Ruth Paget is a game developer and former restaurant critic. She is the author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks about Japan and Marrying France.
Monday, December 17, 2012
Monday, December 3, 2012
Visiting Lyon, France with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Visiting Lyon (France) with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Lyon, France’s geographical position has made it a commercial hub between Italy and northern Europe for centuries.
Charles VII (1403 – 1461) used this geographical position to his advantage by instituting the first of several international fairs that made Lyon a sales capital in 1419. Later in 1450, Charles VII gave Lyon the monopoly on the sale and manufacture of silk in France.
Men in Lyon still wear beautiful silk ties in diamond patterns with red, blue, and yellow backgrounds. You can find these ties in luxury stores and exclusive hotel shops. The silk industry also gave Lyon its famous guignol marionette.
An unemployed silk worker named Laurent Mourguet created the guignol character around 1808. Guignol is a citizen of Lyon, who works very hard, but never seems to have good luck. There is a museum devoted to guignol and marionettes from around the world at the Château Gadagne in Lyon.
Lyon is world famous for this museum as well as its food, which I happily sampled at the Brasserie Georges. The Brasserie Georges makes fun of itself for being an Alsatian brasserie and choucroute landmark, but it has been an institution in Lyon since 1836 when it was founded by Jean-Georges Hoffherr. (Traditional dining establishments in Lyon are called bouchons.)
Brasserie Georges is located by the Perrarche SNCF train station. Its location allows businessmen to arrive on morning trains, carry out business over a leisurely lunch, and return home without having to stay in a hotel.
One of the first things I noticed about Lyon was that diners concentrate on their food and do not spend as much time inspecting other diners’ clothing and jewelry as they do in other cities. Lyon is considered to be the capital of French food and maybe this attitude towards eating is responsible for it.
The first lunch I ate at Brasserie Georges reminded me of what someone from Paris would eat as they headed south in France: roast saddle of lamb with a endives au gratin. The endives au gratin were not bitter at all and tasted sweet a crust of browned cheese. The gratin stayed deliciously warm in its own heat dish. For dessert, I ate crème brulée which had a sugary, warm crust on it – perfection.
The next day was a Saturday and the clientèle changed from the weekday businessmen’s lunches. More multigenerational families were there. My husband Laurent and I had to wait a short while for a table and watched as waiters carried baked Alaska desserts around the dining room hall with sparklers on top of them for birthdays to the tunes of a hole-punched, card-fed music box.
I ordered a traditional Lyon-style menu this time starting with a terrine made of chicken livers. Following this course was a course of sausages meant for cooking that Lyon specializes in. They had been flavored with pistachios, but can also be found with pepper corns and truffles in their more elaborate forms. Mashed potatoes accompanied the sausage.
We drank a Beaujolais from Brouilly with our meal. We laughed at the old Lyon joke:
-What are the three rivers that run through Lyon?
- The Rhône, the Saône, and the …
- And, the Beaujolais!!!
To finish the meal I had a “cervelle de Canut” cheese, which literally means a silk worker’s brains cheese. This is a specialty of Lyon made from soft, white cheese with chopped herbs (chives in the Brasserie Georges version), shallots, salt, pepper, olive oil, and vinegar.
This meal marked the end to our visit to Lyon. After three trips to this beautiful city, I still feel as if I have just scratched the surface of what Lyon has to offer.
By Ruth Paget, Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Saturday, September 29, 2012
Visiting the Tintin - Herge Museum in Brabant, Belgium with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Visiting the Tintin - Herge Museum in Brabant, Belgium with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
During a visit to the Les Secrets de Moulinsart exhibit at the Château de Cheverny in France, I picked up a brochure for the Hergé Museum in Louvain-le-Neuve outside Brussels, Belgium.
During a visit to the Les Secrets de Moulinsart exhibit at the Château de Cheverny in France, I picked up a brochure for the Hergé Museum in Louvain-le-Neuve outside Brussels, Belgium.
Ever since I
studied French-language literature for children and francophone children’s
culture to become a French teacher in the 1990s, I have wanted to understand
Hergé, the creator of the Tintin comic
books better. The Hergé Museum was one
of the first stops we made on a weekend vacation during the summer of 2012.
