Friday, 2 June 2017 to Thursday, 8 June 2017I suspect many people in Europe do not own a car and rely solely on public transport. We have proved over the last two months that this was indeed possible but it was now time to spread our wings further inland. And although there are bus routes inland I suspect the schedules are such that you cannot do daytrips, and would have to overnight when venturing further afield. Thus, renting a car at this point, for a month, made perfect sense, i.e. two weeks in Séte and two in Marseille. And in Marseille we would definitely need a car in order to track down my roots in La Motte d’Aigues which lies about 80km north of there, and also to visit the larger Luberon area as well as the French Riviera.

So, today I booked a rental car through Hertz for pickup in Montpellier tomorrow and the process was pretty painless. And by booking online rather than directly at the office one saves a cool €84, not bad. Now we have been told horror stories about how difficult is it to find parking throughout France at night and otherwise, so this was an aspect of having a car we looked upon with trepidation. But, we argued, if we didn’t try it we will never know, now would we? We were so looking forward to picking up the car.

Since finding out the timing of the opening of the bridges across some of the canals in Séte – in order to let yachts through – Adri has been keen to see this, and that was the reason we strolled down to the bridges just after 19:00 today, beer in backpack and all. We found a bench and watched the one bridge rotate open on its central axis, yachts motoring past as quickly as possible before the bridge closes again a few minutes later.

We then moved park benches further up the canal to watch the double bridges open, these lifting themselves up from the one end of the canal to high heavens. Again the same yachts motored through in a hurry and into the adjoining lake, now they were free. We sat there watching people fish in the canal, people strolling along the canal, the sun slowly setting over the canal, peacefulness personified.

 

While Adri was preparing supper tonight I started watching a documentary on that great band Chicago, which was initially called Chicago Transit Authority. Legend has it that Jimi Hendrix, one night backstage at Los Angeles’ legendary Whisky a Go Go in the late 1960s, noted that Chicago’s guitar player at the time, Terry Kath, was a better guitar player than him. Now that says something. Apparently Kath “could play a rhythm guitar part, a lead guitar part and sing a lead vocal simultaneously”. Kath went on to be hailed by many as one of rock’s greatest – a “forgotten guitar god” who was “criminally underrated.” And yes, he was brilliant.

Saturday morning the alarm went off at 07:30, “This is too early!” I groaned to myself. Adri was up like a spark, or was it a lark, 10 minutes later I had coffee in hand to wake me up, we had a car to pick up.

There was a train to Montpellier at 10:51 so there was plenty of time, no need to rush… and that one always gets to us. As soon as we let our guard down we let it down out of control and always end up puffing and rushing to stay on schedule. And today would be no different.

Adri was following the reluctant leader on the way to the station; it felt like I was pulling her along with an invisible elastic band. Each time she would almost catch up I would accelerate the pace which was somewhere between a slow and a fast jog. She was sometimes five, sometimes 10 steps beyond, but definitely always more than One Step Beyond, this was Madness!

The Hertz car rental address was given as Place Auguste Gibert which is the area in front of the railway station, so that’s where we started our search. Of course we should have known the rental companies would be situated inside the railway station, but it did not say so, pity, it would have saved us some sweat on these hot sunny streets today.

We finally found the location after we peeked into a taxi company who showed us the right way. The car was ready and waiting for us. The young lady requested passport, driver’s license and credit card. The first two worked, the last did not. I scrambled though the wallet and found another one in there, lying low, I would have too. That one did the trick and we were handed the keys to our nearly brand new black Fiat Panda with under 3000km on the clock.

It felt really weird to be behind the wheel not having driven for two years. It is always difficult to adapt from right-hand drive on the left side of the road to left-hand drive on the right side of the road. At least here they drive on the right side of the road. This time around I must admit that the switch came quite easily, probably because I have not driven a car for so long.

We set maps.me up for La Grande-Motte which lies on the coast to the east of Montpellier, and followed the instructions as it was blurted out from the dashboard on which my Iphone was perched, clutched neatly by the GPS holder seemingly tailor-made for it. The instructions were loud and clear but became a bit fuzzy when Adri switched the radio on at significant volume. We loved the feeling of being transport independent…

We drove into La Grande-Motte until we saw yachts, and that’s when we stopped, and there just happened to be an open parking spot as well. The parking spot said payent (pay) so we approached the pay station but we did not know how to operate it. An old man and his wife was also wanting to pay, took pity on us and tried to teach us, pointing to where I needed to press on each passing screen.

