Lot: Travels through a limestone landscape

Lot Blog 9

2009-05-31T01:14:00.000-07:00

The endless fight over the 15 discontinued stops on the Paris-Toulouse train line continues but there is some good news in that a few stops, four in all, have been reinstated and among them appears to be the one that allows travellers from Britain to leave St Pancras at a reasonable time in the morning and arrive at Gourdon, direct from Paris, at around 6.40pm. This is real progress - thanks to those who have been battling with SNCF and best of luck with the continued fight.

Staying with trains, the future of Quercy Rail is still in doubt. The Tourist Office says there are no plans to reopen the line at the moment, though an article in La Dépêche seems to suggest that it is, at the very least, under consideration.

The tourist season is here again and, given the exchange rate, France will have to work hard to attract British visitors. Good to know that the State gives 550,000 euros a year, to which the Conseil Géneral adds a further 300,000 euros and there is a regional allowance of 1.4 million euros a year destined for the upkeep of the patrimoine. It doesn't sound like a whole lot, given the wealth of buildings there are to protect - 2250 in all and 450 religious edifices.

Meanwhile, the much admired Bistrots de Pays 'chain' is extending. Bistrots de Pays was the brainwave of Bernard Reynal in 1993 to try to rejuvenate small communities and counteract "la désertification". There are a few rules for those wishing to join. They can only be established in villages of less than 2000 inhabitants and must promote local produce and local tourism; organise events - theatre, art exhibitions, sport etc; substitute for the disappearance of other commerce in the village; and stay open the year round. The Lot has 12 such establishments and you can find them at Salviac*, Anglars-Nozac*, Faycelles*, Latronquières*, Montet-et-Bouxal*, Capdenac-le-Haut*, Livernon, Marcilhac-sur-Célé, Saint-Cirq-Lapopie, Labastide-Murat, Espère and Montcuq according to Dire Lot. The BdP website (*) adds, Cazals, Gigouzac and Lamothe-Fénelon and excludes some of the above. They should display a Bistrot de Pays sign. If you like café's that are the real hub of a village keep a look out for them.

A fascinating article in the March edition of Dire Lot (not available on the web) charts the lives of some of the many Jews, particularly children, hidden in the Lot during WW2. Many were hidden by nuns and some by brave families. Of the Jews tormented and humiliated by the Nazis in Gramat on May 11 1944, who were subsequently deported to Auschwitz and other camps (and to whom there is a plaque in the town), only two returned. Their names were no doubt given to the Nazis by the infamous Bonaventure family (see the Resistance chapter in my book).

Margot Cerf went first to the Ecole Jeanne-d'Arc at Figeac, where Sister Margaret hid them, and then was moved to Notre Dame de Massip at Capdenac-Gare in the Aveyron (just below Capdenac-le-Haut in the Lot), where she was under the care of Denise Bergon, a nun who saved over 80 Jews.

Denise Bystryn and her brother Jean-Claude went first to St-Céré, a town well known for sheltering Jews, and then to the Institution Jeanne-d'Arc at Cahors. Her young brother meanwhile was sheltered by Marie-Louise and Alfred Aymard at Escamps. The courage of these people cannot be over-estimated. It would have meant death for all had they been discovered.

Yvonne Féraud, who was instrumental in asking the Aymard's to take Jean-Claude, was warned by a representative of Bishop Saliège of Toulouse (a bishop who did much to help the Jews, unlike many in the Church) that Denise's life was in danger and that she had been denounced to the Gestapo. She was secreted away and hidden at Feraud's parents' farm in the Haute-Garonne.

Charles Gol(d)stein and his cousin Pierre were hiding in Gramat when Das Reich passed through on May 11 1944. Charles and his mother fled and were hidden by Alain and Rosa Castagné. Pierre and his mother escaped also, but the rest of the Goldsteins, along with members of the Fiszbin and Zysman families, were not so lucky and were arrested, humiliated and finally sent on to the death camps. The boys were subsequently hidden in Luzech.

In later life Margot Cerf became a distinguished midwife. Denise and Jean-Claude moved to America, Denise becoming a sociologist at Columbia University in New York and marrying Eric Kandel, a nobel-prize-winning doctor. Jean-Claude is a well-known dermatologist. Charles Goldstein had a business career but is also a painter of some distinction, Chevalier de la Legion d'honneur and works with various Jewish bodies. Pierre Golstein is also a renowned doctor, but in France, researching, curiously, in the same field as Eric Kandel.

It has emerged from newly discovered archives that the Pont Louis-Philippe in Cahors, inaugurated in 1838 and always overshadowed by the mediaeval Pont Valentré, is hiding a treasure. Gold and silver coins were hidden there as a homage to Louis-Philippe, who made available the 900,000 francs for the building of the bridge. The coins, all with an effigy of the king, were worth 20 and 40 francs apiece at the time. How long before they are removed?

A collection of Marcel Marceau's belongings were auctioned recently in Paris, where the renowned mime artist was interred in Père-Lachaise in 2007. But Marceau actually lived and died in Cahors, whither he had moved on his retirement in 2005. His daughter Aurélia is active in Lot theatre.