The museum
is rich in panels of cartoon page drafts that allow you to understand the
multiple sketches that went into the creation of a single page when Hergé was a
cartoonist. As you work your way through
the French-language exhibits, you learn about the newspapers that Hergé worked
for; Le Vingtième Siècle and Le Soir.
Both newspapers were Catholic and sought to have a leisure section for
young people that Hergé filled with Tintin
or other comic strips. Most of
Hergé’s comic books started as comic strips in these newspapers.
Hergé was
not a wealthy illustrator at the beginning of his career. The second gallery following the tour is
decorated with his work for the advertising industry. Both his advertising and comic strip work
make use of techniques such as speed lines to indicate motion, the interplay of
angles to focus the eye, and color to incite emotion among other techniques to
focus viewer attention on use of products or product placements in attractive
surroundings.
My favorite
gallery was devoted to the influence of cinema on Hergé’s work. Books for each decade of his work were set
out on tables in this gallery. It was
interesting to see how Hergé could speed up a sequence by showing one long
frame on line, then two frames on the next line, and finally three frames on
the last line. The same sequence of
frames in reverse could slow up a sequence as well.
I am more
interested in technique than content with most comic books. However, Hergé’s publicity claim that Tintin comic books were for people aged
“seven to seventy-seven” keeps me coming back to the medium.
A book in
the gift shop convinced me to buy it for its focus on narrative in comic
books. The book is entitled J’apprends à raconter une histoire:
l’atelier de la bande dessinée avec Hergé (2001, editions Moulinsart). The books shows children how to ask
themselves questions to start a story, how to track story notes and sketches,
how to convey different moods with bubbles, and how to tell a story with
figures in action among many tips.
Children
often learn how to draw comic strip characters, buildings, and vehicles, but
sometimes need help with creating stories.
I was happy with this purchase that appealed to my love for knowing how
things work.
It took half
an hour to get back to Brussels where we ate dinner: a carbonnade flamande (beef stew) with fries
for me and entrecôte (steak) with fries for Laurent. Of course, the fries were dunked in
mayonnaise like the Belgians eat them.
By Ruth Paget, Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Friday, September 28, 2012
Discussing Napoleon's Battle Plan for Waterloo (Belgium) over Lunch with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Discussing Napoleon's Battle Plan for Waterloo (Belgium) over Lunch with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
As my husband Laurent and I drove towards Belgium for a weekend trip in Brussels, I thought of how many times Belgium has been a battlefield or subject to foreign powers. Our touring guide did not gloss over any of Belgium’s painful history.
As my husband Laurent and I drove towards Belgium for a weekend trip in Brussels, I thought of how many times Belgium has been a battlefield or subject to foreign powers. Our touring guide did not gloss over any of Belgium’s painful history.
Instead the Belgique, Duché de Luxembourg Michelin guide lists Belgium’s 500 years under foreign domination before it notes tourist sites. The monarchies or states that controlled Belgium during this 500-year period include: the Dukes of Burgundy (1384 – 1482), the Hapsbourgs (1482 – 1701), the Austrian Netherlands (1701 – 1795), France (1795 – 1814), and the Kingdom of the Netherlands (1814 – 1831). In the twentieth century, Germany also occupied Belgium from 1940 – 1944.
On this trip, Laurent and I visited Waterloo, which is about fifteen minutes outside Brussels. I had read about Waterloo in 100 Decisive Battles: From Ancient Times to the Present Day by Paul K. Davis several years prior to our visit. Davis writes that Napoleon Bonaparte’s (1769 – 1821) strategy was one of “a separation of enemy forces” or “divide and conquer” in the jargon of office politics.
I remembered
Napoleon’s strategy from Waterloo, but not the specifics of this battle, which
took place on June 18, 1815. Laurent
drew a map of the battlefield on my paper place mat at the Wellington Café of the battlefield site.
The A-shaped
battlefield had Napoleon in the center facing the Anglo-Dutch forces under
Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington (1769 – 1852). Prussian forces under Field Marshal Prince
Gebhard von Blücher (1742 – 1819) arrived on the right flank of Napoleon’s
forces in the late afternoon (after 4 pm), allowing the Anglo-Dutch forces and
Prussian forces to defeat Napoleon at once.
The Anglo-Dutch forces under Wellington held off Napoleon’s forces until the Prussian forces could arrive. This resistance completely undid Napoleon’s plans to defeat each force separately; instead he had to fight both forces at once from the middle of a triangular battlefield.