One has to enter your car registration number, the length of time you wish to park where after money is requested. But it did not want my money; the ticket produced said we could park for free for 45 minutes. This was not exactly what we requested but we weren’t complaining. After placing the ticket on the dash of the car we started our stroll along the quayside where some beautiful yachts were parked. Some of the owners were having lunch in the cockpit, on another there was a party brewing, all seemed at ease with life.

While out strolling Adri mentioned that she saw an “idol”, or could that have been “idle”, I was not sure. But when she pointed out the idol/idle sign it turned out to be a Lidl – a supermarket chain in France – she missed the “L” creating mass confusion in my Lidl brain.

We found a row of restaurants along the quay, any one would have done just fine for lunch and it was just past noon but we decided to push on.

We reluctantly left La Grande-Motte behind, a wonderful place, now heading in a south easterly direction and came upon an amazing little place called Le Grau-du-Roi; this was where we were going to have lunch. We could not find parking on-street but found a public parking area where we were again faced with that parking station machine. This time around I found the “English” button and things went much smoother.

 

While inspecting a number of restaurants along the canal I once again noticed many kids walk around with fidget spinners, spinning at high speed in their hands where it is clutched between thumb and some other finger. Now I know I’m too old to get it… but I just don’t get it, it frustratingly makes perfect non-sense.

 

 

Our restaurant of choice was Le Moderne and once again we chose the menu option and once again we were not disappointed. We sat there with a half litre of rosé helping us through those courses, life was good, real good. And it was with this same rosé that we toasted ourselves, today exactly two years ago, we left South Africa on our sabbatical… yea, life was good, real good!

 

We drove back home, through Carnot where Didier lives, then on to Palavas, from where we headed home to Séte, now tired and needing a rest after all the excitement of the day.

For whatever reason I have always been lucky when it comes to parking but I was dreading finding parking this evening after all the parking horror stories we have heard. About 1km from home I told Adri to start keeping her eyes open for a parking spot, and of course there was none. And then, lo and behold, as we reached our front door we found one right there, just for us, my parking luck seemingly still intact.

Have car… will travel; and Sunday would be no different. We decided to take a drive inland to Clermont-l’Hérault for no particular season, other than that it was there.

We drove through lovely little villages on the way there, getting lost more often than not although I must say that was due to the deviations (detours) that were in place. We reached Clermont-l’Hérault, drove around and walked its streets, a lovely town although it does not grab ones attention much.

From there we drove to Lacoste, up on a hilltop overlooking the green world below. Down the mountain on the other side and along various little roads we passed through Brignac where we drove right though their Sunday flea market, not intentionally of course. We were supposed to park in the field next to the market but we continued past it and through the market and on reaching the other side we noticed that the road was condoned off… The people did not seem to mind, they could see we were not local Brignacians.

We headed towards Canet to see what mischief we could get up to there. We walked around its streets, the place was eerily quiet, shuttered and mostly locked up. Maybe people were just taking a nap on this hot and lazy Sunday afternoon, or maybe most of the houses are just second homes for city people?

The only activity in town was on the town’s square where a group of youngsters and a group of oldsters were having a few drinks, at the only open pub in town. We continued on our journey when Adri spotted a castle or fortress of some sorts atop a hill in the distance. “Let’s go there!” and of course we did, it was Saint-Pons-de-Mauchiens and it was the best find of the day.

The old town is well preserved and absolutely stunning… I could not help but wonder where the tourists were, it was also eerily quiet. We saw a total of three people while walking up to the church and winding our way through the many little cobblestoned streets. Maybe the tourists will be back tomorrow; maybe mass tourism hasn’t discovered this place yet. Be as it may, we really liked this town.

Wanting to explore more of this town we drove around the other side and came upon a gathering at the local sports ground, or so it seemed… There we nearly broke up a family reunion which we mistook for a fete or something similar. There were beers and bottles of wine on a table with mounds of food, men playing boules, woman and children watching and chatting… We reluctantly made a u-turn.

On the way home we passed through Villeveyrac, Poussan and many more villages and eventually, tired but happy, we returned to our home to take a rest from driving.

Monday morning I received a breakfast surprise in the form of a breakfast burger. Between two slices of toasted whole-wheat bread there was a fried egg, a couple of wieners cut lengthways in half, slices of fresh tomato, lettuce and gherkins, all swimming in a sea of mayonnaise and mustard, amazing stuff. Dare I say, there was one thing missing in there… Cheese. We were fresh out of that!

