Like the mortal remains of one of our most renowned kings, my wife and I’s possessions are now resting in three different parts of France. Another similarity is that Richard the Lion Heart’s bits were deposited in locations which had played important parts in his life.

At time of going to press, a selection of assorted chattels from the East household are being stored on the top floor of a fabulous old house alongside the Nantes-Brest canal where it meanders past Chateauneuf-du-Faou in the Finistere department of Brittany.  Hirgars is the much-loved home of dear friends Sally and Richard Moore, with whom we have had many adventures afloat on their narrow boat Jenny Wren.  They are also knowledgeable and tolerant enough of our behavioural pattern not to turn a hair when we arrived for dinner recently in  a large van-load also containing a mound of  battered furniture and furnishings.

A shade over 259 kilometres to the south-east  of Hirgars lays the Loire Valley village of Challain-la-Potherie, our base camp for the year and a bit it took to write a book about that area. The otherwise nondescript village is home to one of the most over-the-top chateaux in all France. The ville is less famous for being the repository of four kitchen chairs, a chain saw, two step ladders, a wheel-less wheelbarrow, a mobile dog kennel and various other items not wanted on our next journey. These items are being held for us in the most impressive former stable block I have encountered, which belongs to another friend. Here where the local great landlord kept his horses and those who looked after them is also a new home to our chickens, cockerel and a rabbit called Lunch. Hopefully, he will not have lived or rather died up to his name by the time my wife reclaims him from his gourmet-chef host.

If you take a zigzaggy route north from the Loire to a distance of 313 kilometres, you will find Cherbourg, just outside of which is a truly wonderful chateau. This is owned by and run as a deliciously eccentric B &B and escape from the real world by another set of good and clearly tolerant friends. In one of the many outbuildings may now be found coming up for three thousand books, some by me but most by other and much more distinguished authors.

Although it might sound a little chaotic, the shedding of so much of our stuff was more or less deliberate. Having spread most of our possessions liberally around northern France, we are now free to continue our journeying with no more than a car and trailer rather than a convoy of pantechnicons.

One reason for travelling light to our next home in France is cost; the other is to relieve the inevitable tensions caused by changing location every year. It is said that death in the family, divorce and moving home are the most stressful events in anyone’s life; even though we are now as well-travelled as a particularly restless Gallic  gypsy tribe, doing it five times in as many years in a foreign country has proved a tad challenging. Especially when someone  ( i.e. me) packs urgently needed items in boxes still bearing the  uncrossed-out contents list from three previous usages. 

So, now we are stripped down and ready for action, we are both looking forward to our time living alongside and travelling the length of the Dordogne River.  Apart from expense and chaotic moments and the odd verbal punch-up, there is, however, another problem with pursuing a lifestyle many would think ideal.

Broadly, the problem is that there is so much of France and it is such a delightfully varied country that it is becoming impossible for us to settle on which bit of it we like best. As my wife says, if we had stayed in Normandy we would never have known what a stunning region Brittany is. Had we not left Brittany,  we would never have discovered the delights of the Loire Valley. The truth is that, as well as our possessions, we have left a little part of our hearts in each of those locations, and I have a feeling it will be the same when we head south.

Back to Richard Coeur de Lion, and his dying wish was  for his bowels to be buried at Chalus in the Limousin,  the place where he received his mortal wound. He also asked that his  body be  interred at the feet of his father (Henry II ) in Fontevraud Abbey near Chinon in the Loire Valley, and his heart be kept at Rouen Cathedral. That’s all very well, but we like so many different places in our second favourite country that we would need a mincing machine to follow his example.

Previously in the East’s peripatetic life:

Weather or Not

So far, it’s been a funny old summer in our current neck of the French woods, the Loire Valley.

Last year we lost a lot of friends through trying to fob them off with hundredweights of home-made mirabelle jam, chutney, sauce and hair cream. This year there is not a single fruit to be seen on the dozen trees in our orchard. So we are plumb out of plums, which is sad for our autumnal bottling and preserving plans, if great news for our remaining friends

And even spookier things have been afoot in the vegetable plot.

Last year the tops of our runner bean stalks threatened to brush the stars, and would have borne the weight of  a really morbidly obese Jack; this year the plants flowered and set while not much more than ankle high, and we were eating their fruit in June. Yes, June. If you are a non-gardener, think of Christmas unexpectedly arriving at the end of school summer holidays. Also, the reason pumpkins were picked to do silly things with on All Hallows Eve is that they are ripe for picking in September and October. Ours are already well orangey, so we (and our hapless friends) shall be getting fed up with pumpkin pie and soup before the summer leaves us.

