Bruno’s Blog – 23 August 2010
It has been a strange summer in Perigord, a wet Spring, a perfect May that produced an extraordinary crop of roses, followed by a cool June, and then a magnificent July. August has been mixed, with the usual thunderstorms that always worry the winemakers, and some hot days that filled the rivers with canoes. And now we have the early morning mists that leave the church spires and the tops of poplar trees emerging above the low-hanging brume to give the countryside the eerie, mysterious look of a Gothic novel.
The small shopkeepers and restaurant owners had been worried that the recession would cut the numbers of tourists, but the abundance of camp sites and affordable gite rentals has helped the Périgord do better this year than most other French regions.
Although famous for the numbers of British and Dutch holiday-makers who flock here, by far the great majority of tourists to the region are French, and they all seem to come in the month after July 14 to the middle weekend of August. That’s when the crowds are thickest, the queues longest and it gets harder to bargain in the flea markets and brocantes (antique sales). On most summer days, it can take fifteen minutes to cross the bridge at Saint Denis, and on market days it can take an hour.
August 28th, 2010 at 8:32 pm
I am ashamed to say that I have been the proud owner of the first Bruno for a couple of years now but time, crises, priorities etc prevented me from reading for pleasure.
This summer I have embarked on this lovely book and found myself sinking gently into a rather delicious world that I, in part, recognise…not least because I believe I have been there, and also because, in another lifetime, I may have played 18 holes with M le Baron. Suffice to say, after being driven by him, no one could approach a game of golf as anything other than a gibbering wreck. The man knows how to win.
The words of the dedication are very much taken to heart, Martin. Get in touch!