We lazed about most of the day and around 16:00 we were ready to go for a ride. Can’t have this car standing around doing nothing now, can we? Today we were off to Frontinan which we have seen on a number of occasions through the windows of the bus, but never through a car window. And in any case, the bus does not travel through the southern part of the lake where the plage (beach) is, and that is where we were heading.

We arrived at the little port and looked for a place to have a drink but found nothing that was to our taste, a pub that is. We drove around to the other side of the port which ended with the same sad result. I remember noticing, through my bus window on one of our trips, what looked like a nice little town which lies just north across the lake from Séte called Bouzigues. And that’s where we headed next.

Bouzigues revealed itself to us slowly, on the outskirts it did not offer much but as we entered its centre and moved towards the sea it became clear that this is a little village that has a lot going for it. It has beautiful little streets and a lovely waterfront with cool pubs and restaurants. It’s a pity that the promenade in still of gravel and not a cement walkway, something this place is very much worthy of.

We took up seats at a restaurant that offered respite from the searing sun. Adri had an espresso, I had a beer, I do not remember which one, but it was icy cold, it was great, just like the wifi we got hooked up to. We spent considerable time here surfing and people watching, and generally doing the relaxing thing.

We then stopped off at the Auchan Supermarket – which is ostensibly open until 21:30 every day except Sunday – for a few sorely needed items, read cheese. We should have caught the hint at the entrance when those automated sliding doors did not automatically open for us no matter how much break-dancing I attempted in front of it. But when people with loaded trolleys came the other way, it opened its doors wide to let them through. We sneaked in on their account but found the place had all but shut down. It was only on our way out that we noticed the notice, it was a public holiday and they closed their doors at 20:00, it was 20:05.

Tuesday was spent doing as little as possible but mostly admin. There was the normal yoga and breakfast and such, and it was late afternoon when we heard a knock on the door. It was Renate from upstairs wanting to know whether her neighbours from downstairs were still okay. We were, in fact we had just opened a bottle of red wine and of course I did not dare ask Renate whether she wanted some… I just poured her a glass which she smiled lovingly at.

Renate wanted to know where we were going next and she was very excited for us when she learned that we were taking a drive to Collioure and spending a night in Cadaques in Spain, places she had visited often in her younger days. We made a date to visit her on our return and tell her all about our trip.

Wednesday we got up at 07:00, planned to leave at 08:00 but left at 09:00, same old same old. But no worries, we were on holiday within a holiday, so why rush?

We nosed our way out of Sete and onto the A9 highway heading south towards Perpignan and ultimately Spain, for our little Holiday In Spain, as the Counting Crows did some time in the past.

Soon enough we needed some juice for our baby so stopped off at the first petrol station on the highway we came across. There are many such juice station areas along the highways and they are always a welcome respite from the rigours of the road. The filling process was rather simple and has been streamlined further since I filled up in France a number of years back.

You insert your credit card into the petrol pump, select your weapon and insert it into the tank, press the trigger and voila, the juices start flowing. Once the kicker kicks signalling that the tank is full, you replace your weapon of choice in its sheath, money is deducted and a receipt is printed… you’re on your way.

Our Orange airtime was depleted which I intended to top up via the Internet the other day but somehow the credit card was not accepted, something to do with a security feature on there that is not activated. For any possible emergencies we might encounter along the road we needed this thing to be topped up, so we strolled into the adjacent Autogrill that has all of everyone, except mobile top up. Now we just had to make sure no emergencies came our way.

Our first port of call was Collioure in the far south of France; everyone seems to rave about this little coastal town. Just past Perpignan we turned off the A9 and came face to face with the toll booth, having to pay the ticket we picked up when entering the toll network at Sete. The first credit card was rejected, ouch; the second one was accepted, ah!  It’s always a good idea to have at least two and preferably more credit cards with you.

And, the amount was exactly what I expected, €11.90. And how did I know this? I found a great website called Viamichelin.com that works out what a trip by car will cost you taking into account fuel usage and toll costs… And it was spot-on.

The rave reviews that Collioure receives is not misplaced, this a beautiful little town which becomes immediately apparent as one winds down into town from the high hills that surround it. As we entered we started looking for parking which of course we did not find; the place was abuzz with tourists.

On our third round of recce around town we came upon a public parking area which was full, but we entered it in any case, we needed respite from our search. As we slowly made our futile round around the parking area a car pulled out right in front of us. What luck!