Marceau, whose real name was Mangel, discovered the south-west when he and his family were given two hours to pack their belongings and move from his birthplace, Strasbourg, to Limoges during the war. He was fifteen. The name change was not a theatrical nicety but rather a means of avoiding detection as the family were Jewish and his father, a kosher butcher, was deported to Auschwitz, where he died.

Marceau and his brother Alain joined the resistance, hiding Jewish (and gentile) children from the Gestapo and French police and changing the date of birth on their identity cards so they could not be deported to German labour or death camps. He also led many children to safety in Switzerland, posing as a scout master.

He was awarded the Wallenberg Medal for his work. Later on, his good English was put to use when he acted as an interpreter with the US Army when they were in France. He was a talented man who, apart from being the world's greatest mime artist, also painted and wrote books.

Lot Blog 8

2009-02-23T06:32:00.000-08:00

A cheering ceremony in Cahors around Christmas when Madeleine Gaillard-Arnouil received a Yad Vashem medal from the Israeli consul based in Marseille in recognition of her grandmother's courage in hiding a young Jew, Frédéric Fendler, in her Cahors attic for a year during World War II.

Frédéric and his sister Suzanne had fled to Cahors from Paris, where their parents were jewellers, and it was there that Frédéric found refuge in the house of the late Esilda Arnouil, grandmother of Madeleine. His sister Suzanne was also hidden by the family. The 6-year-old Madeleine discovered the surprised Frédéric one day, a discovery which precipitated Frédéric's decision to leave his hiding place and join the maquis, scared that he would eventually be discovered. He did so and survived the war.

The incident was made public by the son of Fendler, Eric, which led to the award. "We are all Cadurciens today" said one of the Fendler family in their speech of thanks to the Arnouils.

French Country Dreams is the site of Carmen Myers and is undergoing reconstruction just now. Check it out when it is back if you want either to buy a house or rent Carmen's.

January 24th saw tempestuous winds gusting to over 100mph sweeping through the Lot, causing damage and flooding and misery. This is the second such occurrence in ten years. The last big storm was in 1999. Normally one would expect at least a 30-year gap between such incidents. The winds caused havoc all over the southwest leaving 4 dead and 1.3 million homes without electricity. Other departments were worse hit than the Lot.

Good to see that a proposed hydroelectricity scheme on the Dordogne has been blocked, though the site would have been upstream in the Auvergne. Both the Lot and the Dordogne rivers have been spoiled by such schemes. However, as we can see above, climate change is with us and maybe we should think twice before opposing energy projects. Surely we can find ways of doing this, however, without despoiling the countryside.

Plans are afoot to rejuvenate Gourdon's cultural life. The summer will see more exhibitions and concerts, many held in the Cordelier church. Gourdon now belongs to the Artothèque de Cajarc, which will see 5 new works hung in the Mairie every month and some people are dreaming of an annual festival of French song. Dream hard and fast - Gourdon needs a lot of help.

The Légion d'Honneur, established by Napoleon in 1802, is divided into five ranks: knight, officer, commander, grand officer and grand cross. The President of the Republic is always appointed Grand Master and has the power to appoint other members. You enter the order as a knight and to progress up the ranks have to contribute new services to your nation, with a suitable lapse of time between the promotions.

Recent notables to receive the order of merit include Ingrid Betancourt, the politician kidnapped by FARC guerrillas in Colombia; JK Rowling; Ellen McArthur; Shimon Peres; and, promoted to commandeur recently, Alain Dominique Perrin, the man responsible for turning Cartier around.

Perrin is now Executive Director of the Companie Financière Richemont, the group specialising in luxury goods that includes Cartier. M Perrin, whose country home is the exquisite Lagrézette château and vineyard near Cahors, is still closely associated with the Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art. In 2005, Wine Spectator recognised Château Lagrézette as one of the 100 best wines in the world.

And speaking of Cahors wine, it is trying to make a comeback as the "original Malbec". Cahors is facing up to severe competition from Argentian Malbecs, which have a greater range and tend to cost a lot less, and their new blog/website hopes to go some way towards correcting this.

Perrin fell out with the Cahors wine community some time ago, denying them access to his unquestionable marketing skills. However, no hard feelings it seems - he is generously cited on the blog, which ends each section with the words, in English, "Cahors is back".

Rail Europe finally refunded me the cost of having to re-book the seat they cancelled following the Channel Tunnel fire. It wasn't done with a great deal of grace, but it was done.

Here's hoping that notice is finally taken of the long-standing recommendation, which was first made before the tunnel was even finished, that the rolling stock be enclosed, not open, to prevent spread of the fire. The recommendation was repeated - and again ignored - following the 1996 fire.

There are 40,000 vehicle fires per year so it is remarkable there have been no more fires. With increased use of the tunnel likely to continue this needs to be heeded if there is not to be a fatal incident in the future.

Lot Blog 7

2008-12-24T00:12:00.000-08:00

Seems like the long-awaited airport of Brive-Cressensac will not open till 2010 at the earliest. One can't help wondering if in the current economic/ecological climate, it will ultimately go ahead at all. But the news that the TGV line between Poitiers and Limoges has been given the go ahead is good news as this will connect up to London, Lille and Paris. If British visitors could get to Limoges quickly, then there may be more options on trains that stop at Gourdon, Souillac and Caussade.

