StCirq

The next few days are so soporific they blend together in a kind of lush haze. We go to market in Le Bugue but leave once we've walked the length of it and chatted with the Cheese Guy and bought a small bag of cashews from the Spice Guy. The traffic jam getting out of town back toward our house is so intense we decide to go the opposite direction and just spend part of the day wandering. I drive and Taylor says " turn right there" or " take that road." And so we spend four hours lost in the hills, discovering a " route des cretes" and villages never hear of and long abandoned "ports" along the Dordogne and Vezere. We come across sign after sign for the Chateau de Bannes and then when we get there are rebuffed by a stern "Propriete Prive - Defense d' Entrer" sign. We end up in the Limeuil, where the elbow bridge spans both the Vezere and Dordogne and have a late lunch at Le Chai, which specializes in home made sorbets and ice cream. My beef carpaccio comes with three tiny scopps of beet, cucumber, and giner sorbet. For dessert I have a scoop of rose petal and a scoop of violet. Delicious. They have green tea and safran and curry, too.

One night a storm rumbles up the valley. We hear the increasingly loud rolls of thunder for almost three hours before we can see lightning and the rain begins to fall. It's a ferocious storm, but we stand outside entralled anyway, soaked by curtains of rain and jumping whenever the lightning hits. It's still raging when we go to bed, and in the morning a steady rain is still pelting the valley.
Madeleine arrives on the train from Paris and falls out of the train in a jet-lagged coma, saying she hasn't slept or eaten and she has to have a pizza marguerite. We find one along the road in the town of DOuze and she devours it. At home she showers and goes to bed at 5 pm. At three in the morning we can hear her clunking around in the kitchen.
Now that she is here, it's time to go into Sarlat, to shop. We spend a couple of hours stroling up and down La Traverse, but prices are truly astronomical. There are SOLDES signs everywhere, but pairs of shoes once priced at 193 euros are selling for 135 and miniskirts made of less than a yard of cloth are 89 euros. I'm pretty sure that most Sarladais don't have this kind of money to spend on clothing - is it just for the wealthy tourists? At any rate, no one is buying much of anything at all.
On the way home we stop at the Intermarche, which is packed. While we're standing at the cheese counter, the lights go out. They flicker back on once or twice, but then go out again. It's eerie in a supermarket without lights - no one panicked, but there were a lot of children crying and people calling to each other " Daniel! Over here by the yogurt!!" This goes on for 15-20 minutes, and finally there is a loud humming sound and the lights are back on. And of course the lines at the cash register are endless. Enough excitement for the day; time to go home and read and have dinner under the trees, now that the rain has subsided.
We go kayaking again, but this time we get clunkier boats that are harder to maneuver, so it's not quite so much fun. We go to Fauque in Le Bugue for chocolats liegeois more than a couple of times. We punctuate these excesses with bouts of working in the garden and heated ping-pong matches. In the evening we dip in the pool and listen to the quinces plopping off the tree in the driveway.
Tomorrow we head to the town of Pons, just south of Saintes, for a brief overnight before going on to the Ilse d'Oleron for a couple of days. Uncharted territory - always a good thing.

Betsy

...and this installment is also a good thing. Quest ce que c'est "chocolats liegeois," s'il vous plait?

Betsy

Make that "Qu' est-ce que..."

cmt

I didn't know what it was either, but here it is: http://www.cuisinorama.com/index_cuisine.asp?num=670

Betsy

Maintenant, qu'est ce que "vermicelle"? Similar to our chocolate "shot"?

marcy_

I think maybe chocolate curls?

marcy_

Or maybe those little elongated oval chocolate cake decorations- I don't know what they're called in English.

FauxSteMarie

Chocolate liegeois is generally a chocolate sundae. It usually has vanilla ice cream, chocolate sauce, whipped cream, etc. It also generally costs a lot more than it would in the US.

I have been to Ile d'Oleron when I had the loan of a home exchanger's vacation place there. I found it to be no great shakes except for the oysters and a visit to the fortress. In August it is just jam packed with people staying in every sort of accomodation including tents. They also allow dogs on the beaches (whatever the signs say) and that creates another problem.

There are certainly better beach resorts in the US. It may be my own personal preference, but I would never go to Europe for a beach. US beaches are cleaner and nicer (but, of course, without the French ambiance--which may make a difference for some of you) and, for the best beaches, I would choose some island in the Caribbean or Hawaii. European beaches tend to be full of rocks and not as sandy as US beaches.

To each is own. . . .

Glad your family is slowly assembling in the Dordogne. Now we have Taylor and Madeleine. Can StCirq's husband be far behind?

I guess we have to stay tuned.

cmt

Literally "little worms," in the context of an ice cream sundae, I think they might be chocolate (or multi-colored sugar) sprinkles. If you search harder than I did, you can probably find a picture, but this must be the product: http://www.meilleurduchef.com/cgi/md...lle_choco.html

cmt

P.S. I think chocolate curls (above) was a better answer, but I just think it's probably a pretty standard product that comes out of a bag or jar.

It's also a variety of pasta, but not in this context.