According to the experts (our next-door neighbours on either side), all this weird vegetative inconsistency has nothing to do with global warning or a blight upon all village produce  after being cursed by the local sorceress (one of the check-out girls upset her in Super U at the start of the year). It is simply that we have had the wrong weather at the wrong time, if you see what I mean. Depending on whether you are a lizard or a redhead with fair skin resident in our area, you would have enjoyed or endured a blistering mini- heat wave in April, followed by six weeks without a drop of rain. While the results of this unusual weather pattern means mild disappointment for us veggie gardeners, it is a catastrophe for a lot of local farmers.

Normally, the fields around us would be filled with cattle maize as high as a baby elephant’s eye, and hosts of glorious and voluptuous sunflowers swaying and jostling for shoulder- room. Instead, the maize is mostly knee-high to a donkey with a modest inside leg measurement, and the sunflowers look more like daisies with a mild case of yellow jack fever.

We arrived in the Loire Valley last June fresh from living half-way up what counts as a mountain in northern Brittany. As I stepped out of the air-conditioned car, my legs buckled and I thought we had made a wrong move as I would surely melt before autumn came. As it happened, the  national heat wave affecting our new area was even more so in our previous domicile.  This exposes another climate myth, as when we told people where we lived in God’s own region, they would smile sympathetically and say something like ‘ Lovely place, Brittany, but what a shame about the weather. All that rain...’

In fact, Central Brittany has an annual average rainfall of 760 millimetres. The sun-seekers’ Mediterranean paradise of Nice has, wait for it, more than 800mm of precipitation each year. The difference is that all theirs comes down in 63 days, while the Brittany rain rations itself to little and often over 128 days. Thus misconceptions are formed, followed inevitably by uninformed prejudice. To be fair, though, in nearby (to Nice) Saint-Jean Cap Ferrat, rain may not fall for more than 320 days a year, and in the summer months there is an almost guaranteed land temperature of 24 degrees C, with the sea actually two degrees warmer. You can see how some people would fancy those sorts of climes. And here’s another fascinating factette. Apparently confusingly, the French call the south of France the ‘midi’. This is not because of a Gallic lack of location awareness, but because the middle of the day is when the sun is at its hottest.

Officially, there are four distinct climate zones in France: Atlantic, continental, Mediterranean and mountain. Within those zones there are, or claimed to be, any number of micro-climates. This is because there is a sort of weather superiority complex and snobbery abroad in France, where people-especially British expats-equate sunshine hours with good living and sophistication. This is obviously tosh, wherever you are in the world, and I cannot see how the Devil’s Anvil area of the Nefud desert is any classier than some parts of Salford. But to indicate their sunshine status, people make outrageous claims for micro-climates in their area of France, and sometimes even say they have much better weather than the next village.

I think the point I am making is that a lot of hot air is talked about prevailing climatic conditions in France.

Because we seasoned travellers have learned that places gain their identity and attraction from more than just how often and strongly the sun shines, Brittany is still our hotspot. And we know what we are talking of, as we have lived or stayed in or at least travelled through most of the 22 regions and loved them all.

Whatever the weather... 

Local knowledge

Though still in residence in the Loire Valley, we are fresh back from a 3000-kilometre dash down to the (more-or- less) epicentre of France on a reconnaisance trip for my next  book.  As the name suggests, The Dordogne from Source to Sea will  follow the river from where it trickles out of a hole in the ground half-way up a volcano in a ski resort in the Auvergne to its exit  into the Bay of Biscay  (or Golfe de Gascogne  to the French ,  Golf de Gasconha to the  Gascognes and  Bizkaiko  Golgoa  to the Basques ).

During a whirlwind week we whizzed through five departments and three regions, and did our best to sample the   local culture and cuisine and drink of each of them. Apart from being a whale of a time, the trip also set me pondering on a number of aspects of France and the French from a Brit-eye viewpoint.

In no particular order of priority, they were:

 a) What a big and lovely country France is

b) How varied  the different regions are

c)  How  varied ( and wonderful)  the different signature dishes of each region can be

d) How difficult it must be for Brits to decide exactly which part of this great and glorious place to visit or buy a home in or move to live in.

I know from my mailbag and conversations with Brits who buy or move to France that they usually settle on the place where they first visited or most holidayed.     In their case, familiarity has bred contentment and even love rather than contempt. The problem for people like me who have lived in, stayed at or at least travelled through nearly all the 100-plus departments and 22 regions is similar to that of  a child  in a really well-stocked sweet shop. So much choice.

I know I shouldn’t  be doing this and it will more than probably ruffle a few feathers  on the plumage of  migratory Brits who love their bit of France above all others, but here’s my  very personal, unscientific  appraisal and  list of pros and cons.

The North:  nice and close to England (some might say too close) but sharing the same weather

The Centre: spectacular scenery, lots of history and scorching summers, but also freezing winters and much too far from the sea.