Last minute Xmas or New Year prezzies for Lotophiles? Don't forget Lot: travels through a limestone landscape in southwest France by Helen Martin, available from Moho Books, and Amanda Lawrence's excellent and highly readable White Stone, Black Wine.

Update on the nuclear waste disposal. Happily, Gramat has refused the invitation to store this, but a timely article in Quercy Passions points out that earthquakes are not unknown events in the Quercy and that it might be a place best avoided in any case. The first recorded was in 1089. In 1490, the citizens of Gourdon had to flee their houses with the intensity of the quake (a whopping magnitude 8), several of which collapsed. In 1660, Gourdon was hit again and more recently in 1929 it suffered again when, along with Cahors, Luzech and Figeac, it was hit by a magnitude 5 tremor. In 1962, a tremor centered in the Pyrenees was felt in the Quercy.

The papers in the UK are full of articles lately on the tumbling value of the pound versus the Euro. Those people living in France and dependent on income from the UK have seen it tumble by up to 20% alongside inflation in France, with the result that many are selling up and moving home. Selling up if they can, that is, for in areas where the market is heavily influenced by British buyers, there is of course no one to sell to, and moreover prices have been inflated by those very same buyers in the first place. Although a glance through the websites shows only a small drop in advertised prices, it is reported that in actual fact sellers are accepting offers up to 25% lower than the asking price. That amount of money won't translate very well back in to English homes, particularly in the south-east, which even though reduced still cost much more than in France.

Other people's misery is someone else's opportunity. Those unaffected by the credit crunch should maybe buy their French home now (in spite of the exchange rate), though they should remain alert to the fact that there is no shortage of property crisis in France and homes can still take months to sell, in good times or bad.

The French meanwhile, always experts in schadenfreude, are enjoying our misery and so far feel immune from recession, according to well-known journalist Janine di Giovanni on Tina Brown's The Daily Beast. However, in a country so dependent on tourism, much of it British, the curtailment low-cost flights, the exchange rate and other factors may all kick in this summer. Small, French family-run hotels, already feeling the pinch, will probably be the ones to suffer.

Christmas has come early to the Lot this year with snow falling on the causse, Ségala and around Figeac, depriving at least 1000 people of electricity. Snow is ceasing to be anything unusual in the département, indeed, with winter temperatures habitually a little colder than in the southern part of the UK. In times gone by it was not unusual for the Lot river to freeze over in winter and sometimes for months at a time causing great problem for the gabares that ferried goods up and down river.

Lot Blog 6

2008-10-03T01:04:00.000-07:00

It sometimes seems as if the world is out to "get" the Lot. If motorways are built then the Lot sections are toll sections and the road will blast its way across beautiful causse land, ignoring all protestations. If railway stations are to be closed, or trains reduced, then you can be sure Lot stations will be involved, even if elsewhere in the country SNCF extol the green credentials of re-opening small stations.

And now the saga of nuclear waste has reared its ugly head and people have something else to protest about. Where better, after all, to bury nuclear waste than in the middle of a sparsely populated département whose economy is heavily dependent on tourism and agriculture, which is supposedly protected by a Parc Régional (which commissioned a geological survey that found against the proposal) and which is renowned for its tranquility and unspoiled beauty? You've guessed it.

Of the 181 communes identified by ANDRA (see below) as possible sites, only 50 have so far come out against the proposal, the latest being Gramat. You can keep up to date with which ones are accepting or declining on Jean Launay's site. All must reply by October 31st 2008.

Whether this waste will include any British waste now that EDF have bought their way into our own nuclear programme, or whether the UK will be left to bury its own in some equally beautiful environment (almost certainly) I know not.

There are currently three military sites in the département, one of which at Bèdes is known to store radioactive waste following experiments with depleted uranium weapons. Indeed it was thought that the stunningly beautiful river Ouysse might have been contaminated.

ANDRA is the French national radioactive waste management agency (Agence National pour la gestion des déchets radioactifs) and they are looking for a site in which to store low-level but long-lived waste.

Communes with geologically favoured land are being asked to volunteer to host the site in a shallow facility. Work would begin in 2015. Communes are being tempted - in an area of low employment - by development of the community, improved transport links and infrastructure and, of course, jobs. Some areas, elsewhere in France, that have accepted the waste are being showered with so much money - millions of euros - they hardly know how to spend it.

According to Greenpeace, ANDRA is a less-than-exacting organisation when it comes to storing nuclear waste. They apparently do not even have a complete inventory of sites and some of the ones they do know about are leaking.

Hopefully the remaining communes will resist the temptation to host these stores and vote to preserve their unique landscape.

The fire in the Channel tunnel has badly affected the running of Eurostar trains - no one as yet seems to find the date of September 11th in any way suspicious.

According to their website my own train to Lille had been cancelled. I phoned Rail Europe to exchange my ticket as television advertisements had suggested I might, only to be told that I had a non-refundable, non-exchangeable ticket. Well, yes, but I didn't know my train, booked before the fire, would be cancelled! We have been told by Eurostar that the timetable will be upgraded after September 30th - you may exchange it then if the train isn't running, they said.

