Midi-Pyrenees

We left L’eau Salee and got back into the travelling lifestyle-On the road again. We picked up some new books at L’eau Salee and starting reading them straight away. We walked along the 2000 year old ruins of a roman aqueduct to the Pont du Gard. Thomas rolled his ankle and walked like a pirate with a patch and a wooden leg. We had a snack overlooking the Pont du Gard- a 50m high aqueduct built to supply Nimes with water. It had three tiers of arcades that spanned across the Le Gardon river. We didn’t wear enough clothes and were very cold. The museum was closed for maintenance. We drove further west to a Sheep’s cheese France passion and arrived at dark. We would have had an even harder time finding it if the host wasn’t going out the gate.


The next day we bought some of his cheese and the son told us about the time he spent shearing in NZ. They let us have a brief look at their cheese making set up. They bought the milk because they didn’t have sheep. We drove to a canyon similar a little bit like the grand canyon but a lot smaller with trees. At a look out point we could see over Millau- a town famous for making sheep’s leather gloves. In the clouds was the Millau Viaduct-the tallest viaduct in the world. We drove down into the canyon and to a ‘epace’ info centre about the viaduct. There was a great movie about the building and design of the viaduct. The has seven piers holding up a 2km long deck. The tallest pier in 340m high 40m taller than the Eiffel tower. It was an amazing feat of engineering. We then drove to a tourist information office below the town of Roquefort where it was really cold. We walked up to the one street town looking for the ‘Roquefort cheese caves’. The town of Roquefort has about 5 different companies making Roquefort cheese. Roquefort cheese is a unique sheep cheese made from Lacaune ewe milk and special penicillin made from mouldy bread that gives it its recognizable blue dots . The cheese is only allowed to be made in a small part of the town. We decided to go to the ‘Papillion’ company because they did a free tour of the caves. We went into these ‘caves’ which weren’t really caves more like a sealed hole in the ground. The reason why the cheese is stored in the caves is because of cracks in the hill called ‘Fluorines’ which connect to the top of the mountain like a shaft. They act as natural vents that kept the cave at 8-12 degrees and 96% humidity all year round. The caves we went into weren’t used anymore so there were empty rotting oak shelves. The tour guide spoke French and tried to speak English but we ended up understanding mostly everything. We tried the deliciously creamy/salty cheese. There were different cheeses without the mould that were supposed to be mild and more for the liking of kids but it smelt very strongly of sheep .Thomas didn’t like it he thought it taste like a woolshed. We bought a special knife used to peel the skin of the cheese in the 1920’s but it cut cheese as well. We got some original Roquefort cheese too. Our guide and the man selling the cheese were very kind and gave us each a pin shaped as a butterfly-’Papillion’s’ label. We walked further up the town’s hill to a crumpled chapel with a view of the valley and hills glowing in the hills. We lost Anneke when we went ducked into a church on the way back but luckily found her again. We moved on driving in the dark. It’s getting very cold so we’re trying to move south to a warmer climate. We stayed in Albi and went in a giant catherdral the next day, there was a funeral going on inside and it was raining.

Lourdes wasn't any warmer which is where we went next. On the way we tried to find a gas brand at the supermarkets to change our bottle but we happened to have the brand that nobody sells. After lunch we walked in to town rugged up with all our clothes on. Lourdes is special because it is where there was the 18 apparitions of Mary. We walked through town to the sanctuary. The streets are lined with tourist shops but it felt like a ghost town with no people in it. First we visited the most important site in the sanctuary The Grotto. It is kind of like a cave in the hill where Saint Bernadette saw the 18 visions of Mary 152 years ago. Now there is a lit up statue. Silently we all walked through the grotto. Next to the Grotto are the candle burner which a little metal sheds full burning candles that people have of offered they burn all year round and symbolise the candles continuing people prayer and also light. We were quite late so the baths were shut but it is where you can wash in the special water from the Grotto. Back at the Grotto they were doing the Rosary in French. We went to the taps and filled a special bottle of the special water for Oma at home. Then we went into the three level Basilica the was built pretty much on the top of the Grotto. We went into the crypt of Saint Bernadette and in the next door chapel they were having a mass. Then we went in the top storey chapel and then the low level the biggest. I think the bottom is the most impressive. Above the alter was a cross that looks like it was floating and around the walls was the story of Jesus illustrated in amazing mosaics. It was dark when we walked back through town to the camper and stayed there for the night. The next morning we went back into Lourdes to go the visitors centre and find out about the conditions on the roads to Cirque de Gavarnie. The weather and roads were good so we decided to go up. We walked back through town of Lourdes which is different from around the sanctuary. There was heaps an heaps of dog poo everywhere! Which was unpleasant and because William was leading the way home without a map and trying to do a shortcut we took a while to get back and at one time we were almost lost. Back in the camper we drove up the beautiful road to Cirque de Gavarnie.

