La Fete du Vieux Seynod

La Fete du Vieux Seynod is a charming thing.

It's a celebration of the old ways of life in a Savoyard community.  Full of handsome animals.....

  

and industrious young men keen on keeping what's "artisanal" alive

.

Like apple cider making...

hazelnut and walnut milling, for flour and oil.....

There are strong, handsome animals on parade

and sun-blushed happy, well-behaved young people celebrating their local products

and reminding us how fun it can be when we all pull and push in the same direction.

  
           Guys who've been around and know a thing or two, demonstrating how the right cheery red
                                                    contraption can help the work day go faster.

At the Fete du Vieux Seynod it's hard not to think how nice it is to be out on a sunny day.

in a place where wholesome food 

is still as beautiful as it is plentiful.

One is reminded that there are many ways to do a thing and that handmade often also means very sound and solid (and also beautiful!)

We're reminded that the Postman is our friend.

And that we're stuck with the Maire (Mrs. Mayor, too) whoever he might be.  Love him or not.

We're reminded that it's not just the Basques who wear berets.  And look terribly cute in them.

In the old days, they found ways to have fun.

Even if those ways seem a little quaint and "home-made" to us now.

I thought these horns were a bit cheesy and quaint in the wrong ways, before I heard their beautiful beautiful sound.  A music that will soothe the savage beast.....

But apparently not so soothing to this one.  You may already know the "Vache Qui Rit". This is her cousin, the Vache qui Peed!  And the whole town seemed to want to have a laugh about her accident, the poor thing.  I'm guessing she was missing her cozy barn and green pasture and wasn't so sure about all these people.

At the Fete du Vieux Seynod we're reminded that we need ALL the help we can get to keep order on the farm.

And that there is no proper local fair without Barbes a Papa.  (We call it "cotton candy" in the States.  What do you call it?)

OH the good old days!  Rough, scratchy underwear!

and...... baby horse wrangling!

And wood-turning!  (I have uncles who do this kind of stuff, don't you? )

And other useful stuff like making knives, and knife handles, and attaching them to each other....

They start them early with animal husbandry in Vieux Seynod.  As much now as they did then.  This little guy had known his charges since birth, just six weeks prior.  Just too sweet!  Don't you think?

This post about the Fete du Vieux Seynod was a long one, but I hope you thought it was just as lovely as I did.  These aren't things you get to see everyday.  Well I don't!


**Seynod is just outside Annecy.  "New"Seynod is just one big shopping center!  For better or worse.  The Fete du Vieux Seynod has been taking place every September for quite a few years now.

Monday Bites - Gelatomania, Annecy

Why is that in cold places, people are mad for ice cream?

And why is it, that only in Annecy have I seen SO MANY ice cream places in such close

proximity to each other.......

having to compete for ice-cream avid crowds by making their glaces, their gelato, their frozen custards........

Soooooo distinctive, sooooo visually appealing

so luscious and enticing......

So artistic, like Italian deco edifices

studded with jewel-like but entirely natural drool-inducing embellishments......?

Why?  To compete with this place, maybe?  Le Glacier des Alpes.

How do I know?  Cause this was the only place with a line this long.  And I've read the Yelp reviews.  It's not OFTEN that French people get this excited about something.  Am I wrong?

For this, I HAD to resurrect "Monday Bites".  Have you bought your train ticket to Annecy yet?  (Me, uh huh, I have made some plans.)

Not My Holiday Pics

But just fine, all the same:

Someone else's beach souvenir.

Someone else's shot of Hawaiian-kine front steps with the usual rubbah slippahs.

A vintage postcard from some long-ago person's Swiss holiday, like the one I did not have.

 But so pretty.  (Or maybe it's the Lake in Annecy from back in the day.)

All above via Bohemian Wornest who always posts great stuff.  Have yourself a happy 

October weekend?!

The Sweet Gite - Comme a La Maison

So the Paradis family were "vraiment en panne".....with a flight to Europe the next morning  but nowhere to stay. Even though we had been planning our holiday for a full year and had spent a month of Sundays clicking through accommodation listings in Switzerland to find just the right place....Our rental on-lake-amid-vineyards* fell through at the last minute in a very messy way.

