the wines tasted better with food. He was thrilled to discover we lived in Samoa, having himself lived in New Caledonia for years, and proceeded to give us the full rundown on the wine in his region. Upon discovering we hadn’t yet eaten lunch, he suggested we pop down to the nearby village’s pizzeria, order ourselves a takeaway and bring it back to the farmhouse, where we were welcome to finish off the open bottles while sitting by the pool. This didn’t take a lot of convincing, and soon Ed and I were back, sunning ourselves with a glass of sensational wine each to complement a gourmet pizza (did I mention that one of my new year’s resolutions this year was to eat more pizza? I’ve never kept a resolution so well). Now unfortunately Samoa’s customs allowance is one litre of alcohol per person, regardless of whether it’s wine or spirits, so in theory we could only purchase two bottles. But we thought bugger it, and bought six.
Now it really was time to get to Toulouse, and to get into a very long line outside the stadium.
The rugby match
Fiji vs Japan - Fiji doing the 'cibi' before the game (pronounced 'thimby') - the Fijian version of the haka It was Fiji’s first match of the tournament, against Japan, and we were on the sideline, pretty close to the field, in a patch of black and white-wearing Fiji-supporters. Unfortunately though, as Toulouse was base camp for the Japanese team, most of the rest of the stadium seemed to be wearing red and white. The game was great fun to watch, and the atmosphere at sports events of this level is always incredible. Fiji won, 35-31, although not quite as easily as expected, so there were some relieved faces in the management team when the final whistle was blown. A wave goodbye to old colleagues from Fiji Rugby and it was all over, and Ed and I headed to a great tapas bar with a couple of friends to farewell France. (We watched the rest of the rugby matches on a small tv at a friend’s house in Samoa at either 1am or 4am. Fiji played amazingly well and made the quarter finals, a feat they haven’t achieved since 1987, and were only just knocked out by the eventual overall victors, South Africa. A fantastic result for a small island state - I think they got an absolute heroes’ welcome
when they returned to Fiji).
The final morning we made our way straight to the airport, took a deep breath and checked in for the first leg of a monster journey, including a flight to Gatwick, bus to Heathrow, flight to LA, flight to Auckland, 14 hours in Auckland (including a whirlwind cup of tea with family friends Fred and Cheryl) then a flight to Samoa, arriving at 1am. On the flight to LA, thoroughly sick of planes already and sad the trip was over, I peered out the window and was absolutely stunned to see snow-covered mountains and glaciers below us. Greenland! It was one of the most breathtaking things I’ve seen, and quite ethereal - especially since we’d left medieval villages and were returning to a tropical island. And most of the aeroplane had no idea it was down there.
To cap off our fantastic trip, we even managed to get through customs with our six bottles of wine. We still have three left, so if you hurry up and come and visit, you may be lucky enough to taste them!
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Simo
non-member comment
EPIC
Nice entry Jules, Ed has quite a task matching that one. Back stage entry with the Fiji team too! Nice work! Eurotrash Eddie.........hate to say it but he makes it work!!!! Have fun kids! Simo