Rural Life

August festivities and harvests

Normally I find that things quieten down in the first couple of weeks of August, before exploding into action again after Assumption (15th August) as we go into Comice season and preparations for the Rentrée.  This hasn't been the case this year, with Convivial'été having its last hurrah of the season on the 1st August in Vieil Baugé.  The Comité des Fêtes was on war footing, despite a number of key players being away on holiday.  We were supported by the Baugé en Anjou technical services and tourism teams, but everything food and drink was down to us.  By 7pm we were girded and ready for the off.

And that was about the last moment of peace until 10pm!  I was taking dinner orders, not payments, just orders.  The first was at 7:30pm and the queue didn't stop until we had sold out of sausages and chips and andouillettes (rather unpleasant to my mind tripe sausages) and chips at about 10pm.  I stopped the queue at one stage for 30 seconds to put a sweatshirt on as the evening was cool, but that was it!  A chum took a picture of the clouds and caught the queue.

There were two bands.  I totally missed the exotic Bulgarian folk music, complete with strange machine - this is an official photo.

The second band, Pet't J Bus, were a lot of fun.  A punk ska combo who delighted in taking French classics and turning them into ska anthems, with the occasional own creation thrown in (although that might just have been the sound test), which seemed a bit more "basic", if you see what I mean, and less suitable for a family audience.  I did do a couple of videos but there is no chance of loading them on YouTube today, so here is a photo for ambiance.

We weren't the only ones having fun and frolics.  Chinon had its mediaeval market weekend, with lots of people dressed up in fun costumes, lashings of food and drink and music.  I imagine it was impossible to park too!  Anyway, another robbed photo, this time of our favourite brewer, Simon, without his glasses, but looking suitably of the period!

And if that wasn't enough fun, the Comice season kicked off early this year, with Beauvau (tiny village, but gave it's name to Place Beauvau in Paris, which is rather important) trying to rekindle the Comice spirit in its area.  We remember fondly an amazing Comice there perhaps 12 or 14 years ago with 4x4 demonstrations, a chainsaw wood carver, a competition for the biggest pumpkin among other delights, and close to the centre of the village.  This year was all about tractors and ploughing.  We had a lovely ice-cream each from a local farm and admired the range of tractors, but only stayed 20 minutes.

All the preparation work John did on the kitchen garden beds, with rotovating and adding loads of quality compost is paying off.  We are now up to about 150 courgettes harvested, and for the past couple of weeks have also been picking large quantities of small yellow pear-shaped tomatoes which are wonderfully sweet.  Today's haul also included two cayenne chilli peppers, and a green pepper, as well as some yellow carrots and an onion.  We will eat well and healthily tonight I think!

Earlier in the week I was able to pick the first Coeur de Boeuf tomatoes.  While not the largest on the plant, this one demonstrates the heart shaped form of the tomato and deep colour that gives it its name.  It was also delicious with a good dressing as an accompaniment to whatever we had for dinner that night.  There are many more of these to come, and they make a very good tomato sauce.

We've also been picking loads of blackberries - I will be making bramble jelly tomorrow for the first time in ages (I hope I can remember how!) as a real treat for the winter.  Today John was attacked by, or possibly flirted with, by a huge bumble bee.  Once removed from his shirt and placed on a plant, I was able to get a good look - what a marvellous specimen, and well over a centimetre long.

Next week the heatwave returns, but that might also ripen up more plums and tomatoes, so it could be a very red and purple post next week!  Have a good week!

 

Summer ends with a splash!

Friday evening's pub session was grey, cool (I was wearing a sweatshirt, for goodness sake), and distinctly humid.  Saturday morning we woke to a thunderstorm and heavy rain - some 20mm before 11am.  But as so often with summer storms, but midday, the sun was out and temperatures rocketed and we were able to sit out for aperos in the garden and say how lovely it all was.  So at 3:30am, we were unimpressed to be woken with a shock by loud thunder nearly overhead and positively biblical rain, which carried on for a good hour.

I am always surprised after such a violent sounding night, how in the morning, you have to look really hard to find the evidence of the cataclysm that seemed to be going on during the hours of darkness.  Yes, the rain gauge was pretty full, and the one at The Garden was nearly overflowing, and driving to The Garden, there were odd banks of sand by some of the fields, but nothing particularly broken, just a lot more water in the ponds.

It is sad that summer ends so abruptly, not least as we are still in Comice season, and Genneteil were doing the honours this year for the Noyant Villages area.  Still by the time they got to the procession of villages (no fancy floats this year from the Noyant area), the sun was doing its best to shine on them.  I do feel that this year's procession was a demonstration of cruelty to Renault 4s and as I used to drive one, I felt a lot of sympathy for this poor car, pulling a trailer that was too well loaded for the weight of the car.

