Advertisement
Published: June 14th 2006
After leaving you in the Loire we’ve been on holidays, relaxing, sleeping, eating good food, swimming and sunning ourselves in France and northern Spain - hence the break in blog reports. Of course we’ve also managed to visit an array of different places ranging from a French prehistoric cave, Dali’s house in Port Lligat, his amazing theatre in Figures Barcelona with its amazing Sagrada Familia and the Guggenheim Museum in Balboa.
More of that later as you can’t travel through Europe and not indulge in wondrous foods so we thought a little wander through some wonderful meals would be something you might enjoy!
One memorable meal was enjoyed in our little stone cottage in the ancient village of Puy L’Eveque on the Lot River (in the southern Dordogne area or the northern midi-Pyrenees depending on your view of the world). We had a delectable warm Rocadamour goats cheese salad with grilled figs and parma ham and of course with our own boulangerie’s (200 metres away) best flute bread stick drinking Domaine du Pech-d’ Estournel, a 2000 red from Grezels (all of 3 kms from our house) which we purchased at the local market on Tuesday! All the key ingredients
Local market
Markets are held in one village or the next every day!were purchased and produced locally of course but that’s the way it is in France isn’t it?
All over Europe we had Spargel (or as we moved south asperges) or asparagus to us. It was the start of the season in the north of Germany in late April and in Oersdorf Karen cooked delicious thick white asparagus for us that were nothing like the thin green number I buy at home. This was creamy and rich when cooked and eaten any number of ways from natural, with a cheese sauce or in a lovely cream soup. Since then we have followed the season through our travels. In some restaurants they had a special insert of spargel dishes and in Poce, our hostess, Margaret made a magnificent asparagus risotto. Col was so impressed that when we set up house here for one week he bought a kilo of spargel for me to do inventive things with.
Carnard (duck) has featured strongly everywhere but nowhere as strongly as on the Lot in this home of confit, magret and foie gras. We have feasted on what is called the Midi Pryrenees “treasure par excellence” and even found Maryvonne’s recommended Foie gras
Barcelona market on the Ramblas
The produce is displayed as if it was part of a district exhibition at the Royal Easter Show seller in the Dordogne. Col tried black duck sausage in Brive but it didn’t interesat me too much! I found a local Cassoulet made with duck and jambon more to my liking.
I wasn’t expecting to find such lovely local fresh water fish on our travels in Europe and was pleasantly surprised at the quality of trout and other local fish in Germany, Hungary and Austria. In Spain we ate and/or cooked ocean treats such as langoustine, calamari and sea bass and in Bilbao at the restaurant at the top of the convention centre we had magnificent langoustine carpaccio, scallops, red bass and a chocolate dessert to die for. Ross the hot dark melted chocolate came in a small jug ready to pour over the ice cream and biscuit base!
We’ve done our bit for local beers by sampling them wherever we’ve been and had the odd tipple of schnapps, cherry liquor in Lausanne, Malbec in France, Switzerland and of course sangria and digestivo’s in Spain when we caught up with my brother and his wife and it was all Barry’s fault that we were talked into purchasing five litres of Rose wine (it was very expensive at
about A$2.30 a litre) when we shared an apartment for 3 days in Catello d’Empuries!
Marathons continue to follow us around. In Brive (on the Dordogne) one went right past our hotel and even last week when we were driving Barry and Sonia to Barcelona airport we crossed the path of another one. I thought summer was the season for music in Europe but I think marathons are more prevalent this year.
Puy L’Eveque was our first stop after leaving Deanna and Gerd and we really enjoyed the little 1660 stone cottage along the Lot river (organized before leaving home). It was 3 stories high and one room wide with a view directly onto the quay and river from the living area and courtyard. We had fun exploring the hillside village that wound up the hills behind our house and also nearby places like Domme, Sarlat and Cahors.
On the way to Cahors we missed a diversion sign and along with a lot of other drivers came to an abrupt halt at roadworks. What followed was deserving of a Chaplin movie as we all criss-crossed the village with cars crossing in front and behind and then all
Our house
Its the one where you can see the long windows... meeting up at intersections! A local good Samaritan took pity and led a cavalcade of about a dozen cars for 10 kms around the blockage before waving us all on our various ways.
After Puy l’Eveque we drove south, spending a couple of hours in Carcasonne before crossing the edge of the Pyrenees and into Spain to meet up with Barry and Sonia and together we spend a week in a few different places near Figures and Barcelona.
Gaudi’s work is indescribable. I had no idea that so much was yet to be completed at the Temple de la Sagrada Familia considering that it was begun in 1882, worked on by Gaudi until his death in 1926 and now construction is continuing based on his in-depth studies. Eight bell towers are complete - with 4 to go. The 170 metre central dome is yet to be done and the transept and apse are now being constructed between the two ends and the towers. They say it will be thirty years to completion!!! Our Gaudifest included a visit to Casa Mila or La Pedrera built in the first decade of the 20th century and we saw a typical apartment
The hunter returns
Col with the fresh baguettes! and the amazing roof plus a fascinating museum about his design methods. My Dad would have loved this museum as Gaudi was a real do I yourself designer - just like Dad.
After leaving Barry and Sonia we drove across to Bilbao and of course ran into the Monday syndrome where everything is closed so we had a very quiet restful day for washing and wandering.
Tuesday then was Guggenheimer day where we spent 90 minutes wandering in Richard Serra’s exhibition “The Matter of Time” and then revisited it at least twice before we left the gallery. A major Russian exhibition was on two floors with icons, paintings and sculptures from the Hermitage and other collections on display. Most of the works had never left Russia before. The gallery is spectacular on the outside yet the interior is not overwhelming and the art is sensitively displayed in a range of different sized galleries.
Tomorrow (Wednesday June 14) we head off to Guernica and back into France, 2 months after we first arrived. Our Citroen C8 6 seater has served us well, with Gerd and Deanna having almost us much luggage as us and then at various times
we had our 5th and 6th passengers. It may be a bit large for the 2 of us but it is really comfortable and easy to drive. Once we get back into France, our little lady inside the GPS will tell us where to go. We have done nearly 11000km to this point and expect to clock up another couple of thousand before we return it in Paris on the 25th June.
Thanks everyone who has sent us messages through the blog - they are appreciated.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.144s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 16; qc: 60; dbt: 0.0744s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
sara
non-member comment
See you soon !
What a trip ! It's great to travel with you trough your travel blog. We're happy to see you soon "live", and to welcome you for a home exchange in Normandy. The weather's been great lately (not today, though). I guess you'll be glad to cool a little bit down before leaving Europe, after your 11 000 kms ! Talking about marathons.... Patrice intends to run the Alice Ssprings Marathon in August... Enjoy your stay in Paris, and give me a call when you know when I shall pick you up. regards, sara