7 July 012 – Malbun, Liechenstein

Yesterday we spent on the road after a brief stop in Diano Marina to find a post card – the previous day all suitable shops appeared closed.

We were immediately on the motorway and only escaped briefly at Como for lunch. As we entered Como the heavens opened and there was a very heavy rainstorm which included hail so heavy that I thought we may lose some paint off the car. When we arrived at the centre of Como the rain had stopped, but we found a large area flooded with sewage, so took a quick look at the lake and ducked into McDonalds as the cafes that were clear of the residue of the storm were crowded and we ddn't feel like waiting. While the lake at Como was nice, the number of houses built up the hillsides above it reduced the appeal to us.

Back on the road we climbed up through Switzerland to the San Bernardino pass into heavy cloud and occasional rain. As we got higher the “motorway” reduced to a 2 lane road with no passing and steep grades, but we were lucky and had few holdups – the traffic in the other direction wasn't so free with queues of dozens of cars.

Once again we were struck by the orderliness and beauty of the Swiss countryside. Houses are compact and neat, roadsides are trim and everything looks freshly washed. The valleys with flat floors overhung by astoundingly steep mountains rising 1500m are picture postcard territory.

Heading into Liechenstein our GPS totally lost the plot believing that we were 50m south east of our real position, Endless demands to u-turn, turn left into non-existant roads and general confusion later we found a sign to Malbun and headed up the hill with demands to turn left over a cliff. We climbed 800m up the side of the valley, though a tunnel and finally the GPS was back on the road.

Malbun is a ski resort located close to the Austrian border at 1600m altitude. A bunch of 5 hotels, a collection of chalets in a magnificent bowl shaped valley and a lot of sheep (and a few cows) with bells clanking away.

Views from the hotel

Today we lazed around at Malbun. I walked up to the top of the village and then we took the chairlift up 400m to the top of the range above the village – elevation 2,000m. The ski slopes below this chairlift are not for the faint hearted! At the top there was a timber ramp leading out into space over the stunted pine trees. The trees had new cones starting while the old ones were still opening and dropping off. Over the other side of the valley there are 2 chairlifts on what look like easier slopes.

Malbun from the top of the chairlift

After lunch we walked past the church on a path marked as suitable for pushchairs – obviously Liechenstein parents are brawnier than NZers as the gradients were challenging at times. A wedding was in progress at the church, but we didn't make out the couple. Gillian was particularly taken with the wild flowers beside the path and the number of insects and butterflies. Many of the trees grew out horizontally, obviously pushed over by the weight of snow when young. Arriving back at the hotel we found a display of falconry in progress. 5 birds were shown and flown over the next hour including a peregrine falcon, golden eagle, raven and 2 other birds of prey. The eagle was huge and we gathered had a strong grip from the expressions of the people who were game to have him on their arms.

Golden Eagle on show

We have noticed the change in the style of food between the countries. Now we are getting large heavy meals compared to the lighter dished in France and Italy. Cooked vegetables have repplaced teh light saleads.

Tomorrow we head for Salzburg.

5 July 2012 - Diano San Pietro

A three day catch up.  On the 3rd we lazed around Bauduen, spending a good part of the day at a beach on a gravel road that heads out from the village around the side of the lake.  The beach was great, having trees growing at the top giving shade.  While the surface was sharp gravel rather than sand that is what is normal around the lake as all the beaches are artificial (created when the lake was filled in the 1970s) we made ourselves comfortable and enjoyed the peace and quiet of the lake.   The amazing thing (to me) was that for most of the time we had the beach to ourselves.

Looking at the real estate listings properties are incredibly cheap with a big villa on 4000m2 of land, with swimming pool, available for 300,000 Euro ($NZ 500,000).  The equivalent in NZ would be over the million mark.