We followed the river with mountains on either side and passed lots of little hydro power stations. As we climbed the snow got thicker and at the top we decided to park and walk the last few hundred metres because they looked slippery. The Cirque de Gavarnie was stunning but us kids were more interested in playing with the snow and getting the longest biggest icicle which Johanna found. At the town fountain which was almost all frozen. William dropped a huge sheet of ice of the edge onto the snow below and it made a wicked sound. Sadly we had to leave quickly because the sun we about to go and we had to get past a wet part of the road before it froze. We stopped at a village half way down for lunch and us kids went outside and made snowballs and tried to hit Johanna who was standing against a stone wall. After mum and dad got back from there walk we drove back down to Lourdes and went back in for a last time. Then we had hot soup for dinner.

L'eau Salee

We entered back into France on the 10th Nov. The scenery and buildings changed and the signs were back in French. There were waves coming over the road and it was very grey.


We drove over Monaco and Monte Carlo. There were lot’s of tall condo’s and buildings hanging over the cliffs. All the houses had flash pools and there were lot’s of super yachts in the marina.

We got stuck down a street in the middle of Nice because of a triple-parked van. All the cars behind us honked and hooted and some came out to measure us to see if we’d fit through. In the end the Van driver came out and we drove on. We had a hard time parking in the biggest ‘Carrefour’ supermarket we’ve ever been in. You couldn’t see to the other end and had to walk through a huge mall to get to the entrance.

We had French bread for lunch in a rocky river canyon and saw a Chamois - an half goat, half deer like animal. We drove up the canyon and past a walled town with a zig-zag track leading up to a castle hanging on a cliff. It would have been a nice town to go into but we moved on.

We stayed by a dried-up lake and it was very cold that night.

We drove through beautiful scenery and rock formations. . The trees were all red and gold and there were lots of hunters walking on the sides of the road. We stayed near Modene at a France passion goat farm. We parked in the middle of short stumpy grapevines with a view of Mt Ventoux. The goats were kept in a pen like a petting zoo and we weren’t given a tour of the cheese rooms like other places. I think we expected it to be like other goat farms we’ve been to so we were disappointed.

We only drove 15km on the other side of Mt Ventoux to our destination-L‘eau Salee.’ HelpX is an online listing of host organic farms, farmstays, homestays or similar, who invite volunteer helpers to stay with them short-term in exchange for food and accommodation.

HelpX is provided primarily as a cultural exchange for working holiday makers who would like the opportunity during their travels abroad, to stay with local people and gain practical experience. In the typical arrangement, the helper works an average of 5 hours per day and receives free accommodation and meals for their efforts. We wanted to do HelpX to learn about the culture, meet people, work and stop driving for a while and to learn to make cheese. Peter invited us to stay and we decided that t would be a nice place to stop for a while. We stayed in our camper but ate and worked with our hosts-Peter and Ploy Garwood.

We parked next to the pool and introduced ourselves. There were two other HelpX volunteers from Tasmania there as well-Nick and Rhea. We didn’t start work until the next day. There was a hot shower in the pool house and we could watch TV in the beautiful old stone house. On most days when the weather was good we would we would work outside on the old terraces.. The property used to be a farm but the terraces that form a amphitheatre around the house had overgrown with trees, ivy and brambles while Peter was in Thailand and the Alps. We spent most days clearing the trees and blackberry so it was possible to see down the small valley. We burned all the weeds and brambles and cut the trees into firewood. Dad and William used the chainsaw and Peter used a brush cutter. The rest of us cleared the ground with various tools and kept the fires going. The firewood was stacked in sandstone caves. Johanna, Maddy, Anneke and Thomas kept Natthaya (2) company and looked after her when Ploy was busy. Ploy cooked us the most amazing Thai food. We had ‘Kow Soi’ our favourite curry we had in Thailand. There was rice, omelete and different stir-fry’s at every meal. After every meal we had Fromage Blanc with lot’s of sugar and Banana Shakes. Ploy taught Thomas how to make Spring rolls. We had deep fried chicken feet one night, Natthaya really liked them. We had garlic-basil snails. Nick and Rhea cooked Japanese sushi and soup with buckwheat noodles on the night before they left.