Rainy weather contributed to Napoleon’s defeat by making intelligence difficult and creating muddy battleground conditions for his cavalry as well.
The battleground was hot and dry when we visited. Laurent walked the entire battlefield on foot as his souvenir of the site. I hoped that Belgium would never have to be a battlefield again.
By Ruth Paget - Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Thursday, September 27, 2012
Visiting Romeo and Juliet's Town of Verona, Italy with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Visiting Romeo and Juliet's Town of Verona, Italy with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
My husband Laurent and I loved Verona, which Shakespeare (1564 – 1616) used as the setting for his play Romeo and Juliet.
Verona reaps
a fortune on this fictional love story, but we still went to San Franceso al Corso Church to see
Juliet’s tomb. When we left the museum, we helped several
groups of British ladies find their way to Juliet’s tomb, too.
The play Romeo and Juliet may have been fictional
but the domestic turmoil within Italian cities that Shakespeare described was
very real. The Italie du Nord Michelin touring guide we had gave background on
this conflict as one between the Montecchi (Montagu) family and the Capuleti
(Capulet) family. The Montecchi were
Guelphs, who supported the pope. The
Capuleti were Ghibellines, who supported the Holy Roman Empire centered in Germany.
The conflict
between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines divided cities within themselves and
also against other cities that threw their entire support behind either the
Guelph or Ghibelline faction. According
to infoplease.com, the Guelph-Ghibelline conflict affected central and northern
Italy in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.
The time of
the most heightened conflict took place when Guelph-supported Pope Alexander
III (1105 – 1181) and the Hohenstaufen Emperor, Frederick I Barbarossa (1123 –
1190), who was supported by the Ghibellines, fought one another with alliances
and battles.
Medieval
history left my thoughts as the arena dating from the first century C.E. came
into view. The arena has 44 rows of
seats and can hold 25,000 spectators.
Operas such as Carmen still
take place there in the summer. Men
dressed as centurions complete with swords and women dressed as Cleopatra posed
outside the arena with tourists for photographs.
The arena is
located on the Piazza Bra. We ate an
outdoor café despite the heat that could fry an egg on the pavement. We ordered pizza with three liters of water. From the café we had an excellent view of the
arena, park, and a huge TV screen set up for the Spain-Italy Eurocup
match. (Spain won later that night 4 – 0. It was a very quiet evening in Italy Laurent
noted.)
As we walked
back to the car after lunch, I thought all had ended well for our Verona
outing.
By Ruth Paget, Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
Visiting the Italian University Town of Padua with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Visiting the Italian University Town of Padua with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
When my husband Laurent and I visited northern Italy, the city that topped my list of places to visit was Padua for its university.
The
University of Padua was founded in 1222 and is the second oldest in Italy. (The University of Bologna was founded in
1088.) According to our Italie du Nord Michelin touring guide,
Galileo (1564-1642) taught at Padua and Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543),
Giovanni Pico della Mandorla (1463 – 1494) and Torquato Tasso (1544 – 1595)
were students there.
The
astronomer Galileo had to stand trial before the Inquisition in Rome in 1633
for teaching that the earth rotated around the sun. According to Stephen Hawking’s On the Shoulders of Giants: The Great Works
of Physics and Astronomy which records Galileo’s renunciation of his
teachings and book Dialogue Concerning
the Two Chief World Systems: Ptolemaic and Copernican, Galileo is reported
to have said “Eppur si muove” in a mutter as he stood up from kneeling. (“Eppur si muove” is loosely translated as
“yet it moves.”)
Law and math
were the main subjects of study for Copernicus at Padua a generation before
Galileo supported Copernican theory that is laid out in De Revolunionbus Orbium Coelestium by Copernicus.
One of the
University of Padua’s most distinguished students was Giovanni Pico della
Mandorla. Pico della Mandorla wrote Oration on the Dignity of Man, which is
one of the reference texts for Renaissance Humanism. Torquato Tasso, a poet and leading figure of
the Renaissance, studied law and philosophy at the University of Padua as well.
As we walked
through Padua’s streets, I wanted to imbibe some of the insight that Padua
seems to foster, but Padua’s red buildings retain scorching heat well. The medieval town has narrow streets, no
arcades, and very few piazzas. I was
dripping wet when we visited. Padua’s
scholars must have taken summer semester off I thought.