On October 1st I rechecked the timetable and certainly more trains were running - but not mine. I phoned back. Friends had told me that even the trains that were running were delayed, so it was my intention, given these delays, to rebook my ticket via Paris, where there were plenty of trains to my destination, rather than just one at Lille. However, it seemed the goalposts had been moved. More nonsense about non-exchangeable tickets.

There was an earlier train, they said, finally, that ought to be running. OK, book me on that, I said. Oh no, because your ticket is non-exchangeable. You can take the train and you will not be charged, but you must come early on the day and change your ticket then.

As the normal check-in time for the train was around 0630, I wondered what time they would like me to arrive - 0500 perhaps, meaning a rise of 3.30 in order to reach St Pancras? A novel interpretation of customer care. Was there any guarantee of a seat when other refugees from cancelled trains may be fighting to get on the earlier train? No, but it should be all right. Hah! Where have I heard that before!

The upshot seemed to be that they were happy for me to travel on the earlier train without paying extra and I know I will travel on it (because otherwise I would have to rebook the entire journey at my own expense via Paris) but I cannot reserve a seat on it, even though I had a reserved seat on a train that isn't running.

I rebooked London-Lille at my own expense to ensure my seat and hopefully the train will arrive in time to catch the only onward connection to my destination, though with hordes of people trying to board at the last minute this must lead to extra delay.

At a time when we are all questioning corporate greed, lack of responsibility and accountability it is comforting that Rail Europe and Eurostar (the one is allegedly acting on the advice of the other) remain unmoved by the zeitgeist, effectively demanding that passengers on cancelled trains must pay twice for one journey, if they want to be sure of seat on another train. That should certainly help with fees to use the tunnel.

Whether the train will arrive in time to catch my connection and whether they will refund my costs - only time will tell. Watch this space.

Lot Blog 5

2008-09-09T05:00:00.000-07:00

Apparently France, ever mostly sensible where transport is concerned, is re-opening new branch lines in the Champagne region and SNCF congratulates itself on an ecological trend spreading over the country from Provence to Paris, according to Lizzy Davis in The Guardian.

Curious then that the Lot seems to be bucking this trend with the diminution of trains halting at Gourdon and Souillac, and, out of the département, at Caussade. The worry is that this may be a precursor to shutting the stations altogether. It beggars belief that SNCF should promote such an inconsistent policy and in one of the few areas of France where no TGV line exists.

Apart from the inconvenience to locals, this decision will impact on the local economy too, in an area heavily dependent on tourism. Once again the Lot loses out to the big guns.

Travel from the UK is made infinitely more difficult by this decision (see Blog1 where I describe that to reach Gourdon on a through train in time for dinner now necessitates getting up at 4am if one lives in London, or staying overnight in a hotel if one doesn't). To protest against this bureaucratic short-sightedness please sign the petition on the Batail du Rail site.

Meanwhile, another Guardian article reports on the increasing popularity in France of the dreaded binge-drinking among the young. For months now us Brits have been advised by British newspapers to look to France for information on how to drink properly. I was always a tad puzzled by this advice as for years France topped the alcoholism statistics and, although consumption has much declined in recent years, it still ranks second after Luxembourg in Forbes figures of heaviest drinking European nations, consuming 14.2 lites of pure alcohol per capita.

The OECD Health at Glance paper published in 2007, covering world alcohol consumption in litres per capita put France on 13 litres per capita (based on 2004 figures and ranking 4th in the world after Hungary, Ireland and Luxembourg) as against the UK's 11.3, ranking 9th in the world. Luxembourg outdrinks everyone at 15.5 litres and Turkey brings up the rear on 1.3 litres.

At parties I attend in the south-west I frequently witness the seriously drunk, something I see less often in the UK in my own age group. And whilst the newish drink-driving laws have had an undoubted effect, I notice that many people rarely seem to take wine into the equation, cutting down, rather, on the digestifs, though less often on the aperitifs. Lifts home seem to follow circuitous routes to avoid the police! In France's horrific road accident rate, alcohol was the most important consideration in 30% of cases. In twenty years that has not changed. In the UK over the same period it has halved. Indeed the French drink and drive more than any other nation in Europe.

1998 stats show 144 accidents per million inhabitants in France, as against 58 British. No doubt they are down since then but, binge drinking apart, we clearly need not look to France as a means of solving our problems. In 2007, 4,615 people died on French roads and alcohol was the main reason why - 1,241 died as a result. In the UK, with the same population but less space and busier roads, 2946 died in the UK, 460 from drink driving.

So let's turn to a pleasanter part of the demon drink. Mike Reynolds, who co-runs Taste of the Grape, a marvellous and relatively new company that specialises in wine tastings, courses and tours, writes to me as follows:-

'A Cahors winemaker I can very much recommend is Château du Cèdre - they make a range:

'If you don't want a Cahors big gun, then the Heritage du Cèdre is the one - the heart is black, but the flesh is youthful. Malbec softened by Merlot with some lip-smacking acidity. Magret de canard beckons.

'Then move up to the Cuvée Prestige - black fruit, smoked fig and liquorice, low yields and old vines, Malbec with smidgeons of Merlot and Tannat.

'Progress to "Le Cèdre" from the oldest vines on the estate - perfumed, plum-pruney, 100% Malbec, almost impenetrably dark, and aromas of cassis and wild raspberry. You could almost eat it with a spoon.