For an event where the theme was Rock and Retro, I also felt that the non-marching band weren't quite in the swing of the theme by playing Lady Gaga's Poker Face.  But perhaps it is the highlight of their repertoire.

Autumn jobs are coming to the forefront of our thinking.  The Meadow needs to be fully mown and the side paths need to be cleared so that I can get into the little woodland at the end and finally see what is down there.  The Orchard is too overgrown and needs to be sorted out before the walnuts start to fall - not least as walnuts are our rent to the landlady.  So, lots to do, and possibly too much for one man. 

So I rummaged in my moth filled wallet and invested in a strimmer/brushcutter that I can use.  My elbow has ceased to support frequent use of a pullcord for starting a petrol engine, so I have gone for a battery model and used it for the first time yesterday.  The battery lasted longer than I did, which bodes well for later in the autumn.  Me in safety gear, harness and carrying said strimmer is not a good look, but better safe than sorry!

Last Sunday, in a last hurrah to summer, we attended a jazz manouche concert at our local pub - Les Epines de Mymi Rose.  I've wanted to catch one of her concerts for a while, so was delighted to spend a warm summer evening, sitting with a glass of wine. listening to an excellent performance.

One of the delights of autumn here are vivid sunsets, so this from Wednesday night may well be the first of many.  There is much that is autumnal around at the moment, with the giant orange jelly slugs, ripe fruit falling and a certain feel to the air.  I am very fond of early autumn, but not so much this year, as we never seem to have had much of a summer.  Perhaps a week or so in August.

I did mention giant orange jelly slugs - they are numerous and finding life just too, too wonderful at the moment.  Wandering around the One Acre Wood I nearly stopped slug sex but standing on two, but managed to sidestep them just in time.  Fascinating and disgusting at the same time!

Have a good week!

 

It's all about weather, and the Olympics

After years of planning and months of the Olympic Torch passing through as much of France as possible, and people trying to get enthused about it all, last week it started!  Opinions are divided over the opening ceremony, ranging from censorship, through moans about it being boring and taking too long, being bitty and strange, to out and out adoration.  It seems to depend on how well you know French history and culture and whether you can be bothered to dredge your memory for interminable teams with flags parading into tight capacity Olympic stadia in previous iterations.

I can see both sides - from my academic and intellectual perspective, it was an interesting take on how to parade sportspeople from over 200 nations into a holding area where they can observe the Olympic oath being taken by representatives.  The logistics are always challenging, so to take to the water adds another dimension and a different way of doing it.  I suspect Los Angeles won't try to imitate that!  On the detail of some of the tableau, well, if you don't know French history or popular culture, many things will go over your head and the always quirky Philippe Katerine may well be a long way outside your comfort zone.

Some have said it was too inclusive - but working to the French moto of Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité, I don't think you can overdo the inclusiveness, including a 100 year old Olympic Gold medal holder being the third last link in the torch relay.  There were moments that had me teared up (French boat going under the bridge), or held in wonder (the horse charging up the Seine), or just downright proud to live in France (the light show around the Tour Eiffel), but people will never agree.  I liked it, you may not have done, but as always I found something else to do while the teams were on the move.

I've not included a picture - there are many in the public domain.

In the run up to Friday, all the discussion was about the weather - would it stay dry?  Would the front pass through beforehand?  Would it just be a bit of cloud and the odd drop of rain?  At no time did the forecasters say, "It will pee it down like you haven't seen in Paris in July without thunder for years".  O well!  The week was so mixed with hot sun on Wednesday and Thursday, and now again on Sunday.  It just goes to show you can't rely on the weather behaving itself.  But today things are looking lovely.

The sky last evening did actually presage a change in weather, with a wonderful, luminous pink effect across high clouds heading away to the east.  Today is the transition from something akin to October to high summer, which is due to last three or four days I gather!

Yesterday I dug up a load of potatoes for the week - they are looking good, but aren't really interesting to photograph.  While I worked I was whistled at a lot by a golden oriole, so I replied, imitating its call.  We kept up our conversation for a good quarter of an hour - I wonder what we said!

A final item from yesterday, was that the usual Saturday market in Baugé was augmented by the monthly display of classic, vintage and collectable cars and vans.  Some are quite magnificent, while others make me feel old as they were normal when I was growing up.  To add to the display this month, they brought along entertainment - a clarinettist playing jazz standards to a backing track.  He was very good and it was a delight.  I hope he comes back again soon!