The next day we cleaned up the house and put a couple of loads of washing through before heading off to Italy.  As we headed down to the coast the trees became more lush.  When we saw palm trees we knew that we'd reached the Riviera.  Amazingly we found a carpark at the top of the beach at St Raphael and found a pleasant sandy beach that wasn't overly crowded.  Heading towards Cannes we decided to avoid the motorway and ended up on a delightful twisty road through the woods away from the coast.  Beaches in Cannes looked good, but we didn't stop and then got caught in a traffic jam in Antibes, so jumped on the motorway and headed for Monaco, avoiding the chaos (we thought) that would be Nice.  Went to get off the motorway at Monaco and found that the toll both only accepted cards or coins and rejected all NZ cards and required 30c more than we had in coins.  An embarrassing 5 minutes later we managed to raise some assistance was able to change a 5 Euro note.  The queue behind us was amazingly patient.

We found Monaco simply beyond our expectations.  Plastered up the side of a steep rock it is clean, freshly decorated and has a relaxed atmosphere.  The sea front is not great, mainly being a harbour for exceedingly large yatchs, but the mass of hotels and stately buildings above is spectacular.  As we could easily find convenient parking spots we didn't linger and headed back on the road to Italy.

The motorway in this area is a succession of high viaducts and tunnels.  As you come out of each tunnel you get a view of a different part of the area - a glimpse of a town, then an agricultural area, then a rocky valley.  Never long enough to get the full impact before you are back in another tunnel.

The background to our stop in Liguria, Italy, is a series of books by Annie Hawes, an Engliswoman who bought a "rustico" in the hills in the 1980s and made it into a holiday home.  Gillian wanted to see the area described in the books, so we booked into a B&B in the village Diano San Pietro.

We found our way to the village, but the directions we had did not get us to the B&B, so a quick phone call lead us to continue 1 km up the valley to find an aged woman standing in the road to flag us down and direct us up an impossible turn to a parking area.  The B&B turned out to be a good size apartment with kitchen and large swimming pool - bliss.  There is another couple staying here in the upstairs apartment - an Italian and his German wife who work around Cologne.  We have had some interesting conversations with them from religious conflicts through to the ratio of possums to people in NZ.

Just down the road we found the local restaurant.  They have 2 small tables perched on the side of the road that are permanently occupied by the locals to swap gossip and drink apparently vile local liquor(my imagination no proven).  Inside the first room is the bar/wine shop with a couch and small table and racks of wine bottles.  Out the back is a very couth restaurant area with around 8 tables.  The host is also the barman and chef.  The menu is simple - 7 aperativs, 4 primo piattos and 4 secundo piattos.  The special tinight is rabbit.  When it arrives, the food is magic.

Today we headed up into the hills above Diano San Pietro to look at the area described in the books,  This involved a road 2m wide zig-zagging up the hill in a series of blind hairpin bends.  At one stage we met a large (for the size of the road) lorry heading in the opposite direction requiring us to reverse up the side of the hill to give him room.  We got completely lost and continued to climb through the olive groves on roads that our GPS said didn't exist.  Looking over into the next valley we saw more little villages nestled on the side of the hills among the olive groves.

Looking across the valey to Diano Costello

With the narrow rads around here the standard transport is the Ape (Italian for bee) which are small 3 wheeled trucks designed for 1 person, though you often see 2 people crammed into the cab. These are narrow enough to pas on the one lane roads.

An Ape

We decided at last we were not going to spend the rest of the day lost on top of the hills, so we turned around and headed down.  We found the local cemetery where some of the characters from the books are buried, or should I say stashed, as much of the cemetery consists of concrete pigeon-holes which are sealed with stone slabs when the coffin is slid in.  Most graves have photos of the people on them, often quite informal snaps - very evocative.  We found the niches for Domenico and his wife Antonino who featured in the book as great supporters and friends of Annie.

Cemetery at Diano San Pietro

After lunch we headed down to the coast to Diano Marina to wander around the shops (all closed as it was Wednesday) and find a public beach.  All the best spots are covered with "concessions" - fenced off with loungers and umbrellas - but found a corner near the harbour where we went in for a swim to say that we had been into the Med at least once.  After a spell on the beach to people watch and dry off we headed back the the B&B to jump in the pool to wash off the salt.