The walk in
the heat to the Church of the Eremitani (Church of the Hermits) was worth the
effort, though, despite our not having reservations to the Scrovegni Chapels
with its mural paintings by Giotto (1267-1337).
I wanted to
see Andrea Mantegna’s (1431 – 1506) paintings in the Church of the
Eremitani. These paintings were his
first major work and date from 1488 according to the National Gallery of
London’s website.
When we arrived his
work was being restored, so we could not see most of it. However, what was visible of his Martydom of
Saint James, the Assumption, and the Martyrdom of Saint Christopher show how he
achieved the sensation of grandeur in viewers through several technical
devices, especially perspective.
When you
look at Mantegna’s paintings of figures, you feel like you are looking
upward. He achieves this effect by
tapering and angling his figures. He
seems to have lighter colors at the top of his paintings as well and darker
colors below to enhance the upward flow of his paintings. He also uses architecture in his paintings to
create upward momentum by positioning his arches at angles. These technical devices all give his work a
dramatic impact.
The heat had
worn me out and ruled out further touring.
Getting out of Padua was tricky.
Medieval Italian cities like Padua have a circular pattern, which seems to throw
off GPS systems. We circled around a bit
until we could decode the “veer right, then turn left” instructions.
(Tangential instructions?)
By Ruth Paget - Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Eating a Venetian Countryside Lunch (Veneto Region, Italy) with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Eating a Venetian Countryside Lunch (Veneto Region, Italy) with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
In the guest house of Villa Valmarana in Vicenza, the paintings by Giovanni Battista Teipolo (1696 – 1770) reflect the pastoral life of the Veneto region outside Venice, Carnival season, scenes from the life of the Greek gods, as well as whimsical scenes of Chinoiserie and Gothic architecture. Italian majolica dish sets decorated the villa guest house as well.
Italians, like the French, make beautiful decorative art
objects and know how to display them.
The Italians do this by not crowding them with all the other beautiful
decorative art objects in the house. The
art objects probably are rotated as well according to season or holiday as the
Japanese do.
In the garden behind the main villa, my husband Laurent and
I walked under cool, floral arcades with a statue of Zeus at the end of
them. The interior garden between the
main house and guest villa had a rose garden and fountain. We sat on benches and could smell the scent
of antique roses on the hot, humid breeze.
From Vicenza, we drove out to the Berica Riviera. We ate lunch at a small restaurant where no
one spoke English. The menu was given to
us orally in Italian with a few non-verbal signs. I have read several Italian cookbooks, so my
restaurant Italian allowed us to order a hearty meal.
For the primi or first course, Laurent had tagliatelle with
ragu (beef and tomato sauce). I ordered
bigoli pasta, which are the regional pastas of the Veneto region outside Venice
and of Venice itself. The bigoli are thick, round strands of pasta that make
you feel very full after you eat them with ragu like I did. Our other sauce choices were sausage and
marinara.
For the secondi or main course, Laurent had prosciutto with
cantaloupe. I ate a ham hock with
rosemary. For the contorni or vegetables to go with these dishes, Laurent had a
large mixed salad. I ate porcini
mushrooms cooked in olive oil; I could have just eaten these they were so good.
On another Vicenza outing, we walked along the Corso
Palladio for 1 ½ hours. Vicenza is like
Venice on land our Italie du Nord Michelin
Touring Guide noted. Vicenza is a UNESCO
World Heritage site for its architecture by Andrea Palladio (1508-1580) and for
its city planning we read on a plaque at Palladio’s Teatro Olimpico.
In the downtown area of Vicenza, there are 22 Palladian
villas, churches, basilicas, and loggias all together. This area is pedestrian-only if you do not
count bicycles. Many of the buildings
have arcades, which makes touring in the summer heat more pleasurable.
Vicenza merits several visits, especially for lovers of
architecture.
By Ruth Paget, Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Laurent Paget Photography |
Laurent Paget Photography |
Laurent Paget Photography |
Laurent Paget Photography |
Ruth Paget Selfie |
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Visiting Vicenza (Italy), famous for its Palladian Villas and Tiepolo Paintings with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Visiting Vicenza (Italy), famous for its Palladian Villas and Tiepolo Paintings with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
My husband Laurent and I went to see architect Andrea Palladio’s (1508 – 1580) Villa Almerico, popularly known as La Rotunda, on a Sunday morning in Vicenza, Italy.