The South:  Close to the sea and a lovely, even climate, but high prices, often a nose- in- the- air

(sorry, over-sophisticated) attitude and too many flash people and cars for my liking.

The South West: mountains are great to look at, but not much fun when walking the dog or wanting to cycle to the shops.

The North East:  For absolutely no reason, this part of France has never appealed to me.

So, after travelling to the moon and back in distance terms within the borders of France, where do I reckon would be the best place to settle when I hang up my travelling boots?  No contest, actually. It’s Great Bretagne.

Why?

For starters, at more than a thousand kilometres, Brittany has a longer and more varied coastline than anywhere else in the country. Nowhere is more than an hour or so from the sea. And what a coastline, from golden sanded coves to dramatic cliffs and ever-changing shades of sea.

The rest of Brittany is just as varied, from the mountains of Finistere to the thickly wooded and laked central area.  And what about all those picture-postcard fishing villages and inland ports?  The weather, with its hot summers and mild winters, is also right up my street.   And I happen to like rain. Perhaps more than any other reason, though, I vote for Brittany because of the people.  They love their food and drink and history and culture without ramming it down your throat, and perhaps because they are often viewed as outsiders by ignorant French people, Bretons also generally welcome Brits with open arms. Especially if, like me, you can claim some Celt in your genetic make-up.

Finally, any region that considers full-fat butter as an essential cooking ingredient and has more small breweries than the rest of France put together must win my vote.

Having said all that, I still have a lot of France to see and write about, and even a travel writer is allowed to change his mind. Martinique sounds a rather nice place, for instance...

Another Busy Day

Recently we dropped in to  see a friend who runs an estate agency in a local town. The visit  epitomised a number of aspects of life in rural France, some of them so stereotypical you might think I was making them up...but not so. It was our chum’s first day back at the office after a break by the seaside with his family, so as we had not seen each other for a couple of weeks, it seemed appropriate to suggest we go next door to the bar for a chat before we all got on with our work.

Our friend took little persuading, apologised to a potential customer who arrived as we were leaving, and we were soon ensconced in the Bar du Bon Parle. But not before at least five minutes of doing the rounds and shaking hands with a number of customers we knew, several who seemed vaguely familiar, and some who were complete strangers.  Our friend is British but has lived and worked in the town for nearly twenty years, so is almost accepted as a local. Thus he was obliged to do the rounds, asking after the health of each shakee and his family. In the way things are done in this part of the world, we were obliged to literally follow in his footsteps while at the same time tiptoeing through the tortuous minefield of handshaking protocol.

If we already knew the person, it would be a firm and warm handshake and smile on each side, and sometimes even a slap on the back en passant. If it was someone we did not know, the range of intimacy and amity could range from a nod and brisk squeeze, to an experience similar to taking a dead fish in one’s hand.

The ceremony over, we retired to our table. I had meant to order coffee, but somehow three glasses of the local rosé appeared on the table before I had lifted a hand to attract the proprietor’s attention. Obviously, our friend has been a regular so long at the bar that all ordering is done my mental telepathy. Even after all my years here, I still feel vaguely guilty at drinking alcohol before the sun has even put in an appearance below the yardarm. But when in Rome, or rather, small town France...

They were small glasses, and it only seemed polite for us to return the compliment and order another round while we talked about the busy day that lay ahead for each of us. Then an English couple arrived who had just bought a house through our friend’s auspices. They were celebrating the start of their new adventure, and insisted we join them for another glass of the pink stuff. After another couple of rounds, the talk turned naturally to lunch, and what plans we each had. Horrified to hear we had been thinking of  grabbing a sandwich, our new friends insisted we join them in inspecting what was on offer in the bar across the road, which had recently changed hands. It was said that the new owner put on a splendid ouvrier (working man’s lunch), and seemed a good idea to put him to the test.

Crossing the road, we were nearly run over and then hailed by a French friend, who had recently stood us to a meal at another of the town’s four bar-restaurants. It was of course only good manners for us to invite him to join us. 

Arriving at the bar, we met our bank manager and his assistant’s assistant, who were also on a mission to test the menu. He insisted that we and our friends join his table, and more seats were hurried over as another couple of his friends or clients arrived.

To cut a long day and story short, we ate and drank for a couple of hours, then were invited back to the house of our estate agent friend to meet his new hunting dog and try out his latest batch of eau-de-vie moonshine brandy.

We arrived home in a sober friend’s car just before midnight. Oddly, we had both completely forgotten why we had gone to town in the first place. But as my wife said, it could not have been more important than meeting and eating and drinking with good friends. Tomorrow, she added, would be another day, and we could get whatever was needed to done then. As long as we steered clear of all our friends and the Bar of Good Conversation...