Eventually we wander down to the restaurant and again are overwhelmed by the quality of the food.  Gillian has the special (Sardines in a cake) and I choose the Carpaccio de Vitello (thin slices of raw steak covered with a fresh salad doused in olive oil) - both absolutely gorgeous.  Gillian is enraptured by a "ladies version" of grappa (strawberry flavoured) and then more so by Lik Li (Liquore de Liguria) which is a rich dark brown syrupy liqueur.  I only let her buy the grappa on the basis that the flight to Scotland has strict weight limits.

Tomorrow we head off for a stopover in Leichenstein.

*** Photos will be added later ***

2 July 2012 - Bauduen

I don't think I explained much about the house we are staying in.  It is the 3rd house when entering the village (great as it is close to a parking area) and the front door opens directly onto the road in normal French style.  We were first faced with an wrought iron grille locked with a padlock.  The came solid wooden shutters, again locked, then french doors locked with a standard lock and a separate deadlock.  This just to get in the front door!  The first room is a small lounge leading through to the kitchen/dining room with a toilet tocked in beside the sink.  Stairs lead downstairs into a loung/rumpus room/office/overflow bedroom created out of a vaulted basment with a door leading into a small garden.  Upstairs from the entrance level are 2 bedrooms, a modern bathroom and toilet, then the attic above has been converted into a master bedroom and terrace overlooking the lake.  I have no idea how old the house is, but it could be 100 or 400 years - things haven't changed much over the years.  What strikes us is that the entire house is only one room wide and that is standard for most of the house around here.

The house from the lakefront - the one with light green shutters

View from the terrace

Yesterday we relaxed in the heat.  As it was Sunday there was a great village market.  At our end there were vegetable and produce stalls, then cheese and meats with the rest varying between trinkets, jewellry and clothes.  The guy at one of the cheese stalls sold us on one of his cheeses with a sample and then cup us a slice off the round.  The variety of cheeses here is immense and most of them are very good.  The cheese guy ahd a dog sitting in a pile of boxes behind him that took great interest in the deals.  The stalls would never meet NZ OSH standards with unrefigrerated cheese and sausages that were a target for flies.  Gillian was taken with a couple of tops that will be seen in future photos.

 Cheese seller with dog

 I took a walk up a road behind the village, then wandered through the back streets.  The village is obvious ancient with 4 layers up from the lake.  Some of the roads are 2m wide with steps jutting out into the passageway.  I can see the tracks where cars have passed, but I can't imagine having the accuracy required to drive a zigzag course between the steps.

 Street in Bauduen

 Gillian made a Quiche Lorraine from a local recipe for dinner - never believe that the French are cholesterol aware as the short pastry alone was 33% butter, let alone the bacon and cheese.

The village is proving very complete with a good general store, 3 restaraunts, a creperie and several other eating houses of varying descriptions.

Today we drove up to see the Canyon du Verdon.  10 minutes after leaving the house I discovered I'd left my camera - an excellent move as there is no way to capture the grandeur and scale of the scenery.  While the weather has been less than perfect (a few showers) the scenery is breathtaking and, according to Gillian, so are the roads and my driving.  The French do not believe in making roads that are wider than required for 2 goats to pass.  When you meet a tour bus on a blind corner and stop with 1" to spare and then have to squeeze through a gap between the bus and a rock wall with the mirrors scraping in a 90km/hr zone you understand that driving here requires PRECISION.

The scale of the canyon is difficult to convey - we were at 1200m up one wall looking down 600m to the river directly below with 300m cliffs above us.  The road on the opposite side on the canyon goes higher and looks even more scary than the one we were on.  Much of the canyon walls are vertical and are reminiscent of photos I've seen of the Grand Canyon in the US.  The canyon runs for some 40 km, but we chickened out after half that distance.

When we returned to Bauduen, I walked out past the yacht club to the end of the unsealed road passing several really nice beaches which we will laze on tomorrow.  The only issue with the beaches is that they have been created with sharp gravel and you do need reef shoes to swim comfortably.  The water has been a deep green most of the day due to the clouds, but about 5pm the sun shone through and the lake returned to its unbelieveably vibrant blue.