'And to top it all, "Le Grand Cèdre" - a limited edition thoroughbred, a black beauty among Cahors, strikingly soft, lush and richly fruited. You know what to eat with them.... Cabécou, Rocamadour, grilled meats, cassoulet...'

Lot Blog 4

2008-08-22T05:27:00.000-07:00

Devastatingly sad news in June of the final demise of Quercy Recherche, that truly excellent revue on all things Quercynois which has struggled on through many travails since 1974, thanks to the extraordinary energy, dedication and enthusiasm of one man, Jean-Luc Obereiner, who deserves some kind of medal for his contribution to the preservation and explanation of a culture and patrimoine that one knows will be the poorer for the passing of QR.

Nothing was out of bounds for this erudite magazine which covered anything and everything, from the Resistance to caves, to botany, to caselles, to building techniques, to roof shapes and down to even smaller and more intricate details like lintel decoration, drawing on expertise around the region and beyond.

I could not have written my own book without it. I would not know half of what I do know about the area without it. There will now be much left I'll never know without it. I feel quite bereft.

The spirit of the magazine lives on - so far- in the open air museum at Cuzals, which was the brainchild of Quercy Recherche and a practical and educational demonstration of some of the things they wrote about.

Recently it looked as if funding had finally been found to keep the magazine alive, but sadly this seems to have dried up. The Association continues in offices at Labastide-Murat and there is vague talk of a web-site which would be wonderful.

Meanwhile all we can do is mourn the magazine's demise and pay a grateful and well deserved tribute to M Obereiner.

A new exhibition of paintings opened recently in Cahors and is worth a visit for anyone who happens to be there from any time from now until October. In the museum named after him, there is a retrospective of around one hundred Henri Martin paintings collected from nearly 50 museums and towns in France.

Unlike many painters, Martin knew success in his own lifetime, possibly because his art is so accessible. He was also much in demand for public works of art and one can see his work in such illustrious buildings as the Capitole at Toulouse, the Elysée Palace in Paris and many more. His fame spread far and wide and he is particularly appreciated in Japan. Moreover, so frequently did he paint the Lot that, as the article in La Depeche says, Lotois are sometimes able to recognise their own relations in the paintings.

Lot Blog 3

2008-07-14T23:18:00.000-07:00

I mentioned in blog no 1 that Amanda Lawrence was publishing a book on the Quercy: White Stone Black Wine. This is now released and available.

It is a delightful account of the Lawrence family's decision to move to the Lot for good, and the initial problem of purchasing a bigger house (swiftly accomplished in fact) and then settling into the community they would come to call home. Post-Mayle this has become a popular genre of writing with some very average writers getting in on the act.

Where Lawrence scores head and shoulders above the others - including Mayle, in my opinion - is that she can write, and, if it just occasionally a touch self-conscious, never is she on firmer ground that when writing about food and related topics, where her evident passion for the subject spills out in endlessly evocative descriptions of markets and the time-consuming obsession with food, in all its guises, that is still a feature of Quercy/Lot life and culture.

When Lawrence visits a market she transports you with her. You can feel the strength of the sun on your shoulders, be newly excited by the enticing displays of fruit and the strange varieties of vegetables and taste your reward of a post-shopping pastis in the café.

Another way in which Lawrence scores over Mayle is that the apparent condescension towards the locals that was, I felt, so evident in his books - where it seemed his neighbours were being unwittingly exploited for literary/financial purposes- is nowhere to be seen. Lawrence, by contrast, writes with respect and affection of her neighbours while still managing to convey how bizarre some of their customs, and how incomprehensible their accent, seemed to her British eyes and ears at first.

Her ability to slot so apparently effortlessly into Quercy life may not be so surprising. Lawrence quickly took up the challenge of entertaining her new friends in the manner to which they were already accustomed, tackling the making of pâté's, the eviscerating of birds, the salting of hams, the preparation of pickles (not such a success with the French, she reports), the pots of jams and jellies, with a lack of squeamishness and also with an evident accomplishment that indicates she was clearly a Lot peasant in another life, even if she does draw the line at preserving haricots verts and bottling tomatoes.

The book is about more than food, though. It is a pot pourri of Quercy anecdotes, a Quercy tapas of different tastes; delving into subjects as diverse as Eleanor of Aquitaine, or Aliénor as she would have been in the Quercy (and as some I know, still are), the annual wine bacchanal in Albas, the winter truffle market of Limogne, or simply walking into the nearest village on an orchid trail.

Some of these anecdotes are slight, perhaps, but it doesn't seem to matter because she does them so well. You are bathed in the lazy art de vivre of rural France. They are quotidian snapshots of her life, amuse-gueules that add up to a six course meal of sights, sounds and impressions of the Quercy in all its loveliness, a feel-good book that leaves you smiling and a tad wistful and wanting more.

How could I fail to enjoy it, therefore? Buy it! You will too.

Lot Blog 2

2008-06-19T01:03:00.000-07:00

Quercy Passions, a relatively new addition to the magazine scene in south-west France, has been researching the events of May 68 (which actually stretched well into June) in Quercy and the Lot, and which appear to have been notable by their absence, at least in the early days. As the capital erupted in riots and strikes the first real action in the Lot was on May 14th when hospital staff went on strike - for three hours. By the 19th the national train strike was biting locally and things gathered pace a bit with the PTT and others joining in. But by June 7th two trains a day were operating from Cahors, Gourdon and Souillac and things were slowly returning to normal.