Anyway, for a Sunday, we have a very busy end of the day (annoying as I would quite like to vegetate in front of the TV watching the cross country bit of the Olympic 3 day event from Versailles, but they keep cutting away to basketball or table tennis, so I guess I'm not missing much).  I had better go and do "stuff", and wish you a good week!

 

Getting serious about food production

I had intended a week of intense sowing and planting and weeding activity - well best laid plans and all that, something else came up, but having said that, we aren't doing too badly.  The first 27 potatoes I planted at the end of March are now all showing above the weed suppressant mat, while some of the second batch of 18 are also showing signs.  The final dollop planted last week won't show for a while yet - or so I assume.  The rows of garlic, shallots and onions are doing OK despite being rolled on from time to time by itchy cats - the shallots look very vigorous while the onions are slowly starting to show growing shoots.  They went in rather later than the shallots and have suffered more from cat attentions and being picked out by birds. 

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The broad beans all now have pods set, and as they have stopped flowering and are starting to show signs of blackfly, I have taken out the tops and they can concentrate on filling out those pods.  The speedy cabbages aren't really proving to be that speedy, despite a month with a cover on them, but are starting to look more convincing now, while the radishes sown among them will be ready this week, particularly if we have a bit more rain.

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Today was really devoted to sowing.  I carried on cleaning up the rotavated potato bed, although we aren't planting any more spuds.  Instead, while investigating my seed stash, I found an old packet of purple mangetout seeds, so I bashed in three poles, surrounded them with three former tree guards, and sowed a circle of peas around each.  I finished off that bit with a dense row of very cheap parsley seed - either they will grow, or they won't, we wait and see. 

John rotavated a bit of the potato bed from two years ago, cleaned it up a bit and spent a happy while sowing half of a cheap packet of dwarf french beans and half a packet of radish (18 jour variety) seeds.  If even half the seeds we sowed today come up, we will eat well in between 3 and 10 weeks time!

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The wildflower meadow is getting ready to burst into flower, so John took the opportunity to mow a path around the edge and along the line of fruit trees.  At the edge, under a cherry tree there are two early orchids flowering beautifully, but the main show of bee orchids won't start for two to three weeks yet.  The lizard orchids are starting to send up spikes, but they will be in full splendour in three to four weeks.  In the meantime, the ox eye daisies and clovers will put on a magnificent show, while the field scabious prepares to take over from them.  The better soil of the garden has a wonderful undercurrent of deep blue speedwell in it, while the bathroom orchid has finally bloomed again.

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Not much activity on the trail camera front this week - well lots of activity but too speedy for anything interesting.  The badger passing through was the best shot.  The camera has moved on - we are hoping for film of young badgers putting their noses out of the set, but realise it is a long shot (in every sense).  There was an Easter Sunday Excalirock festival at our local pub, so we went along - great to see people out and about again, and to enjoy the punkabilly of D-Track - a local group of people old enough to know better, but who are really energetic and fun.  My camera just about managed a photo of that, but wilted at trying to get a video!

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Have a good week!

 

Day 6 of Lockdown - a very quiet Sunday (with a cat picture)

Once I had done this blog yesterday, I was overcome by a fit of domestic goddessness (and needing a good excuse to have The Cat Empire DVD on loud), so I made cake.  It is basically a Quatre-quarts using brown sugar, and with some of the flour replaced by ginger and cinnamon - it's very nice with cream and jam!

Today has been even quieter than normal, as people respect the lockdown and also the noise curfew that is always in place here on a Sunday.  Perhaps the highlight of my day so far was when I pottered down the garden to let the chickens out for their daily vandalism spree.

Zola decided to show me what a voracious hunter she is, by leaping into and climbing up the pear tree to catch a collar dove that was sitting in it and taunting her.  Zola is not aerodynamic or subtle, so before she was even half way up the tree, the dove had flown off to the next perch.  Leaving Zola in the tree...  I carried on my garden inspection, released chickens, talked to them (well berated them for poor egg production actually) and turned back to the pear tree.  Someone was stuck.  Someone was very stuck.  Someone was crying and asking for help.  So, once I had taken a few photos, I grabbed a branch she could walk down, then she walked down me, and ran away to find another tree to climb.  Later on she brought John a lizard's tail to say thank you (but I'm not sure for what).

We are lucky to have a garden and cats and chickens to entertain us.  We also have a vast reserve of DVDs we haven't watched in ages.  Yesterday was The Cat Empire, perhaps today will be The Who or Gerald de Palmas - not decided yet.