Our first stop was the local Wednesday market that is rather quant, situated on a small square covered with enormous trees.

 

 

 

 

From there we walked down to the waterfront passing the beautiful fortress or Chateau royal de Collioure to our right. At the waterfront we were faced with a number of restaurants on the Plage de Collioure that were busy serving the lunchtime crowds, they were doing brisk business.

 

 

We continued on to the wonderful Eglise Notre Dame des Anges church and then along the beach to the Chapelle Saint-Vincent. From there we strolled back to the fortress which also house marines who were busy preparing for a day of training out at sea. It was lunchtime and thus the fortress was closed so we did not get to see its innards. Onwards we went past the fortress to the beautiful Plage de Port d’Avall with the few restaurants there also doing good business.

After being all strolled out we settled in at one of the restaurants on Plage de Collioure, enjoying a pair of espressos and drinking in the beautiful view in front of us.

It was time to leave; Spain was not going to wait for us. On the way to the border we passed little coastal towns such as Port Ventres, Banyuls-sur-Mer and Cerbere and stopped off just past the border at a lookout point to marvel at our first views of Spain, it was good to be back.

Staying with the theme of wildly winding narrow mountain roads from Collioure we continued on into Spain past Portbou and Llanca to El Port de la Selva which we briefly visited in 2012. This town captured our imagination the last time we were here and it was still great, it is sleepier and less touristy than many places in the region, or so it seemed.

From there it was on to our final and intended destination, Cadaques. What put Cadeques on the map, apart from the fact that we visited here in 2012, is that Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marqués de Dalí de Púbol, aka Salvador Dali, lived here and in the area for many years. Now Dali was a prominent Spanish surrealist artist, a rather strange, eccentric and colourful character, who was born in Figueres a short way from Cadaques, you can read more about him here.

We visited Cadaques in May 2012 and at the time I described it as “Cadaques is special… I was not disappointed and you won’t be either” in this post dated Saturday, May 26, 2012, and it still holds true today. On entering this lovely town all still seemed familiar, just as we left it five years ago. Memories of that trip came flooding back; it was wonderful to be here again.

First things first, we needed to find parking even before finding a beer. We were once again lucky and found a spot almost right in front of the hotel we had booked. We were also lucky in finding a beer, a very cold Estrello Damm at a restaurant just behind where we parked.

While sipping away at this icy goodness, with the hotel we booked to our right, we noticed a hotel to our left that took our fancy. Adri went across to Hotel Residencia, checked out the rooms and came back beaming, it was great and although the price was a bit more it included breakfast. While the beer was still cold and the wifi stillgood I cancelled the booking at Hotel Christina and we subsequently offloaded our luggage at Hotel Residencia.

The check in guy could not have been nicer and also advised that should be have booked the hotel through booking.com we would have paid €40 more due to the extortionary booking fees that the website charges. We’ll have to keep this in mind for future bookings.

The guy also mentioned that the hotel was the very first and for a long time the only hotel in Cadaques and thus many famous people, friends of Dali, stayed there over the years. When one looks around the foyer and adjoining lounge area, and for that matter throughout the whole hotel, it seems like a shrine to Dali with paintings and pictures and books and what not of Dali. This could probably serve as a Dali museum!

But of course Dali has his very own museum which is housed in the complex of buildings where he stayed until his death in 1989 in Port Lligat, a short walk over the hill from Cadaques, which was first on our itinerary. We marvelled at this compound of buildings which houses many of his personal paintings and belongings but unfortunately we could not enter, it was already closed. And it seems that if one does want to visit the museum you have to book an appointment beforehand. Next time we’ll know.

Back in Cadaques we walked along the promenade that traces the entire bay’s border. It was early evening and the sun was doing its magic over the bay, turning the water a different shade of purple with each step we took. This place is truly magic.

The French like to have supper early and finish it by 21:00, the Spanish only start thinking about supper at that time and finally sit down for such around 22:00, we had to fit in. It was close to 22:00 when we entered the same pizza restaurant we visited in 2012, Pizzeria Trattoria Plaza, and again it would not disappoint.

This time around we chose the menu option. For starters we both chose the thon (tuna) salad and wow, there must have been a ton of tuna in there! I had the chorizo pizza and Adri the grilled sardines for a main. The pizza was good enough; the sardines were outstanding, grilled to perfection. For dessert we shared a chocolate mousse and crème brulee which were pretty good. And of course all this came with a glass of wine, filled to the top, unlike the smattering of wine offered in the French glasses!