Peter has a 80kg Mastiff bitch called “’Chloe’ we had to be careful around her because she broke someone’s leg playing catch but she was a very nice dog.

Timothy (15) was at school most of the time and really tired because the French school day’s from 8 to 5o’clock. It was nice to talk to someone our own age.

The place was called L’eau Salee because of a slightly sulphurous spring with an overgrown pond that William and Dad started to drain and dig the muck out of but it’s a project for another ‘HelpXer’.

On the 18th we celebrated Natthya’s 2nd birthday. Thomas taught Ploy how to make Apple pie and Crumble and Ploy cooked even more food than usual.

The next day we drove up on one of the hardest parts of the Tour de France. We parked the camper and had lunch at the top below the snow line. We left Peter, Ploy and Natthaya and started a 4km hike to the top of Mt Ventuox. The Mountain is quite special because there are no mountains of similar height for miles around. There was an amazing view of the Alps and we could almost see the sea. The rugged shape of the land was very different to NZ or any other place we’ve been to. Nick and Rhea climbed up with us. At some parts the snow had covered the track. We reached the top a little later than we expected. There were two observation towers at the top. We had chocolate bars and took photos on the top then walked down the closed road. There was black ice that Johanna slipped on while Rhea and Anneke held her up.

It was a neat day out.

The weather wasn’t very good on the last three days and Peter wasn’t feeling good. Thomas fell down some stairs and scratched his eye. We pretty much finished the terrace we had been working on.

We are heading towards Portugal via southern France and Spain but we’re are finding it very hard to leave this special place. Thank you Peter and Ploy for the wonderful experience you have given us-it was a pleasure and privilege to have shared time with you..

Tuscany to the Mediterranean

We spent the morning doing washing and cleaning up. We left Roma and drove north past lots of apartments and traffic. We stopped for lunch by some caves and burial tombs carved out of tofa cliffs. While the washing dried Mum and Thomas walked around to a closed in a cave and a small amphitheatre like the Colosseum but carved into a hill. We drove though dry clay-like soil, grapes and olives. We stayed outside the medieval walls of Tuscania.

The next day some of us went looking for information on the cork-oak trees. The National Reserve office and tourist office sold local art and produce. We had to force the information out of them. We decided to not hunt for Cork-oaks with the limited knowledge we had. Instead to keep moving north to Monteriggioini, another small walled village. We parked in the gravel park on the side of the hill with lots of other neighbours. Inside the walls there was Co-operative market in the Piazza. There were lots of Italians tourists with their ‘Poofy’ jackets and Umbrellas on their long weekend. Some kids were playing with firecrackers and celebrating Halloween/day of the dead. Anneke and Johanna put towels on their heads and chased and scared the little kids running around our camper. The next day mum went to a mass in the small church. Thomas and Anneke tried to get a stamp at a Tabbachi but didn’t succeed. A Tabbachi is like a dairy or corner store.

We drove to San Gimignano and parked on the side of the road. We walked up to the walled town in the pouring rain in our raincoats. The towers were really tall and there was red ivy growing on the stone walls. It was raining so hard the sewer overflowed onto one place in the street. Yuk. There were lots of shops selling painted ceramics, pizza, gelato and tourist souvenirs. The piazza in town had a well in it full of money. Anneke finally got a stamp for her postcard after going to every shop in town. We came back saturated.

We went to Florence on the first of November and it was still raining. We came in from along the hill looking over Florence down below. We happened to have stopped Michael Angelo piazza with a view over the city. There was a bronze replica of David a famous nude statue by Michael Angelo. The Duomo and its massive dome stood out from the rest of the orange red buildings. We could see the Ponte Vecchio the famous 14 century bridge lined with expensive jewellery shops that was the only bridge in Florence that was not bombed in WWII. We parked by a stadium east of the centre and walked in the rain. We past ‘Vespa’ scooters, three-wheeled electric cars and colourful graffitied dumpsters. We reached the Duomo and its piazza full of tourists that tried to poke ours eyes out with there hundreds of colourful umbrellas.

