I'm writing this just after putting Mike, who is fully recovered from his bout of strep throat, to bed and reading another few pages of the first book of Lord of the Rings, the Fellowship of the Ring, to him. Today is Wednesday, which is his half-day at school and which means that we spend several hours in the afternoon and evening immersed in 6th grade academic pursuits, i.e., homework and studying. So we're all a little dazed by bedtime. But his French is noticeably improving, and he loves history, and now in math they're studying geometry, which I liked and which he seems to grasp readily, so the family efforts have not been completely in vain. He has ANOTHER 2-week vacation coming up the week after next, which I'M having trouble grasping! I mean, I knew there was one impending sometime in the future but we just got finished with Christmas break, didn't we? There are, of course, a zillion places we haven't seen yet, and want to, so we've begun planning a series of day trips. It'll be fun.
On Sunday we decided to circumnavigate the Etang de Berre, the largest of the many shallow lakes or lagoons that dot southern Provence. I've mentioned before that this one is ringed with factories and is one of the most polluted sites in Europe, but there are still some unspoiled spots, especially around the western end and on the southern strip of land which separates the Etang from the Mediterranean. We drove west from here across the northern edge of the Etang and down, in a counter-clockwise (or anti-clockwise, if you're English) direction, through more of the seemingly endless supply of picturesque hilltop villages around here. Our first stop was Istres, a medium-sized town of 30-some thousand, which sits between the big Etang de Berre and the smaller and more pristine Etang des Oliviers, which appears in the pictures below. (See the clouds reflected in the water? I've always been a sucker for shots like that.)
(I don't remember exactly when the sunset picture was taken, but it was recently.)
Then we proceeded to Martigues, which is called, or calls itself, the Venice of Provence. (We've since learned that there's another town that claims to be the Venice of Provence. I think it's Isle-sur-la-Sorgue, a little farther northwest.)
There's a lot of water in and around Martigues; the channel that connects the Etang with the Mediterranean flows through downtown, and during the season it's a very popular tourist destination. Even as we sat at a cafe for post-lunch coffees (we have begun to take our own lunches with us - baguette, cheese, apples, cookies - because eating in these cafes can get expensive) in cloudy and chilly conditions, a giant tour bus pulled up and disgorged (does that sound contemptuous? I honestly don't mean it to) a crowd of seniors (that is, people not much older than us), who followed their guide around the waterfront like ducklings behind their mother.
There's been an onslaught of publicity for about 3 weeks in the papers and on radio and TV about the big annual Sea Urchin Festival that takes place on the south coast, the epicenter of which is Sausset-les-Pins, which was just a short detour from our route. We had been toying with the idea of going but hadn't reached any firm decision until we realized we were just a few kilometers away, so we said, "Oh, what the hey! Let's take a look." By this time we should have learned that these coastal villages are all huddled down on the beach at the foot of towering cliffs and there's usually only one road that tenuously connects them with the highways up above, and if that narrow serpentine way is somehow constricted - like, say, by thousands of sea urchin fanciers and their cars - you can be caught like a rat in a trap. (Actually, I'm reminded of the ant lions and their prey that I first saw in Florida many years ago when visiting my grandparents. The ants descend an innocent-looking slope and can't get out.) We should have guessed something was up when we saw cars parked alongside the road a couple of MILES above the town, but by then it was too late. The road that took us in was also the only road out and there was only one way to go - forward. One look at the madness around us and we didn't even stop - just kept going, inching along, until we got back up the hill at the other end. I had asked my friend Francois, "So how do you cook sea urchins, anyway? Boil 'em?" He just looked at me and said, "Cook? You eat 'em raw, of course!" Now we've all seen sea urchins on PBS, right?, and they look like little squids with those hard beaky mouthparts. Apparently you rip that part out, or something, and then just swallow the remaining soft parts down with a mouthful of wine. The leathery old sea urchin aficionados on the tube are all speaking Provencau, or Provenco, the essence of which seems to be that the first halves of words are French and the endings are Italian. Alas, another delicacy which I will never be able to bring myself to sample.
After our narrow escape, we continued a few kilometers further along and decided to check out Carry-le-Rouet, which was a little less crowded. We were able to get out, stretch, walk out on the jetty and take a few pictures. Including one, taken by Mike, of a sea urchin in its natural, still-living state. It's the dark brown object beneath the reddish filamentous object, which it might almost be wearing as camouflage. In one of the photos you can see the southern tip of Marseilles across the way, about, I don't know, 15 or 20 miles away. The village was jumpin', but with a subtly different type of crowd, and I later discovered that there's a big casino there, which might account for the uptown vibe. Also, there are some magnificent houses on the cliffs overlooking the sea that belong to big Marseilles executives. Or possibly gangsters.
A small but significant milestone has been reached in our family: Michael is now taller than Lois. In the photo below he might be standing on a rock, but I've measured them on level ground and he's definitely taller. "Never mind, dear," I tell her in my tactful, supportive way, "you still outweigh him."
I've been reading about this orchestra that is funded by the department and which offers a schedule of free concerts in communities throughout the area, from Rognes (pop. 400-ish) to Marseilles (pop. 840,000-ish). It's called L'Orchestre de l'Pays d'Aix and we had intended to go see them last week in Rognes (site of the famous truffle festival of several weeks ago), but Mike came down with what was later diagnosed as strep so we didn't. But I noticed that THIS week they were performing in St. Cannat (pop. a couple of thousand), the next village over, so I was able to go after we got back from our drive on Sunday, alone because Mike and Lois decided to stay home. It was great fun! The concert was in the Salle de Quatre Septembre (I blush to admit that I'm STILL not sure what happened on September 4th, but every community in France has at least one street or building named after it), a civic center and multi-use structure which looked, to my eyes, anyway, suspiciously like a gym, even to the basketball backboard looming over the string section. The place was packed and they had to supply more chairs, and even then there wasn't enough room to hold everyone who showed up. I just sat there bathed in the melodious sound of mostly incomprehensible French emanating from my fellow concertgoers until the music started. It was a program of excerpts from famous ballets, and the orchestra of 57 did a fine job. Unfortunately, no printed program was available so, while I sort of recognized many of the tunes, I may never know which ballets they came from.
Yesterday, after taking Mike to school, I dropped the car off at a garage in Eguilles (a different one, the third I've tried) for an oil change. I spent the ensuing hour and a half in the village, having a coffee and pastries and reading La Provence in the newly smoke-free tabac, stopping in another of the bakeries for a baguette, shopping for veggies at the weekly open-air market (see photo), and just walking around. I took some pictures from one of the scenic viewpoints, which is a street of old attached houses overlooking the Arc river valley and which is where, Lois and I agree, we would like to live if we lived here permanently. I ended up in the village cemetery (don't we all?), which is built around some ancient ruins. There's also a shot of Our Lady of the Pigeons.
Congratulations to the Giants for reaching the Super Bowl against all expectations, and to my brother-in-law Ernie, who has never wavered in his support though his heart was breaking (although his language got pretty colorful a time or two!), through thick and thin, taking the bitter with the sweet, from the ridiculous to the sublime!
Au revoir until next time!
Tom
P.S. I've just reread the above and I realize that, because we brought just one suitcase each, we're wearing the same clothes in every picture of us that has appeared in this now several-months-old blog. Good thing we have our own washer! I've also realized that our stay is half-over and we're definitely having mixed feelings.
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