La Rotunda,
is made up of four wings on which a central hall has a dome over it. The façades on the wings have Greek columns
on them, making La Rotunda appear to be a small temple on the small hill it
stands upon on the outskirts of Vicenza.
However, what distinguishes La Rotunda is Palladio’s use of the dome as
an element in domestic architecture.
Witold
Rybczynski dates La Rotunda between 1560 – 1570 in his book The Perfect House: A Journey with the
Renaissance Master Andrea Palladio.
Rybczynski’s book is a wonderful touring guide that might have you
identifying Palladian elements in your home town such as those on banks besides
using it to appreciate Palladian Villas in Italy.
Palladian
influence was wide Rybczynski writes.
For example, in the state of Virginia, the James River Plantation homes
owe their colonnaded porches to Palladian inspiration. Palladio also inspired Thomas Jefferson while
building his home of Monticello outside Charlottesville, Virginia.
Visiting La
Rotunda was tantalizing, but the villa was closed on Sunday mornings. We had to
photograph it through a gate. We later
learned that the interior was open on Wednesday afternoons only. So, our plan A for the day would not work.
However,
this was Italy, so if one villa was closed, another would probably be
open. We walked around the corner to
Villa Valmarana. When we bought our
tickets, we discovered that Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696 – 1770) had painted
scenes from mythology in the main villa and from literature and Venetian
popular sources in the guest house.
Laurent had
vaguely heard of Tiepolo and asked me more about him. I told him that Tiepolo usually worked on
paintings that looked as if the ceiling had opened up to the sky with angels
transporting people to heaven or themselves on billowing, three-dimensional
clouds.
In the main
villa, Tiepolo used three-dimensional painting to show the sacrifice of Iphigenia
by her father Agamemnon. This scene is
often thought to be savage and brutal, reflecting the misogyny of Greek
culture. I have always read this Greek
myth differently.
Agamemnon
belonged to the House of Atreus, which was descended from Tantalus. The House of Atreus was cursed, and I
believed it was for its mistreatment of women.
Families that treat their women well should be blessed. Perhaps this interpretation explains why this
scene of Iphegenia’s sacrifice would show up in a home to remind its
inhabitants to treat women well.
Just the
paintings in Villa Valmarana main house make it a destination to visit in
Vicenza.
By Ruth Paget, Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Ruth Paget Selfie |
Friday, September 21, 2012
Visiting Cheverny Chateau, the Model for Tintin's Home Drawn by Herge with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Visiting Cheverny Chateau, the Model for Tintin's home Drawn by Herge, with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
The Château
de Cheverny built outside Blois is a rare, unified gem of French architecture
built between 1604 to 1654 for Hurault de Cheverny.
The
château’s twelve niches for busts on the second of its three stories give the
façade rhythm and a unifying element despite the semicircular, triangular, and
trapezoidal roofs over the main body and wings of the château.
The
symmetrical arrangement pleases the eye and appealed to the Belgian comic book
creator Hergé (1907 – 1983), who used Cheverny as the inspiration for the
Moulinsart Château in his Tintin comic series. Hergé just used the central part of the
château for his comic book strip.
Hergé may
have chosen to use only the central part of the château, because the two wide
wings on the ends of the central part of the château would have made the comic
book frames very wide. The architecture
would have taken away from the action of the figures. Hergé also refrained from drawing the twelve
niches for busts for the busts. Too much
detail in comic books can take away from the action of the characters, whom you
want to focus upon as a reader.
There was a
French-language exhibit being held when we visited called Les Secrets de
Moulinsart. One of the secrets of
Moulinsart is that Hergé placed the château in Belgium in his comic strip and
named it Moulinsart by reversing the name of a Belgian town Saar-Moulin to
obtain Moulinsart. (Hergé did this with
his own name of Georges Rémi, which became Hergé to show the reversal of his
initials.)
Moulinsart
Château was important to the heroes of Tintin
– Captain Haddock, Professor Tournesol, Milou the dog and Tintin – because
they finally had a stable home to come back to from their adventures according
to Benoît Peeters in L’oeuvre intégrale
de Hergé.
