The French Journal

Lyon with Peregrine

I've written about Lyon many times in the past, but since my desires to visit the city are as of yet unfulfilled, I will gladly take an opportunity to follow in Anthony Peregrine's footsteps as he travels there for The Times (U.K.). Starting off in Vieux Lyon, there's a taste of the Renaissance, and the frightening information that the city fathers once considered bulldozing the area for urban renewal. Happily, that disaster was avoided, and now you can still poke around in the unique walkways (called traboules) which connect the buildings in this vicinity. There's shopping, of course, as well as museums dedicated to the filmmaking Lumière Brothers and the Resistance (whose leader, Jean Moulin, died in Lyon). And this being Lyon, food is king, with restaurants ranging from master chef Paul Bocuse's temples of cuisine to the bouchons, the characteristic eateries of the city.

For more, be sure to go to my Rhône Alpes index, where there's a wealth of material.

Travel round-up: Ski stops, Backpacking, Paris with kids, Montmartre on the cheap, and danger

Here are links recent travel articles which I haven't featured because they're too short, or I've written about the subjects before, or some other reason.

• Chamonix lodgings. The Times (U.K.) reviews Les Granges d’en Haut, an agglomeration of ski chalets which have been restored as boutique lodges. The paper is impressed (even if the writer forgets to mention the lodge's name until the end of the article). There's also an adjoining spa. "This is simply an independent, family-run operation that channels a tasteful mix of mum and dad’s talents towards its aspirations of five-star comfort."
• Club Med in La Plagne. Another ski area, another hotel. The Daily Mail opines: "A touch of glamour and comfort in one of France's less celebrated ski resorts."
• Cheap stays in Montmartre. The Sydney Morning Herald recommends the Hotel Sofia, a one-star in the area's Arab district. It's clean, with big rooms, and a "in-the-middle of it all" location. A helping of local color makes this review enjoyable.
• Paris with kids. A mother with romantic memories of the city determines whether its magic is still in force with children in tow. (It is.) There's a good list of family-friendly activities. (Toronto Globe and Mail)
• Backpacking in the Auvergne. A grim beginning with lots of rain, but France's magic takes over by the end. (The Boston Globe)
• Courchevel landings: not so good. The folks over at ProTraveller have a post about the ten most dangerous airport landings in the world, and Courchevel has made the list. "Not only is the runway short, but you also have to navigate through mountains to get to it." Here's a simulation:

Happy landings!

Six writers, six escapes to southern France

Dream fodder. The Guardian (U.K.) asked six writers, living in France, to name their favorite places to escape to when they want to go far from the madding crowd. Here are their selections; take your pick for a quiet Monday morning.

• Gigaro, Provence. Chosen by Stephen Clarke, who begins by trashing St. Tropez -- the man can't help himself. When he writes of the nearby town of Gigaro, however, his tone (almost) changes: "...in one corner of the bay is the start of a coastal path that winds for 10km through fragrant pine forests. If you don't fancy a long hike, you can stop at one of the rocky coves that might just turn out to be your private beach."
• Buoux, Provence. Jamie Ivey, who keeps the blog Extremely Pale Rosé, says that "Buoux is a small hamlet set amid towering pine-crested cliffs. The shape of the valley contrives to drive traffic away, and only the curious discover the untouched heart of the Luberon."
• Banyuls-sur-Mer, Languedoc. Chosen by Rosemary Bailey, Banyuls is a "modest Catalan fishing village of Banyuls-sur-Mer. I love its old town with its steep whitewashed streets with shady patios filled with palms and bougainvillea..."
• Vence, Provence. A neighbor of Saint-Paul-de-Vence, Vence is the selection of photographer Tania Cagnoni. "Vence's forte is daily life: sipping rosé in dappled sunlight under the plane trees in the square, buying freshly baked bread from the boulangerie and punnets of Carros strawberries at the daily market."
• Eugenie-les-Bains, Aquitaine. Emily Barr, a novelist, reveals that the "test kitchen" of a popular, nearby three-star restaurant is a "sublime experience," and a bargain.
• Northern Ardeche. Correspondent Jason Burke says, "Here there are fewer gorges, fewer people, fewer caravans and fewer German school parties. Instead, you can enjoy a landscape like a warmer, drier Scotland, with high moors, plunging valleys, sheep galore, rushing torrents and superb walking..."

