Festival time again

It's festival time again and the principal activities of our village festival are drinking Pastis and avoiding bulls!

Unofficial, all-inclusive bull avoidance takes part in the streets. I'll try to take some pictures tomorrow.

The more organised bull avoiding is in the village arena, where the Provençal version of bull- fighting takes place. The bulls are not killed. In fact it's more dangerous for the 'Razateurs' who try and cut small string rosettes from the bulls' horns. I've put togethr this little slide show to give an impression of 'Les Courses Camarguaises'...

Festival Time Again

The Avignon Festival started this week. I haven't had tome to go into Avignon just yet, so I thought I'd put up some shots I took at last year's festival to give a bit of flavour....

Bulls' heart steaks "Margherita"

We've been buying Coeur de Boeuf (Bull's heart) tomatoes at the farmers' market in Velleron.  They are aptly named - heart shaped and enormous, and you can cook hem like meat.  They're sweet and flavourful and their flesh is so firm that they can be sliced and grilled on the barbecue.

The other night, we cooked them in just that way and then tossed torn fresh mozzarella and basil leaves over them and finished with some good olive oil and balsamic vinegar.  Delicious! 

 The combination of tomato, mozzarella and basil is called 'Margherita' after the classic pizza topping named Margherita after the queen of Italy, because of its red, white and green colouring; the colours of the Italien flag.  

A Purple Patch

At the end of June, it's a purple patch that we go through.  The lavender and perovskia are really going for it and they have been joined by the agapanthus now.

Here they're mixed with cosmos (pink daisy) and berberis for contrast.

And we've got another purple patch going beside the pool (above) with a low growing bed of ageratum, alysum, verbena and lobelia (not in shot).

The perovskia (Russian Sage) provides a great back ground to these dark red hollyhocks too.

Shooting the Cat

It's not easy, photographing the cat, you know.

Especially when it's a wild one that's adopted you.

She'll let us pet her now, but it took a long time to gain her confidence.

And perseverance pays off in the end.

Lindsay has named her Sweetie-Pie.

She doesn't come in the house.  But she does catch mice so she's welcome to stick around!

Roussillon

This is Roussillon in the Luberon.  Until the beginning of the 20th century it was a centre of pigment mining.  The pigments were used for paints of all kinds, and Rousillon is a good advertisement for its own product as all of the houses are rendered with various tints and shades of the local red rock.

Indeed, I am told that Roussillon means red earth in the old language of the South of France.

Les Sentiers des Ochres, Roussillon

These cliffs are the old ochre works in Roussillon.  In the 19th Century natural pigments were mined from these hills.  

The disused quarries, called "Les Sentiers des Ochres", are now open to the public.  The circuit takes about an hour and a half.

First you descend the stairs into the bowl of the quarry.

The cliffs glow with intense reds, yellows and pinks.

Strange pillars of stone are left standing.  Perhaps the rock in these columns was not rich enough in pigment to warrant cutting?