Inside was closed until later. W e stopped to admire the beautiful pink, white and green marble façade and the Duomos bell tower, trying not to get too wet. The Santa Maria del Firoe cathedral aka the Duomo the fourth largest cathedral in the world with its huge dome. We sheltered from the rain in a open air museum of nude statues. We walked past the gelatarias that had rainbow displays of swirled gelato mounds decorated with fruit slices and other things to show their flavours and make them even more good looking than they already are.

We walked along the muddy Arno river and over the bridge. We made our way back to the Duomo and joined the line behind some Australians. It was very plainly decorated compared to the outside. There were frescoes on the walls and a few glass windows.

We drove to Pisa the next day. We parked 2km north of town and had lunch. An English-speaking Italian guy came over and talked to us after seeing our ‘New Zealand’ sign, he was very friendly. We walked to the wall around the city and then to Piazza de Miracoli. The leaning tower was on a much greater lean than we expected and a little bended like a banana. It stood out between the other building not because of it’s height but because of the lean. The tower itself was really nice to look at because of the little arches on every level. The top second to top level was covered for restoration work. We took photos pretending to stop it falling over. The Piazza de Miracoli (field of miracles) and spacious area and didn’t make you feel you were in a city. It was lined with tacky tourist stalls where Johanna bought a little leaning tower.

We walked around the Cathedral and the Baptistery and then inside. Like lot’s of other churches in Italy it had huge sculpted bronze doors. It had a golden ceiling and 68 striped marble pillars to hold it up. We could see the Frescoes painted on the small dome. The baptistery was in front of the Cathedral, is a circular or octagonal building. There was also one in Florence but they charged to get inside them.

We walked towards the river down so main streets. William took out the laptop and hooked into some unsecured ‘Wifi’. We managed to tell our worried friends and family that we were alright. We reached the muddy brown river and Thomas got a map at the tourist info and asked for the best Gelataria. We looked in the nearest Gelataria. The Gelato wasn’t as extravagantly decorated as some places but it still tasted amazing. It was very strong and rich. Some of the flavours we had between us were strawerry (made from real strawberries), coconut, tiramisu, caramel, coffee, lemon sorbet and banana.
We drove north with rocky peaks to our right and resteraunts to the left blocking out the view of the sea.
We walked on the beack at sunset out to a pier where men were fishing with nets on long poles.

We had an interesting experience looking for a ‘dump’ (to empty our sewage and fill up with water.) We ended up in a rubbish dump and some gypsies living in old caravans pointed us to a hole in the ground in the sewage treatment plant.


We drove though La Spezia and over some olive covered hills. The houses were mostly painted in yellow, pink and orange with painted on shutters, frames and bricks to make them look nicer. We parked for a late lunch between Santa Margarita and Portofino. We smashed bits of marbles of rocks and put Kina (sea urchins) back in the sea before they were buried by the construction works. We wanted to go on the straight ‘autos trade’ (toll-motorway) after driving the afternoon on the narrow windy roads. We didn’t though. We stayed in San Rocco and could see Genova along the coast.
 
We went walking around to San Frutuoso Abbey between Portifino and San Rocco, We could see the Alps to the north. The track was paved til the last bunch of houses that were set on the hill. It was a little bit like the ‘Mumma Mia’ island but not as dry and the sea was a dark blue. We whacked spiky red fruit off the trees and saw some mountain goats. We rested at a Battery/Gun point looking out to sea. The track then got quite rough. We had to hold onto a chain and not slip or we’d fall off the cliff and into the sea below. We got to a point where we could se where the track went across another cliff but it looked wet and slippery. We hadn’t gone as far as we’d thought and decided to have a snack and think about continuing.

We turned around because we weren’t prepared enough and didn’t want to risk it on the slippery cliff. We went back and talked to a New Zealander living in Italy going to check his olive grove on his bike.

We drove to Oasi Park campground near the french border.We had wifi to publish our blogs about Italy. We went walking on the beach, made huts out of the washed up bamboo and buried cans for the metal detecters to find. We did lot's of washing.
On our second day William and Tom went for a Run and we did more walking. We went into the centre of town and ended up in a children’s Halloween festival. We had pizza and bread smothered in Nutella. The girls got their faces painted and we tried throwing balls into bowls to win goldfish in bags. But we got bracelets and yoyos instead. There was a Piñata and Johanna had her pockets full of lollies. Thomas tried cooking 'Polenta' (corn porridge). Mum booked plane tickets home. We are flying from London to Auckland on Singapore airlines, we’re glad we’re not on Air Asia because there’s no food, movies or spacious seats. We're going back to france tomorrow.