The Tintin
exhibit had rooms set up to look like Tintin’s bedroom complete with clothes
hanging in a closet that were identifiable from his different adventures,
Moulinsart château with broken windows from a storm, the deck of the Unicorn
ship, and Professor Tournesol’s laboratory among others. The exhibit also showed photographs of people
that Hergé had caricatured.
As my
husband Laurent and I walked up to the steps of the château all I could think
of was how wonderful it would look in wedding photos.
By Ruth Paget - Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Visiting France's Stonehenge at Carnac and Quiberon Bay Resort in Brittany with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Visiting France's Stonehenge at Carnac and Quiberon Bay Resort in Brittany with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
From Nantes,
we drove out to Carnac located in the Morbihan département. Three major Neolithic sites make up what are
called the Carnac Alignments in this département of Brittany.
“High
season” in the summer means that even though we arrived at 9 am, all the
tickets for a tour were sold out until the 11:30 am tour and those were going
fast. There would then be a lunch break
before the next tours.
We decided
to pass on a guided tour and drove along the road, which links all three
Neolithic sites, with our Celtic music playing.
The Bagad de Lann Bihouë music we listened to while driving made the ride cheerful.
According to
The Carnac Alignments: Neolithic Temples
by Jean-Pierre Mohen, the Carnac monoliths were erected 6,000 years ago by men
and women who used them between the fifth and third millennium BCE. The Neolithic period witnessed the dramatic
change from a hunting and gathering culture to one that relied on agriculture
according to H.W. Janson in his book History
of Art.
Mohen writes
that there are 3,000 monoliths at Carnac.
Most of these monoliths are menhirs that stand upright. The menhirs are not as tall as those at
Stonehenge, but their regularity of spacing illustrates how Neolithic man may
have sought to create order not only through a reliable food source, but also
through religion.
All three of
the Neolithic sites we drove by have fences around them now, but it is easy to
see the sites of Kerlescan, Kermario, and Le Ménec from the car. From Carnac we drove to the yachting town of
La Trinité-sur-Mer.
La Trinité
is a harbor with 1,200 docking slots for yachts. It has all the amenities to serve a yachting
population such as clothing boutiques, a weekly market, a merry-go-round for
children, and many restaurants along the harbor front. A catamaran that towered over the yachts was
in the harbor; it was made to ride ocean swells in the Atlantic and elsewhere.
We ate
steamed mussels and fries for lunch and enjoyed looking at yachts sailing in
the open sea. After lunch, we continued
along with the Bagad de Lann Bihouë
music playing to the Quiberon Isthmus.
The sun beat down on us, but the fresh ocean breeze cut down the heat. We could see the large island of
Belle-Ile-en-Mer in the near distance.
On the way
back to Nantes, I admired the Breton homes with granite inserts around the
windows, steep roofs to let the winter rains from the Atlantic roll off them,
lace curtains in the windows, and carefully pruned flowers everywhere.
Brittany
always charms me.
By Ruth Paget - Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Visiting Camelot (Modern-day Nantes) in Brittany, France with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Visiting Camelot (Modern-day Nantes) in Brittany, France with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
We left Charente-Maritime and set out for Naoned, the Breton name for this former capital of Brittany. The Vichy Government (1940 - 1944) politically separated Nantes from Brittany in 1941. Following French administrations liked this separation and have kept it in place. Nantes is now the prefecture, or main city, of the Loire-Atlantique département.
We left Charente-Maritime and set out for Naoned, the Breton name for this former capital of Brittany. The Vichy Government (1940 - 1944) politically separated Nantes from Brittany in 1941. Following French administrations liked this separation and have kept it in place. Nantes is now the prefecture, or main city, of the Loire-Atlantique département.
However,
when the massive Palace of the Dukes of Brittany comes into view, you sense the
dual identity that has been forced upon Nantes. I prefer focusing on the Breton
past of Nantes as it was the capitol of Brittany for generations.
We started
our visit of Nantes in Breton fashion by heading to the Quartier Bouffray,
which is the restaurant district of Nantes.
We went to eat savory galettes, buckwheat and flour crêpes, at the
oldest crêperie in Nantes called the “Crêperie Sainte Croix.” The crêperie was close to the Sainte Croix
Church, giving the restaurant its name.
Our meals
were simple, but well prepared. Laurent
had a galette with ham, eggs, and cheese while I ate one with eggs, cheese, and
mushrooms. We drank a traditional apple
cider with our meal. Laurent ate a crêpe with honey and almonds for
dessert. I finished my meal with a
buttery Breton cake called Kouing Aman.