Enjoy. I'm off to speculate whether I'll ever visit any of the hundreds of places in France that I write about and other ironies.

Rhône-Alpes undercover

It's a fantasy of youth: work at a resort, get free room and board, and play in the off hours. The French ski chalet version of this story was covered a few week's ago in The Telegraph U.K. (and noted in The French Journal), but at that time I wasn't aware that the reporter made a video about her experiences. Now I am, so you can watch above.

It appears The Telegraph also decided that once was not enough, because it has also put two people undercover for the season, and they are reporting weekly on their time as slaves in vacationland. The woman works in a bar, which accounts for the dismaying amount of space she devotes in her early entries to the consumption of alcohol. The guy, whose job is as a kind of house boy, seems less interested in drinking -- at least at first -- and more in the girls. This may not be everyone's favorite flavor, but if you've ever wondered what it might be like to be young and loose and living in France during ski season, these sequences tell the tales.

Chasing l'amour in Avoriaz

L'amour, l'amour. Toujours, l'amour...

Valentine's Day is a few days away. So, with love on our minds, here's a story from The Times (London) about spending a week in the French Alps on a singles' holiday, searching for romance. For the reporter, however, there are structural mismatches: he's younger than many of the participants, and -- more importantly -- two-thirds of the attendees speak French, and he doesn't. He also confesses to heavy drinking, which is never the most attractive come-on. (His excuse: some partners look better through an alcoholic haze.) Despite speed-dating, message walls, and a vicious snowball fight, love doesn't find its way into his life this time around.

If you want to believe in the possibilities of finding a sweetheart during organized matchmaking activities, however, be sure to read the short coda by another writer. Where they live all happily ever after.

Lyon moves to Dubai

A truc from the NY Times today tells of a man who loves Lyon so much that he is undertaking an effort to re-create the atmosphere of the city on a 1,000 acre plot in Dubai. From the article:

"The project, temporarily called Lyon-Dubai City, will include a university; small versions of Lyon’s main museums; housing, hotel and office space; cafes, restaurants, pedestrian malls, town squares, courtyards, a film center, maybe even a church, all inspired by Lyon, France’s third-largest city...The Paul Bocuse Institute is hoping to set up a branch to train young chefs and restaurant and hotel managers. The Museum of Textiles is poised to open a silk museum and lend select treasures from its vast silk collection. Lyon’s soccer team has signed up to operate a center to train a Dubai team. Research is under way to cool outdoor spaces naturally to make strolling bearable during dust storms and 105-degree heat."

This effort is somewhat similar to a plan that I have to recreate the atmosphere of Paris in my house. So far I have a remarkable facsimile of the Eiffel Tower (somewhat reduced in scale) in the corner of my library, where Charles Trenet songs play in the background on permanent shuffle, and where I park my Smart Car on snowy days. I sometimes let my cats crap on the rugs to evoke Paris sidewalks. I'm working with master chef Alain Ducasse to open a knockoff of Benôit in the living room; he's eager to jump on this opportunity (actually, he's eager to jump on any opportunity), and we should be ready for business by summer. I've put out a few feelers to officials at the Pantheon about burying some French notables in my basement -- Chirac is high on my list, when the time comes, and let's just say they haven't dismissed the idea -- and I've asked one of Sarko's cabinet members -- Borloo -- to become mayor of my project -- currently known as États-Paris -- if we can work out the zoning issues. Surprisingly, he's interested.

Have to run. Scheduled a call to Bruni about having my baby.