P.P.S. How did we get on this tangent?

tondalaya

This is like watching grass grow.

cmt

Oh, and while we're on the subject of iced confections (sort of), as much as I do love to try new things, and I enjoy these flavors in certain placesw, saffron or curry flavored sorbet sounds a little too jarring. Has anyone tasted it? Rose, violet, ginger, cucumber, and tea flavored all sound a lot better.

StCirq

I don't go to Europe for a beach, either. I've got a pool here - I don't need water to round out a vacation. I do have French friends who suggested a tiny village on the Ile d' Oleron with a nice beach that has some historic sites and good restaurants. I doubt it will be more overrun than Le Bugue has been in the past few days, and as it is new territory for us and nearby to Royan and Saintes and lots of other places with all kinds of interesting sites, I doubt we'll be bored.

Lauren, I guess you'll just have to keep reading to find out which family members arrive when. I guess you're surprised that Madeleine is here, given your earlier comments. Perhaps your 17-year-olds didn't still want to travel with the family. Strange you should be so interested.
I'm offline for the next week, so there's no compelling need to comment.
Betsy: a chocolat liegeois is a couple of scoops of chocolate ice cream with whipped cream (not the sugary stuff we get in the USA but pure whipped sweet thick French cream) and sometimes a bit of chocolate syrup. I don't know where the " vermicelle" came from, but I've only heard that referring to pasta - angel hair pasta to be precise. If it did refer to a dessert, I'm certain cmt would be right and it would be shavings of chocolate.

cigalechanta

Ile de Ré is wonderful.

cigalechanta

But if you want an underdevelped, inexpensive sleepy, island with good beaches, Oleron is terrific. Her children will love bike riding there. The castle looks like a prison to me.

FauxSteMarie

The fortress off Ile d'Oleron was erected by Louis XIV or XV (all those Louis can get confusing) as part of the defense during the wars of religion. The area around La Rochelle was heavily Protestant. What that citadel is known most for today is that it was the site for a really crazy French quiz show that was sort of a live version of a video game. I can't remember the name of the show, but I do know it entertained my son. And, I don't know if it is still going on.

I don't think I actually went over to tour the Citadel (I am not sure you can tour it). I just passed it by on the causeway over to the island where you see the oyster beds.

In case StCirq sees this before returning to her house: Saintes looked like a nice town with a few things to see. Unfortunately, I did not get to see them because I did not have time.

I found Oleron to be very boring and hotfooted back to the people's principal home exchange in the Loire after a couple of days. It was basically just another place where people sit on the beach, but with dogs on the beach (again, despite the signs). There were also vendors selling food along the beach. Not my cup of tea. I like my beach more peaceful.

It is true that Oleron is flat and that, if kids have bikes, they can have fun riding them, but, again, you can do that anywhere.

I do agree with the poster that said that these reports are sort of like watching grass grow. When a person goes back to the same location year after year--no matter where it is--the vacation becomes a ritual. You do the same things and, since you have already done the major touristy things, you just relax. StCirq may be having a nice lazy vacation but I doubt there is anything here to help anyone else plan his vacation in the Dordogne unless they own the house next door. Most of us going to the Dordogne would be there to see the sites that StCirq knocked off her list ages ago.

And, yes, 17 year-olds in my family generally had jobs or preferred doing things with their friends to vacationing with parents. The family vacation rebellion began in my house at about age 14 or 15. I know I wasn't much for hanging out with the parents either at that age. In my own family I fought it with the first child and then realized that it was a natural part of growing up and said, "OK that's over." We sent my daughter on a teen tour to Israel one year and she had a blast with a pile of teens to hang with (as opposed to old foggie parents); also they knew what to do to keep teens amused. My son was only interested in going back to work at the camp where he now runs the drama department, so that is what he did--and still does.

My daughter caught the travel bug really bad: She now lives in Germany and speaks both fluent French & German. She makes a sort of living doing translation. My son was not as interested. He wants to make a living writing plays. Both are out of a socially acceptable college and--more or less--on their own.

When I think back on the family vacation, I remember best the years spent at a local beach when the children were too small to take to far flung destinations. Then, all of a sudden they were teens and asking to take friends with them on vacation as a condition of going themselves. Such is life. . . .

You turn around and the kids are gone.

To each his own.

klondike

We loved Saintes last year as we passed through. Wonderful lunch at Le Bistrot Galant 28 r. St-Michel and too much to see in a short pass-through. Fantastic Roman history/ruins and too many abbeys/churches to squeeze in. We're planning on heading back in September so I hope you can give us a little direction StCirq in your next report!

FauxSteMarie

As I said, Saintes looked interesting and the above post proves that my suspicions were correct.

Unfortunately, I wasted 2 days on Ile d'Oleron instead of having a look at Saintes.

laverendrye

Faux/Lauren. I am intrigued to learn that your children went to socially acceptable colleges. As a non-American I am not familiar with the concept, but I imagine that in some circles Bob Jones U. would be unacceptable, while in others Oberlin might not have a very high social cachet. Can you explain?

rockhopper7

laverendrye, You may be a non American but you are plugged in enough to know that Oberlin and Bob Jones U occupy opposite ends of the US political spectrum. Why the need to bait another poster?