We rolled home, fortunately it was less than 100 metres away; if it was any further our bruises would have been more severe.

A night in a hotel is like… well, a night in a hotel. I like to sleep in my own bed, it takes a few nights to get used to a new one, so we had a pleasant night’s rest rather than a great night’s rest. Breakfast Thursday morning – with a view towards the waterfront – made up for it though. The continental breakfast consisted of orange juice, strong filter coffee, mini croissants, pain au chocolate, prosciutto, toasted baguette, fresh tomato…

 

Now those last two items may not sound interesting but the way the Spanish eat this ends up rather remarkable. First you drizzle copious amounts of olive oil onto the toasted piece of baguette, of which the surface should be rather rough. You then slice the tomato in half, take one half in hand and, as if you were grating cheese, smear that tomato pulp over the baguette until only the skin of it is left in your hand. You can eat it like that but it’s even better with a slice of prosciutto resting on top of it, amazing stuff!

After checking out and loading our one small bag of nearly nothing into the car we walked around town one last time marvelling at the narrow cobblestone alleyways and streets which were still nearly empty of tourists this time of the day. After an hour’s stroll we were not yet ready to leave this magic place, but we had places to go, people to see.

Reaching the town of Roses after a winding road around and across the mountain, we drove around this lovely large holiday town with many mansions perched on the side of its mountain, all with obvious gorgeous sea views. For this time of the year there were already many people on the beach that we passed, I can just imagine this town would be overrun in high season. A lovely town it would be for a beach holiday.

We continued on towards Figueres but on the way we got sidetracked into Castelló d’Empúries with its beautifully preserved old town and its lovely Santa Maria de Castelló basilica. After strolling and marvelling for an hour or more we headed on to our next destination a few short kilometres away.

Figueres, the birthplace of Salvador Dali, is a large town or small city, pleasant to drive in and pleasant to walk in. After a few circles around town with Google maps getting confused with the road works and all we finally came to rest in a public parking area, a short walk to the old town.

Adri made a beeline for the Dali Theatre and Museum (described as the largest surrealistic object in the world) even though we did not have the time to wander through it due to time constraints; we still had to make it back to France. As you know, Dali was a rather strange, eccentric and colourful character and the museum building would not disappoint with its facade topped by a series of giant eggs and what not.

Regarding the eggs, Dali loved using symbols and used them throughout his art in various forms and guises such as angels, clocks, elephants, crutches, ants, eggs…  Eggs feature regularly in his works and apparently confirm the example of the contrast of a hard shell and a soft inside. This interior/exterior contrast (hard/soft) is consistent with the psychological notion that individuals create defences around the vulnerable psyche, that is flexible. Okay?

It was getting late and it was time for a beer and a local Estrella Damm was delivered to our table at our chosen restaurant, accompanied by a macchiato for Adri. When Adri ordered the macchiato it brought a smile to my weary face when I remembered the television coffee advertisement that Wimpy ran a number of years back… who can forget that punch line of “Aag Henry, I love it when you talk foreign!” And Mikey liked this add more than most… enjoy!

The mother of a friend of my cousin Jabez owns a property north of Perpignan and we thought that if Steve was visiting at the time we could have a coffee or a beer with him. Jabez confirmed that he was indeed not there but we decided to visit the town of Feuilla in any case. Leaving the highway we passed through towns such as Caves and Treilles, all the time heading into the mountains.

Feuilla turned out to be a lovely sleepy little town nestled amongst the mountains with seemingly a myriad walking trails leading off and through it. We walked around town for a while looking for a place to have a coffee, sans Steve, but we found none… really, told you it was sleepy. There was no restaurant, no supermarket, no nothing; this is surely a place where one comes to rest.

What we did find was a winery of sorts, doors closed, with a huge plastic container filled with red wine on its sidewalk with bottles in a container next to it. Seems like you can help yourself if you are in need and pay tomorrow, or never? There’s also a book exchange, door closed, where books are contained in a container on the wall outside the shop, so exchange at your own free will in your own free time.

It was getting late as we left with my need for an espresso growing with each coffee-less town we passed. Back on the highway we stopped at the first petrol station restaurant we found, had our espressos, while having a final rest before the last push home; it was already around 20:00 with the sun sinking fast.

We entered our apartment at around 21:30, thoroughly tired but thoroughly happy having seen so much in such a short space of time. It was great to have a car!

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