On the slopes of La Plagne

There've been surprisingly few articles about skiing in France this year, so -- with the end of January a few days away and spring getting closer -- let's indulge in one from The Guardian (U.K.) about journalist Gwyn Topham's return visit to La Plagne in the French Alps. While I'm not sportif myself, for those who like activity La Plagne has the virtue of being a good place in France to learn how to ski. Its vice, however, is that the town itself is "tragically unpicturesque," although -- once you've picked up enough skill to venture away from the baby runs -- the Alps which surround the vicinity themselves can be stunning.

If you like narrative, the article is a follow-up to a series from 2003 in which Topham detailed his efforts to master the slopes. The recent "return" article is brief, but the earlier sequence will allow you to extend your time in imaginary France.

The Times (London) goes to France (with kids, pétanque, skiing, and sun)

The Times (London) went fou for France this week in its Travel section. I'm tempted to dole out their stories one-by-one -- content is valuable -- and, indeed, I've already served up Porquerolles and andouillettes from their offerings. But to avoid seeming like I'm just an RSS feed, I'll offer a quick recap of the remaining items for you to explore as you wish.

• Kids with a glass of wine. For family vacation types, The Times visits Château Rigaud in St. Emilion, a child-friendly boutique hotel where kids are tended while the adults lounge around and eat late dinners.
• Kids with bullet holes. Another family rents a spa/villa in Corsica, where they are spoiled with pain au chocolat and massages, and titillate themselves by checking out bullet holes made during regional vendettas.
• France versus Switzerland, ski edition. Two sporting types point and counter-point on the merits of Val d'Isère and Verbier in Switzerland, which I hear is a nice country but which isn't France.
• Back to the Golden Isles. Duplicating its efforts, The Times had a second story about the Golden Isles off St. Tropez, which offers more on Porquerolles and adds a leg to the trip with a visit to Port Cros, "... covered almost entirely in pine and holm oak trees...highly regulated. You can’t even smoke there. There are no forms of transport, not even a bicycle."
• Pétanque at the source, or, How I Learned about Boules in Provence and Met Renoir's Descendant.
• A tour round-up. Need suggestions for a thematically organized vacation? Here's a list: new hotels, surfing jaunts, more options for kids, wine tours, cooking classes, etc.

Two different views of skiing in France: Being a drone, and buried alive

Instead of travel articles about winter holidays in French ski country, here are narratives:

• A story in The Telegraph (U.K.) reminds us that vacation spots depend on cheap labor. A reporter goes underground as a "chalet girl" in the Val d'Isère, where she and a small team do household duties (including meals) in exchange of room, board, and unlimited skiing. It's a jolly crew who spend lots of time on their feet. A couple of revelations: more than half of the chalet girls are guys, and -- a lesson that I picked up three decades ago -- only novices and idiots drink Long Island Ice Tea.
• A more dramatic tale comes from The Toronto Globe and Mail, when circumstances lead a family of skiers to a more treacherous route than planned in La Vallée Blanche, and the mother falls into a crevasse and is covered by a slab of snow. All ends well -- I'm giving nothing away since the writer is also the person who fell -- but this is not a story for the claustrophobic.

Moving to France for six months

Lest you misinterpret the headline, it's not me who's spending six months in a stone villa in the Rhône-Alpes, it's a woman from Australia and her family, who -- through a chance encounter -- are able to live the dream (Sydney Morning-Herald). The couple who own the place only use it during the summer, so they offer it to Australian Deborah Snow and her husband and three kids. Although used to a warmer climate, they adapt reasonably well to their retreat with its cooler air, and they find that each season brings a change of character. Late summer there are the tourists; in fall, the grape harvest commences; later, hunters traipse around the property near theirs and "squirrels and pheasants skitter through the garden" and the house "creaks like a old sailing ship in the autumn winds"; at Christmas, lights are strung everywhere. The kids integrate more or less easily into the school system, the grown-ups into the life of the village. "(W)orried about the French reputation for stand-offishness... we encountered only warmth."