2007-2008 Holidays In France

December 21-22, 2007
By the time 2007 came around, flying to France and traveling within the country was becoming routine. And that’s good. So for the holidays in 2007 including the 2008 New Year, I decided to do some very advanced planning. We drove from Portsmouth to DC Dulles and parked in row 29C. We had a direct flight from there to Paris. That was one thing that made it easy, limiting the flight time to only seven hours. The other thing was that I had actually booked the flight 11 months prior in February 2007. So there was no searching for weeks on end for the best flight and the best deal. On the flight itself we had marginal food and were actually saved by the chocolate bars I bought at World Market the previous week. Baggage was the normal one hour ordeal at Charles de Gaulle. We had to change from terminal 1 to terminal 2D to find an open Budget rental car counter because we arrived so early. We ended up with a Nissan Note with only 5 km on it! It was very nice. We drove into Paris and found a sweet free parking spot right beside Karine’s building. The rest of the day we explored Montparnasse shops and the Luxembourg Gardens. Things kept getting more crowded as the day progressed. By the time we found our way to the Paris Opera area to see some lights and window displays, Paris had exploded into a summer like pedestrian condition. That means chaos, rudeness, smelly people... just crazy. After a few minutes of swimming through people and getting separated again and again we realized that our play for the evening was over and took the Metro back toward Karine’s apartment and bought evening provisions at a nearby Monoprix. Sev and I polished off the Moulis-Medoc Bordeaux with dinner and we all slept well. 

Daylight is about 8 AM or later this time of year, so we got up after that on 23 December. We ate and loaded up for Orleans only about one hour south of Paris. It was nice... not crowded, and pretty so we made a fine choice. The bad part was the traffic out of Paris. Once again everyone seemed to be leaving Paris. The highway was an endless jam. We were lucky to have a national route option and we bailed off the autoroute toll road and took it instead. After touring the old town on foot the ladies ate food from a market while I had to get the requisite regional French salad. As usual, it was perfect. Dressing on the side this time. Two lettuces. Ripe tomato. Roasted potato. Cured ham. Lardons (pork belly cubes). A poached egg. Homemade croutons. Cucumber. Dry cured sausage. This type of salad is mostly lost in America. Restaurants apparently do not know this simple rule – if an ingredient can’t stand alone it has no place in a salad. Superior ingredients equal superior salads. Later that day, the drive to Saint Paul de Lubressac just south or Cahors was long. We arrived with no gas left in the tank, both the car's tank and our own energy levels, at 7:30 PM we settled in to some dinner of warmed potatoes, cheeses, and cured meats with salad. Tomorrow would be Christmas Eve and we had been moving hard and fast for 2 1/2 days.

On December 24, 2007 we woke up close to 9 AM. We were sleeping downstairs where there are very small windows so it was very dark and quiet. After the sound sleep the day was the usual chaos of socializing and eating. All day long. Actually, Christmas Eve is a gastronomic blowout. Breakfast is as usual. That means croissants or brioche and jam with coffee. Lunch is usually normal as well... a sandwich and a vegetable. But, on this day Michelle prepared green beans and pork loin with onions and prunes in the pressure cooker. I could eat this dish every day for the rest of my life. But the real action started at 8 PM and we ate from that hour until after midnight. Oysters, shrimp, snails, salmon... it was a seafood feast. The hors d’oeuvres included prunes wrapped in bacon and then baked. Christ! Just kill me now! I loved the bacon and prunes! There will be a tray on the way to heaven and most certainly an endless supply once there. Before all this gluttony, we ran about 10 km to Fountain La Boeff. The land in the Tarn-Et-Garonne  and the Lot regions is pretty. It is rolling and pastoral. France is the land of moss. Any organic object facing the sky with a good amount of shade will succumb to a green sheet of the stuff in time.

On Christmas day we just recovered. Of course, and this is a good thing, we had a two hour blowout lunch with a round of foie gras from both duck and goose. The livers were served with homemade fig preserves and wine from the region that was slightly sweet call Jurancon. It’s just not possible to describe how good this food was. Oh, there were more bacon wrapped prunes, too!