A pale rendition of the colour of the lake this evening

30 June 2012 - Bauduen

Yesterday we blobbed out around the hotel pool until 4pm, then headed in Avignon hoping that the tourist masses would have reduced and the temperature would be lower.  Both proved right and we emerged from an underground carpark in front of the Papal Palace - a massive complex in excellent condition.

A wander down towards the river took us down small streets lined with tourist shops (and a bookshop with second hand books in English), through the massive city wall to the famous bridge - the Pont St Benezet.  Originally built through the fundraising talents of a local peasant Benezet in the 1100s, it has been destroyed by kings, floods and other effects and rebuilt several times.  Only 4 of the original 22 spans remain, but it is still an amazing monument to what must have been an immense task when it was first built.  We walked out to the end in a strong wind, then retreated to the square in from of the Papal palace for an excellent dinner.  Apparently in the middle ages Avignon was second only to Paris in size in France and there are many signs of the affluence of the times.

 Pont St Benezet in rush hour traffic

 The Papal Palace from Pont St Benezet

Today was a day of colours.  We drove across Provence to my cousin's house on Lac Sainte Croix du Verdun at Bauduen.  We passed fields of lavender amid the rather arid vegetation in white stoney soil and drove through villages painted in pastel colours rather than the usual French stone grey.

Lavender fields

On first sight of the lake the colour of the water was a bright blue.  I can only imagine that it is a combination of the bright sun and the depth of the lake, but the photos really do not do it justice.

The exit point of Lac Sainte Croix du Verdun just above the dam.

The lake is behind a hydro dam with a retained depth of 95m feeding an underground power station.

We finally reached our destination - a delightful 4 storey house looking out across the lakefront,  very comfortable with several cafes and restaurants within 2 minutes walk.  The rest of the day again spent lolling around in the heat (around 35C).

29 June2012 - Uzes

A day of highs and lows.  We were sorry to leave our converted barn at Conques-sur-Orbiel, but tore ourselves away and headed down to the Mediterranean coast at Sete on the recommendation of our last hostess that the seafood was great and that we would see flamingoes.  All we saw was a traffic jam,  no parking spots and some very grotty housing apartments.  We turned tail and headed for Uzes where we were booked into a hotel.  Unfortunately the GPS didn't recognize the road, so we tried heading for the Office de Tourisme in Uzes.  First we were diverted through the very unsealed and dusty local church carpark due to roadworks and then had to jamb on the brakes and squeeze into an illegal carpark to get into the office to be told it was so simple to find....  After finding the first sign and following it down some unsavoury half sealed rural alleyways we found the hotel.  Very modern, comfortable, but lacking the atmosphere of our accommodation to date.  However the view from our balcony is certainly rural which helps.

 View from the hotel

After recovering from the trip we headed off to see Pont du Gard, a well known Roman aqueduct about 12 km away.  A very different style to the one we saw at Segovia in Spain 5 years ago - much more massive and in a very stark natural landscape compared to the urban background in Spain.

Pont du Gard

We ended the day with a meal at a recommended restaurant in Uzes.  I had the best Beef Tartare I have ever tasted - included parsley, capers and something we couldn't work out but which gave it a true zing.

One thing I have noticed as we've been driving through France is that from any slight elevarion you can see for miles - the contours are so flat. I'm sure that the Central Massif is high, but the scale of the country makes it seem flat.

28 June 2012 - Conques-sur-Orbiel Carcassonne

Yesterday we were on the road from the Dordogne down to Cathar country.  First we had to clean our apartment to the satisfaction of the owner - in the end we surpassed her expectations (surprise!).

4 hours later and $40 in tolls we arrived in Conques-sur-Orbiel (according to the GPS) and then read the fine print in the booking details.  A U-turn involving 20 blocks of a very small village afflicted with two-way streets 2.5m wide and a one-way system in parts, a dash down the local highway, brisk discussions between the navigator and the driver and 4km of roads 1 car wide with weeds/wild flowers growing up 2m high either side and large trucks heading in the other direction through vineyards and scrubby woodlands we eventually turned into a farmyard that had old wagon wheels scattered round, white washed buildings and 2 delightful apartments built into part of a ruined barn. Our hostess Jilly turned out to be an English high-flyer who had decided to head for France and the relaxed pace of life.  She, her husband and their young son run the accommodation (more units in preparation) plus a farm that includes a horse, 30 goats and a lone emu left over from the previous owner flock of ostriches.  Apparently an egg had been left and hatched independently, but why an emu egg happened to be on an ostrich farm has not been explained.