After our
hearty lunch, we set out to see the Saint Peter and Saint Paul Cathedral built
from 1434 to 1891. Parts of the
cathedral have been reconstructed since it was bombed during World War II (1939 - 1945).
The cathedral also suffered from a fire in 1972 an exhibit in the
cathedral noted. Today it glistens
inside and out from the restoration work that has been done to it.
There is a
magnificent tomb for François II (1433 - 1488), Duke of Brittany in the
cathedral, but it is the story of his family that is most interesting.
From 1364 to
1468, the Dukes of the Monfort House took over Brittany and only rendered
theoretical homage to the kingdom of France according to our Michelin Guide for
Bretagne Sud.
Duke François
II actually caused the demise of his family in 1488 by losing a battle to the
Regent of France Anne de Beaujeu, the Bretagne
Sud guide related along with information about François II’s heir Anne de
Bretagne (1477 - 1514). Duchesse Anne de
Bretagne played power politics all of her life to try and maintain the autonomy
of Brittany.
In 1491, she
married Charles VIII (1470 - 1498), the king of France and maintained the
independence of Brittany. She later
married Louis XII (1462 - 1515), the king of France in 1499. Brittany came under the de facto control of
the crown during this marriage.
In 1514,
Anne de Bretagne’s daughter, Claude de France (1499 - 1524), married François I,
King of France (1494 – 1547), who legally ratified the union between France and
Brittany.
After our
visit of the cathedral we walked to the botanical garden. There are trees and plants from all over the
world here, reflecting Nantes’ naval and commercial past.
There was a
playground in the botanical garden. I
smiled and laughed a little as children dressed in white clothes went to play
in the sandbox and on the swings under the supervision of their parents. Parents chided children to make them play
nicely.
Children had
to take turns on the swings, boys could not push girls and vice versa, and
there was no throwing of sand at playmates.
I finished the day thinking of how much I like French civilization.
By Ruth Paget, Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Monday, September 17, 2012
Visiting France's Hidden Beach Resort at the Sables d'Olonne (Vendee, France) with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
Visiting France's Hidden Beach Resort at the Sables d'Olonne (Vendee, France) with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
My husband Laurent and I left the Charente-Maritime
département the next day to visit the Vendée département. We knew we had entered the Vendée when we
passed the département’s symbol: two superimposed hearts with a crown and cross
on top of them. The Vendée was the last
royalist region to rebel during the French Revolution (1787 – 1799). The Vendéens paid dearly for their allegiance
to King Louis XVI (1754 – 1793), Queen Marie Antoinette (1755 – 1793), and the
Church.
During the Guerres de Vendée (Wars of the Vendée) from 1793
to 1796, peasant and noble leaders emerged to lead the Catholic and Royal Army
against the Republicans of the revolutionary government in Paris according to
the Pays de la Loire Michelin Touring
Guide.
The most horrifying part of the Vendéen Wars were the
“Colonnes Infernales” whose mission was to exterminate the soldiers, women, and
children of the Vendée as well as to destroy all the housing and fields our
touring guide noted. The Vendéens lost
the wars, but managed to escape genocide.
Despite its bloody past, the Vendée is now one of the most
visited areas of France. Our destination
that day was the beach and the town of Les Sables d’Olonne. The Michelin touring guide noted that it was
the Empress Eugénie (1826 – 1920) who popularized swimming in the ocean in the
late nineteenth century. The appearance
of the train in the Sables d’Olonne in 1866 cemented its position as an
oceanfront resort town.
I was looking forward to seeing the ocean and feeling the
Atlantic breeze in this town where Laurent spent his summers with his
grandmother. She rented a tent for
decades along the oceanfront where we all enjoyed sunbathing and building sand
castles.
When we arrived, we walked along the Ramblai, which follows the entire curve of the beach. The Ramblai has several openings to the beach. We went down one of them and up to the lapping edge of the ocean. Laurent said he received his first driver’s education course at the beach’s Go-Kart area when he was six years old.
We ate raw oysters for lunch and finished the day walking
around the neighborhoods before going back to Charente-Maritime to pack our
bags for our next coastal destination.
By Ruth Paget, Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Laurent Paget Photography |
Laurent Paget Photography |
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