The Perigord region of France is very rural. It is mostly farms here. They grow a lot of corn which they let mature on the stalk for harvesting later. Presumably, this is to feed the ducks and geese which are major products of the area. The Perigord is known around the world for its foie gras (therefore, its geeese) and truffles. This is also a walnut area, with walnut trees everywhere in the same fashion that in northern US we find apple trees everywhere.
The countryside is undulating hills, not very high, but constant. As soon as we get to the top of a hill, we are almost immediately driving back down. And so it goes for the entire region. One valley leads to another hill without much of any valley bed. The hills don't seem to have plateaus, just more up or more down. The towns (there seems to be only one city) here are about 10 miles apart from each other, with villages in between. The villages are often so small as to look literally like just a bend in the road with four or five dwellings and a few barns. Then in another mile or two there will be another village. From the tops of the hills, like at one of the tourist sites, you can see the villages all strung out like pearls on a chain.
The roads are mostly one lane; or if it's a bigger road, it will be, say, a lane and a half. The vehicles move over to the side onto the grass to allow each other to pass. The "major" roads have two lanes. Most of the roads around here were laid out by the Romans. No one ever saw the need to change them as they all lead directly from one village to another. For the most part, the roads here are well sign-posted. The round-abouts are particularly well posted.
The French and their Food:
While, technically, it is possile to eat like an American and have a sandwich for lunch, then a big dinner, that is not how the French do it, it seems. The French shops, post offices and even tourist attractions (but, not in high season) close in the middle of the day for at least two hours. At that time, about the only things open are restaurants. In the villages, the restaurants are full at lunch and you need reserve ahead. In the rural restaurants, at this time of the year, there are plenty of seats to be had. The idea is generally to just go in and order the "menu du jour", and see what it is as it develops. The meal always has soup, the next course could be some type of salad or pate/terrine, then what we call entree, then cheese, dessert and finally coffee. Often a small carafe of wine is included in the price. Coffee is usually extra. All of this comes to anywhere from 11-24 Euros. I've even seen some menus offered at 9 Euros. Most people, meaning most French people, simply order the lowest price menu of the day.
I figured out that the meals consist mainly of dishes that can and should be made a day in advance. Soup, terrines, stews or other long-cooking entrees and desserts can all be made a day ahead and simply warmed up on the day of service. I imagine that the way these restaurants work is that they do their cooking in the afternoon to serve the next day. In some cases we had an entree that was freshly prepared. But if that is all that a restaurant has to make at the moment, the whole operation is very low in labor intensity.
In the very rural restaurant that we at in yesterday, called Les Marroniers (the chestnut growers --maybe it also pertains to walnuts as well), there seemed to be only one person in the whole place. She was a woman of a certain age who apparently owned the restaurant. She also seated us, took our order, served us, cooked the fish of the set menu, and totalled up our account. She could do that because there were only three tables occupied yesterday -- clearly off season for her.
Her soup, as with all the others, was simple but perfectly flavored.
We seem to have settled on a fairly easy life style. Our mornings are typically spent having more coffee, doing my blog, perhaps doing some laundry, planning the day and then, finally, leaving for the day. The "day" starts with driving someplace for one of these great lunches, then off to see usually one major siteseeing place, a bit of wandering about in a village, perhaps stopping at the grocery or bakery on the way back. Because we have these four course lunches, we are not really hungry at dinner time, so we usually have bread and cheese and then dessert and coffee. It strikes me that this is actually a perfect way to eat: big lunch, light snack later.
Our adventure yesterday took us over some roads which are becoming familiar to me. i am the driver because in-town driving doesn't bother me a bit, and Larry is the navigator because he is better at it than I am. When we reverse the roles, there is nothing but trouble. This way is good because I don't care how many false starts we get on the idea that no matter which way you turn, you get something worthwhile seeing. I actually love to just drive down a road and see what's there. Serendipty. Larry is more for the planned route.
So, about yesterday. We went to a hugely advertised garden on the very top of one of the highest hills around. It's called Jardin Marquessaac. It had the usual sculpted boxwoods, garden paths and a lookout over the river valley that was spectacular. My opinion was that the gardens themselves were not nearly as well kept as the Eyrignac that we visited earlier this week. But the Marquessaac did have that unbelievable view going for it. These gardens were started a couple of centuries ago and like a lot of things around here, fell into disrepair. My impression is that 25 years ago, there was little tourism here because most attractions seem to have been started or revitalized within the last couple of decades.
Here is the Jardin Marquessaac.
here's Larry at the lookout
This is what he saw from there
There were scuptures throughout the gardens. There were also these whimsical heads
As we were leaving the grounds, we saw the Montgolfier balloons just ascending. The thrusters make quite a noise, we could hear them from the ground.