Not what you expect to see in France.

We crashed out in the afternoon and then headed into the ancient city of Carcasonne for dinner,  Unfortunately the recommended restaurant was closed on Tuesdays, so we were sucked into a VERY EXPENSIVE restaurant in the gardens below the castle.  Food sort of OK, but service slow and so-so.  We walked out without desert feeling hard done by.

 Walls of Carcassonne

Today we returned to the walled city of Carcassonne to visit the castle and learn a little more about it.  Originally fortified in Roman times, the fortifications were improved in the 12th century with the Cathcar community needing a safe refuge,  The Cathcars were religious zealots who rejected the corruption of Rome and were consequently labelled as heretics (an excuse for France to grab the lands on the Spanish border).  The Cathcars were ruthlessly dealt with and the French improved the defensive capabilities of the town. 

 Looking along the ramparts of Carcassonne

After wandering around the ramparts with a delightful guide we grabbed some food from the local supermarket and headed north into the hills to find a lake with swimming beaches.  Due to the signs to the lake facing the wrong direction and road works closing a section of road it was after 5pm before we reached the promised swimming hole.  This turned out to be a reservoir where sand had been imported to form a couple of beaches, but the lake itself had a distinctly muddy feel underfoot.  As this was at about 800m altitude it wasn't as oppressively hot as the Carcassonne area and we only stayed in the water for 10 minutes.

Reservoir in the hills

A quick dinner at the apartment and bed, ready for another road trip to Uzes, near Avignon.

25 June 2012 – Lembras

Yesterday was spent in the area of Les Eyzies-de-Tazac-Sireuil which is the centre of an area containing caves with drawings, paintings and engravings dated from 10,000 to 20,000 years ago. We visited 2 of the caves. Grotte de Rouffignac is a large series of caves running some 10 km. The tour is on a train which wanders slowly through about 1/2 km with stops to inspect points of interest. The artwork is amazingly detailed and accurate, done both by engraving and drawing in charcoal or some form of crayon. The best display is in a large cavern with a flat roof which is covered with bison, mammoths, ibyx and horses. To keep the light to a minimum the background lighting is kept dim and features are highlighted by the guide with a small torch – very frustrating when you are trying to see the whole picture, but adding to the atmosphere and sense of discovery. Our guide was a voluble frenchman who hardly drew a breath in the hour we were in the cave and we were accompanied by a group of around 30 school children on a class trip who were amazing well behaved.

The second cave was Grotte de Font de Gaume which is much smaller – never wider than 3 m. Here the paintings are in colour with shading and outlines. While the details are not as accurate as at Rouffignac the artist has used the contours of the cave wall well – stalactites for legs, bumps for eyes and ridges for the back. Most of paintings were of bison, but horses and reindeer also feature. It is noticeable that great effort is made to detail the tails of the animals. As you would expect some of the paint has faded and I walked past some without seeing then until they were pointed out. Again the lighting was dim and features were illuminated by the guide with a torch. This time the guide was soft spoken and almost reverent towards the paintings. The cave is limited to groups of 12 and a total of 200 a day to limit carbon dioxide levels.

We carried on to Domme, a hilltop village surrounded by walls perched high above the Dordogne river. Completely taken over by the tourist trade, but the views over the surrounding country are great. 

View from Domme

We had been recommended to a restaurant nearby with a terrace overlooking the river, but found it closed. Instead we dined at a hotel in Lalinde under a plaque in memory of a local woman who had involved with the resistance in WWII and had been killed by the Germans.

On the way back we passed Chateau Beynac perched impressively over a small town.

Chateau Beynac

Today we are having a quiet time at the apartment getting ready for the next leg down to Carcasson. The weather a little cooler today with a fine mist that hasn't lifted entirely at 12:00.