Ok, so again it's been a little while..
Well, ok, make that a hell of a while.
Ok, almost 3 months.
But it's all to make it worth the while!!! (1st joke, yay)
What happened is that the last couple of months, me and my
accompagnateur have been traveliving in the car. However great the aforementionned, it is nevertheless not yet equipped with the latest contributions of technology such as wireless or even a computer.
We've got so far as a gas stove we can warm up cans of
cassoulet on though, so no need to despair, first step towards efficiency is taken, woopee!!
Hmmm, 3 months hey, so what...
Ok. Step 1 - came back from Iceland
and back to Brittany via Camembert
So far everyone remembers (yeah, right)
Step 2 - Brittany, Douarnenez boat festival where
The above Accompagnateur, my brother and I went to lend a hand.
We met loads of nice people, saw loads of nice boats including the
Belem, the
Earl of Pembroke and many others like
VERACITY
which our now friend Marcus (in the blue) built himself. We were kindly invited to join him for a sail aboard.
I then tried embroidery on shrimp net (Ndlr: true fact), it was great fun!!
Step 2 - A few days later, met up with the MacLeods, including my namesake Eimer/Emma for the first time (at last!!!!)
Step 3 - Left for the South
to go and see MORE family (on the French side this time) and try and get some work.
Did we get any?
Ooooh lala.
Our first shot, we tried working in a fruit conditionning factory for a week.
Apart from being badly paid and boring, the coworkers were appalling enough to make anyone want to resume studies for another 5 years, lest one should end like them. Heaven forfend. I'm sorry to sound like such a bourgeois, but it was terrible. (details available upon request)
5 minutes in there would turn the hardest of liberals into a badass anarcho-syndicalist. Not that we needed to be convinced or anything, but it's sometimes good to have your nose rubbed into reality.
At least, it made us think, and once again realise how great our condition and how lucky we are to even be able to make choices.
I knat. :P
Second shot was picking grapes, which was ok. Details also available, I'm just summing up.
A double-headed grape.
Picking grapes is an activity better known in France as the "vendanges". Depending on the region, it goes from mid-August to October.
It is organized very differently depending on the region where one is.
We started in the Roussillon at the foot of the Pyrenese mountains, where the weather is great and the surroundings beautiful. The air smells of thyme and lavender and the delicate scent of fig trees floats; agaves, almonds
and
these grow all over, the Tramontane blows warm from the South and the sun shines so bright it makes your eyes cry.
The region is great and working there totally sucks.
The day starts, you arrive at 7, wait for half an hour (unpaid), 14 of you climb into the back of a 1970s citroen van, the doors don't shut but that's ok 'cause 10 of you are smoking their morning cigarette with their first beer, so that way between the dust you can get some air.
You get to the vines, someone throws a bucket and pruning sheers at you and tells you to get on with it until the end of the half-morning morning or day. Climb back into van, hope the driver isn't too drunk by then, get home.
Well, that's our experience anyway.
After that, Step 4 - we (really surprisingly!!) decided to leave for
Burgundy , Beaune and Aloxe-Corton to be precise to go and do the same thing.
I'd never been to Burgundy and always heard good stuff about it.
Well let me tell you, nothing too good could ever be said about it.
The landscape is utterly beautiful and well preserved, forests border with vines and fields
The architecture is really nice as well, loads of well preserved old houses, and the people are extremely nice and welcoming. (knowing we were living in a car, a few people offered to take us in for showers and stuff, including Karen and Alan who warmed us up, dried our clothes and offered hospitality on a cold soggy day, cheers to you!!!!)
Ah yes and also, in Burgundy, the wine is nicer.
Forgot to say, the average price of a Roussillon wine is a couple of euros. In Burgundy, it's more like a couple of hundred... (well actually it ranges from about 10 to 1000 a bottle)
But yeah, I guess I won't surprise anyone if I add that even here, pickers are still paid minimum wage...
Picker's hands...
But considering the price and the value of the wine, the picking is more monitered, and therefore better organized, which is actually surprisingly nice! And people actually communicate like they're human beings. Big surprise also...
But anyway, looking forward to this, almost!!!
Totally glad to have been to Burgundy and looking forward to going there again, working or not. Our employer was really nice and allowed us to leave some of our stuff at her place (merci Lauriane) so we could go and pay a visit to a friend in Zürich, Switzerland for a few days after the vendanges.
Great weather for the time of year.
Only in Switzerland... :o)
But after a little over 2 months on the road, we were starting to look forward to getting back "home" to see friends & family and enjoy Autumn and forest fruit...
So we stepped back into the car and set off for 2 days' funky driving on the slowest roads of Europe. I swear we got half of the red lights of Switzerland and went past most of the roadworks between there and Orléans!!!
Back home, it was real fun unpacking and finding out just how much not so obviously useful stuff we had with us... a bit like moving house really.
A random list of the first things springing to mind?
About 20kg of pebbles from different origins
About 150 kg of modeling clay
Flippers, snorkels and climbing gear
Wool (tons, needless to say + about 150 different kinds of needles)
2 lampshades
And the rest... :o)
Our parents are really glad to have us back, because they totally missed having their houses cluttered up with insanely useful things like that :P
So many things have happened in one year, it's pretty overwhelming.
Of course not a day goes by without a thought towards her, but I do want to give her an EVEN MORE special thought today (and share it with you all), as it's Christmas Eve.
Also a special thought full of TLC for all the faraway friends who are always close to my heart, despite being geographically far.
A very Merry Xmas to you all!!