On December 26 we left before 9 AM to take a side trip away from the family to the Languedoc and Roussillon regions along the Mediterranean. This would be our first venture there. The Tarn region gives way to the Haut Garonne. It is much less pretty there. The large city of Toulouse comes and goes. Soon enough we arrived in Carcassonne. The Cite is in an old fort/castle, built to mythological proportions. It has more than 48 towers and turrets. It was never taken by force. After visiting it is easy to see why. Only a fools fool would attempt to penetrate it. We had crepes for lunch and listened to a happy man talk of the never-satisfied French worker for about 20 minutes or so. This old guy had been around, so he knew things from experience! We drove around town by accident as we got lost trying to leave. They are modernizing the plaza there and we drove around the construction and up a lively shopping street. Heading out of town, the Roussillon vineyards started right away. Gnarly old head pruned vines and strong winds were with us through the rolling hills and wind power farms as we approached the Mediterranean. With the Mediterranean in sight, we descended to Perpignan and arrived in Collioure before dark. We parked and strolled along the sea in this pretty city. There was a port in the cove and pebble beach. They were also several castles and ramparts within the city. It is quite beautiful and reminded us of the Cinque Terre in Italy without the crowds. We found a hotel with the help of a friendly tourist information desk employee. One thing to keep in mind is the small letter”i” in blue can be your savior. The Hotel Teapliers Was a decent place and only cost €62. We walked to the local shops and bought cheeses, bread, yogurt, cured meats, and wine. We feasted on this food and drink and the local red Cote de Coulliore wine before watching some TV and going to bed.

On December 27, 2007 we woke up to our grocery provisions for breakfast, that being breads and apricot jam that was of local origin and a regional specialty. Then we walked up to the old windmill to the south of town. This mill actually was used to drive a stone press for olive oil and is still functional. Beyond that we walked on up to a  ridge line panorama adjacent to a very imposing monastery. After returning down into town we had coffee and some great chocolate pastries delivered to us by a really happy lady on the beach/cove area. We drove out through Seret and over a pass on the D618 road through the town of Oms. The pass was pretty and impossibly long. We took a national route to Villafrance de Conflents. There is a beautiful castle and a fortified old city there. From there, we headed up into the Pyrenees where the ski areas started to appear. Lots of traffic on two lane roads with no passing available. Then we connected to the national route number 20 through a tunnel and took 30 additional minutes to clear Ax de Thermes. I know I’m repetitive here but the traffic was really pretty bad. Slow drivers were having a hard time realizing that they should use the pullouts and let all of the backed up traffic behind them pass. It was just a slog that seem to go on forever. As we cleared another tunnel at Foix, the fog followed us all the way back to the Lot region. What a drive! We had a Cepe mushroom omelette, salad, and fruit for dinner back at Michele’s that evening. 

On December 28, 2007 we were up at 9 AM, again! After some breakfast and talking we said our goodbyes and drove the two hours and 15 minutes back to Bort. On the way we left and joined the fog over and over again. It’s seem to be sucked in to the valley from the Atlantic ocean some one hundred kilometers or so away. Then the valley somehow compresses and gathers it. It becomes palatable, spoonable, impenetrable. We finally left the fog for good around Brive en Gallard. Bort was actually sunny, thank God, as there are not many sunny days in the winter there. We had sausages and veggies for lunch. I did a hike to the cross of the Bastides across the valley and above town. The ladies hiked on the other side at the Orgues. In the evening we had another mushroom omelette. No complaints here! Cepe mushrooms are very special. They are similar to shiitake mushrooms and grow on and around oak trees. 2007 was not a good year for these types of mushrooms but 2006 was a banner year. Since mushrooms freeze well we were actually eating mushrooms from the previous year! 

On December 29, 2007 we had a simple day. We ate breakfast, went to the market, ate lunch, hiked, ate dinner, and went to sleep! More specifically we ate pork fillet at lunch with prunes and onions. We hiked the Orgues in the rain in the afternoon. Then we ate Pot Au Feux in the evening, which is a traditional dish of beef parts boiled with potato carrot and rutabaga. It’s seasoned with the green parts of a bunch of leaks tied together as a garni. As usual, Severine’s mother Elise never stops. Always chopping, shopping, cooking, cleaning. That is why I bought flowers today for her at the market. 

On December 30 and 31st 2007, we had two more glorious days of eating and walking and reading. I forgot to mention that I usually go through at least two books on these trips. Thanks to my mother gifting me a Kindle a few years ago, reading has become a new passion for me. On both of these days there was fog in the morning that cleared by afternoon. The days have been cool at about 7°C, but not bad for this time of year.

On January 1, 2008 the sky was blue in the morning for a change! We packed everything into our luggage and ate our New Year’s dinner early. Then we drove to Paris. On the way we went through about four different climate zones. We actually had sun in the Dordogne valley, ice in the high Massif, fog on the Cher plains, and clouds in the Loire valley. We had dinner back at Karine’s apartment before going to our hotel near the airport. The Holiday Inn Express we stayed at was actually very nice. Returning the car was not so easy. Bad signing, rude people, and freezing cold made it a little bit of an ordeal. At least we wouldn’t have to deal with it on our departure day.

On January 2, 2008, our trip back started at 8 AM with a wake up call. We were in the check in line by 9:30 AM. Our plane was supposed to depart at 12:30 PM. By the time we cleared security, our plane was boarding! It took three hours! There were four separate passport checks, long queues at each... just awful. The flight was fine. We landed back in DC at 2:30 PM and we’re home by 8:30 PM. Traffic exiting the DC area was OK that evening. So our travel time back home that day was 18 1/2 hours total.