I happened to find myself in Paris during the évenements of May 68, taking a weekend break from exams and the serious work of protesting the Vietnam War. It was to be a determinedly hedonistic weekend, but as we munched our way through the six courses of our pre-departure lunch, resolutely trying to ignore the distant sounds of shouting in the streets, we were finally moved to action by waves of students rushing into the restaurant to leaflet our fellow diners.

Giving up on the lunch we descended the stairs in search of the protest, unaware at that stage of its magnitude, only to find things peculiarly quiet. We had a rendezvous with a coach - to take us to a small airport on the Normandy coast and thus by propeller plane across the channel - somewhere around République.

Arriving at the métro, however, we were waved away. Everything was closed. Managing to find the last available taxi in Paris, whose driver explained the situation and expressed grave doubts about us reaching our destination, either coach or plane (the airports were now closed too, apparently), we took a right hand turn into a boulevard, cobblestones, to our astonishment, piled up alongside the street, to be met with a surging mass of people advancing upon us, stretched out across the width of the boulevard, arms linked, shouting "CRS SS".

"Merde" said the driver in tones of awe and fear, reversing with such speed back round the corner, that we nearly shot through the windscreen. It suddenly felt impossibly bourgeois - and a little dangerous - to be in a taxi at all and it was with some relief at being able to preserve what was left of our Leftist credentials, that we got out when the driver told us the journey was impossible.

We joined the march for a while - aware of a kind of edgy menace to it that seemed quite different to the Vietnam ones in London - before realising that we were stranded without any money. The taxi had used up the last few francs.

I'm afraid the revolution and our rent-a-mob capabilities were temporarily forgotten.

The rest of the day was spent walking to the American and British embassies (my boyfriend was American) to try and borrow some money for the extra night or two we would have to spend in Paris. It was a city in turmoil and chaos that met our eyes as we walked across it. No transport of any kind, the streets thronging with people, rushing hither and yon in a desperate attempt to find a way home, groups of Parisians arguing politics, students leafleting, the distant noise of demonstrators, private cars hooting at the pedestrians milling over the streets, an air of expectancy and slight fear hovering over the proceedings.

At the British embassy - the Americans, who were to have their own problems that year, refused help to their Latino citizen - I wrote my last cheque and prayed it wouldn't bounce.

It was, of course, an adoptive Lotois who was largely responsible for the peaceful resolution of the '68 uprising. Georges Pompidou's strategy, for good or ill, was to split the solidarity between the students and the workers, by negotiation with the trades unions. A year later, Pompidou was in power and the little town of Cajarc on the Lot/Aveyron border, was put on the map as the holiday haunt of a President and earned its sobriquet "la deuxième capitale de la France".

Pompidou was introduced to the area by Françoise Sagan's sister, so it is appropriate perhaps that this summer of 2008, the 40th anniversary of the May uprising, belongs apparently to Françoise Sagan, or so says Le Figaro. And indeed there has been a rush of revived interest in the author, whose dog reputedly overdosed from sniffing her handkerchiefs, according to an interesting article by French correspondent Angelique Chrisafis in The Guardian.

Apart from a new biography by Marie-Dominique Lelièvre, Sagan: A toute allure, a memoir by a former lover Annick Geille, a film biopic and the re-issuing of many of her books, there is also talk of a possible Hollywood version of her famous first novel Bonjour Tristesse.

Quercy Passions has also jumped on the bandwagon, indeed was one of the first to lead the way, with a long article in the April-May edition reminiscing on her friend Sagan by Eve Flavin.

Sagan was the hedonistic wild child from the Lot who, long before Pompidou, introduced many of her friends to the département. You can visit her grave in the walled cemetery of Seuzac (see p.162 of my book) near Cajarc.

Lelièvre cites Sagan's passion for the causse:

"Les Causses pour moi, c'est la chaleur torride, le desert, des kilomètres et des kilomètres de collines ou seuls émerges encore des hameaux que la soif a vidés…c'est l'impression fantastique, rassurante que la France est vide."

Exactly.

Speaking of drugged-up dogs there was great excitement in Gourdon on May 20th when a home owner spotted a curious animal skulking in the bushes of his garden. It identified itself as a wallaby when it hopped onto the lawn. As one might expect in France the Office National de la Chasse et de la Faune Sauvage (note how the two are inextricably linked) were soon on the spot and the animal was captured. Don't be surprised if wallaby steaks start appearing on menus shortly.

Marc Baldy, the President of the CDT who kindly threw a press reception for the launch of the book is something of a mover and shaker in Lot politics (and indeed national ones too) and has a blog of his own, the Political Bistro. Anyone who wants to keep up to speed with politics in the département should take look. Baldy is well connected and the swipes he takes at Sarko are amusing.

If you associate T E Lawrence, aka Lawrence of Arabia, only with David Lean and the desert, think again. In 1908, aged 20 and a student at Jesus College, Oxford, Lawrence was to be found pedalling around France on his bicycle, according to Guy Penaud in Dire Lot. The journey, the point of which was to discover mediaeval castles and fortifications, was one of several undertaken by Lawrence, and covered an amazing 4,000 kilometres in 54 days, two of which were spent in Cahors, where he was much impressed by the "curious rather than beautiful" Pont Valentré, but less keen on the mosquitoes, wrapping his head in a towel to escape them. From Cahors he cycled west down the Lot valley through Luzech and on to Fumel in Lot et Garonne, passing the ruins of Bonaguil on the way.

Lot Blog 1

2008-05-05T11:00:00.000-07:00

Off to Cahors for the press reception/launch of the book which took place in the bar of the Grand Hotel Terminus in Cahors, nibbles courtesy of the excellent Balandre restaurant, along with a special aperitif created in our honour by the sommelier. We were supposed to guess what it was but never got the response. It was, however, pink, fizzy and very good, possibly a hint of framboise lurking there somewhere.

My publisher Jan and I both had to speak in French in reply to M Baldy, president of the CDT (Departmental tourism committee - and very nerve-wracking it was to do it in public - I don't much enjoy doing it in English. Once that was over it was easier to get into party mode and answer questions, though the resulting photographs in the press next day left something to be desired! It was a glorious day with the first real sun I had seen all week and after the ordeal was over we sat on the terrace of the hotel, finishing off the canapés, with me wondering, for probably the two millionth time in forty years, why I had so dogmatically dismissed the idea of living permanently in France.

The first thing that slapped me around the face like a wet fish on this visit was the reduction in trains stopping at Gourdon, which has, I know, led to many protests. In an effort to be green (but really because I don't much enjoy flying) I have for many years (unless driving- not so green!) taken the train from London to the Lot and for as long as I can remember it was an easy journey (even in pre-Eurostar days) of effortless connections. Not this time. The choice is to arrive at Gourdon at around 14.30 necessitating being at the London Eurostar terminal at 0500 (ie rising at 0400) in the morning or arriving towards 2300, too late for the delicious dinner that tempts you throughout the journey.

To fall off the train and wander off up to the Bouriane where I sip slowly on a kir royale before dinner is one of life's small pleasures. These days, I am even spared the walk, as Mathias has taken to meeting me off the train. Is this a sign of age I ask myself. If so then it is also one of its advantages too! After dinner it's off to have a digestif with Georges, Mathias's father, in his house next to the hotel and catch up with all the gossip, before, finally tumbling into bed, the floodlit light of the church and the ancient castle playing around the silent streets of the little town and the hotel. The next day is already planned. Georges and I will enjoy a light lunch together - as the former chef/owner of the Bouriane 'light' is a relative term - before setting off on one our promenades, where we wander the causse seeking out the new discoveries Georges has made in the intervening months.

But back to the trains. After much searching of timetables there is one other option of changing at Brive, but long journeys are made tedious by multiple changes and are anxiety inducing if connections are late. Is this, I wonder, the beginning of the Sarko effect? Are we to watch France become like everywhere else - cuts in train and hospital services, short lunches, long weeks - a Thatcher-like revolution?

We Brits love to laud the efficiency of SNCF as against our own third-world system, but while the French have a long way to go to catch up with our own particular degree of transport hell, I have noticed, in recent years, a slipping of standards in France too. TGVs I have taken from, or to, Nice or Angers have often been late and sometimes cancelled altogether; the Corail service from the Lot to Paris is frequently late (though less so the other way round for some reason) and then whilst it used to be the UK that suffered from endless disruption caused by strikes, that particular nuisance is now the prerogative of the French.

Speaking of which, why no TGV service to the Lot? Nor even one in the offing. Almost alone in France, the centre/southwest is a barren desert for fast trains; a strange omission for a rail system that is predominantly north-south, rather than east-west, based.

The gap created by this oversight (presumably the betunnelled stretch through the Vézère gorge is the problem) will no doubt be filled by the new Brive/Cressensac airport, due to open….last year, this year, sometime...Part of me dreads it. Will we have drunken stag parties falling off the plane and roaming around Cressensac, Souillac and Brive baring their bottoms? God forbid.

One of the nice things about publishing a new book is the number of new people you meet, or make contact with, whilst undertaking all the hype and publicity connected to the launch. It was great, for instance, to meet Sophie Bacou, owner of Librairie Chiméra in Montcuq at the launch, after many years of hearing about her. Copies of the book will be on sale there and at Books and Company in Gourdon. The genial M Marvier in the Librairie de la Bouriane, Gourdon, has some on order too.

I have been corresponding for a few weeks now with Amanda Lawrence who has been delighting many of us for several years with her charming newsletter on the French Entrée site.

Amanda is an aficionado of Quercy markets and clearly an accomplished preparer of the produce she buys there. Now she has written her own book, White Stone, Black Wine based around this theme and judging by the extract, you will find its pages easily as evocative as the newsletter. Sadly, as I trek to Cahors to launch my book, Amanda treks in the opposite direction to the London Book Fair to promote hers (due out early June), so our meeting is temporarily postponed.

In similar ways have I corresponded with Michael Sanders who wrote From Here You Can't See Paris, based round La Recréation restaurant in Les Arques, and more recently Families of the Vine about the Cahors wine producers. Michael is moving on to the Pyrenees now but I am sure will still keep his Lot contacts.

Catherine Stock is another contact who is also an artist and author living in the Lot and you will recognise some Lot landscapes in her illustrations.

Some years ago I was invited to speak at a table ronde of British authors writing about SW France, in Duras, Lot et Garonne, where I met the author Douglas Boyd who has just published Voices From the Dark Years: the truth about occupied France, an interesting account of the Occupation with some new and original material.

One of the awful things about publishing a new book is the number of errors that slip through no matter how many times you check the text. As Amanda says, French errors are the worst as they are immediately assumed to be author errors, whilst English slip-ups are presumed to be the printer's responsibility. This is so true, so let me say here and now and before everyone points it out, that it should be “nuits folles” in the introduction and point de vue not pointe de vue! There was a time when errors in books were inconceivable - how did they achieve that. Were there armies of people checking the text?

And things date quickly. Already, since publication, Au Déjeuner de Sousceyrac has regained its Michelin star of the first edition, which I had had to withdraw in the second. Quercy Recherche, that illustrious magazine seems to have found extra funding and is happily publishing new research and Chez Louise in Le Vigan has re-opened its doors again.

Writers seem to flock to the south-west as moths drawn to a candle and few more illustrious than WS Merwin the American Pullitzer winning poet. Anyone who shares my passion for the Gramat causse should read The Lost Upland. I was put on to his Lot connection when Peter Davison, poetry editor of the Atlantic (Monthly) and an accomplished poet himself, mentioned both my book and the Lost Upland in an article in the Atlantic in 2001. Thinking I would send him a copy of the second edition I looked him up only to discover that he has sadly died. There are some people you regret never having met. Peter Davison is one. Louis Malle another. Causse lovers both.

Wandering the causse with Georges after lunching on some melt-in-the-mouth asparagus, we fetched up at the tiny, lost hamlet of Beguès where the farmer invited us in to his magnificent, if slightly dilapidated, house for something I have rarely been offered in the Lot before, a glass (or two) of cider. We sat round the bare wooden table for a couple of hours chatting, surrounded by dusty, browning photographs, until Monsieur T had to go and look after his stock before nightfall - the lambs, adorable little things with black-patched eyes - were bleating audibly, though not for Monsieur T presumably, as their food was on tap so to speak. Madame, Monsieur and Master T accompanied us to the car and waved us off into the twenty-first century amid much hilarity. The sun set in fierce horizontal waves of gold, blinding our eyes as we made our way home across the silent, darkening causse.

A couple of days later it was not cider we were imbibing but a mysterious bottle of red that Mathias had decanted so as not to give away the label. French friends from Angers had joined me and we spent some time trying to guess at its origins. Mathias had earlier told me that he was going to give us a bottle of 1989 Clos de Gamot, which he recently sampled and found boisterous and excellent. However, Georges and I had accidentally found ourselves in Prayssac the previous day and couldn't resist stopping off at nearby Clos de Gamot for a dégustation. Taking Mathias at his word and not actually bothering to taste it - I bought several bottles of the '89 and some 2005 - already tasting pretty good - to lay down - Cahors ages well.

Mathias had therefore changed his mind about what to give us. The wine he offered was definitely quite mature we decided and a Cahors but beyond that we were stymied. In point of fact it was not old at all but a 2003 Lagrézette from Alan-Dominique Perrin's vineyard. ADP has something of a reputation for this kind of thing and it was amazing that something so young tasted and drank so well. The traditional (Clos de Gamot) and the new Cahors - each style has its merits.

Speaking of people flocking to the south-west, one who did so a few years back and who filmed and wrote of it, was accomplished chef John Burton Race. In the programme and the book he waxed lyrical about the produce and the area (Aude, I think). This weekend we discovered the truth. Race was bored to tears by south-west cookery and the eternal “ duck, duck, fucking duck” and decamped to Barcelona every other weekend throughout his stay.

In younger days, when I could polish off foie gras and the "fucking duck" with ease I would have thought this sacrilege, but I have a sneaking sympathy with Race now. Countries like France and Italy, with strong traditions of good regional cuisine, can be incredibly parochial about trying other things. One of the advantages of having lost touch with our own cuisine in the UK is the diversity of good food on offer these days - albeit at a price - and particularly of course in London, but also in some of the provinces. But while one can eat well in pubs and restaurants in many areas it is still incredibly difficult to buy good ingredients in ordinary shops. There are farmers' markets of course, but bog-standard markets simply don't come close to those in most of France. Thanks to the quality of these markets in the Lot one can cook in whatever style one prefers, but I think my every day tastes would run to a more Provencal type of diet than the typical Lot one.

I've never written a blog before. Reading back through this I wonder sometimes if it doesn't read like one of those round robin letters people are apt to send at Christmas, boring on and on about people you have never heard of and care about less. Will Simon Hoggart of the Guardian start to do for blogs what he has already done for the Christmas letters. But then one has to consider the success of la petite anglaise, where people got so involved in the meaningless details of her life she had to finally call a halt to the intrusion occasioned by it. I will endeavour therefore to limit the regular dramatis personae and hope I can find a balance in future entries that falls between both extremes. More in about a month.