So there I was in L.A. in a bit of a panic and where did I turn:  to les Gites de France!**

And miracle of miracles, some things are just meant to be, and I am SO glad of that:  here's what I found in no time flat:

A proper French country gite 40 minutes south of Geneva, complete with it's own.......yes, nain!  And more miracles: fully booked on either side of our arrival time but - for the week of our visit - FREE!!!!!!  Within only hours of my email, we'd had a response from the lovely property owners and the rest is a blissful history.

"Comme a la Maison" is how the gite is called and it is impeccable.  Do go to the website, it will show you more and tidier pictures. 

This gite really is "like home" complete with every convenience you might want but set right in the middle of a farm hamlet i.e., in gorgeous peaceful surroundings.  (And we were welcomed with a wheel of reblochon in the frigo and a jar of insanely delicious homemade apricot jam.)

The Paradis family are longtime gite holiday makers, we have stayed in Gites in Normandy, the Loire, the Herault, on vineyards near Bandol, les Deux-Sevres and dairy farms outside of Paris......(Gites are extremely affordable because they are part of a French government programme to shore up economies in remote places in France and to make vacationing in those places accessible to average people.  Over time some of those places have become less remote, and more popular/expensive but the gites system still provides a competitive, if not always cut-rate, alternative.)

But this might have been the sweetest gite so far (sorry all les Madames Henry of gites past!)  The owners went out of their way to make us welcome and to make sure we enjoyed all the best that the region had to offer during our too short stay.

And this time, instead of staying IN the four a pain (which has twice been the case) we were staying across the street from it.  (And dreaming of....... pizza!  This communal oven is still operational.)

Americans, and some English people, think that I am a bit unreasonably nutty-dingue-folle about France.  But: I am never disappointed when I visit there.  I know that you, proper French people, have a different experience of it but can I just say?

You are so terribly terribly lucky.  (Your countryside: its variety and richness.  Your food, culture, and traditions.  Your holidays, your sense of community and solidarity with each other.  Your civility towards each other, even if sometimes its only a veneer.  Your infrastructure - yes, I mean trains, highways and securite social!)  Nothing in the world is perfect but you have something that comes very close a lot of the time.  Hold on to it, work at keeping at it.  It may seem creaky and old-fashioned and doubtful sometimes to you all, but it is very much worth all your care and pride and fidelity.   

*  If you are planning a holiday in Switzerland/Europe and would like a heads up about the booking agency that let me down, - which I found on the official Swiss Tourism site,  drop me an email and I will fill you in.  I would hate for someone else to have my experience.

**  For an excellent experience I can only recommend the official government-operated Gites de France - recognizable by their mostly green and yellow logo and not the many private imitators.

Annecy - Please Let Me Come Back!

Errgggghhhhh.....I did a million and one things last week as soon as I got back to L.A.

And I have a million chores and "must dos" waiting again.  I so do not want to even think about them ...................

I am missing Annecy and her sweet Savoyarde charms.  Can't believe I was there on the lake

exactly three weeks ago.  (The weeks fly so fast, no?)

Strolling these beautiful story book streets, soaking up their colors.

They call Annecy the Venice of the Alps.  My Italian relatives came from just over the mountains and they spoke a Franco-Italian dialect which may just have been Arpitan, the old language of Annecy.

Maybe that's why I felt so at home.

Or maybe it's just the cozy relaxed vibe in Annecy.

And the cheeses bigger than my head.

Or the brioches bigger than my body.

You can get sandwiches that look like this in Paris, NY, or L.A. nowadays that's the good news.

But they don't have the whoosh of fresh mountain air still clinging to them.

And I haven't even seen roasted mussels for sale - not even - at the San Francisco farmers' markets lately.

I didn't have enough time to savor views like this.  And drink in the limpid reflections from the clear mountain water.  I know it's snowy-ish and cold there....sooner than later.

 But I want to go back.  I do I do.

Holiday Highlights for a Happy Weekend

Something magical happened to the Paradis Family two weeks ago.

(Annecy, France)

It started two days before departure, when we learned, that accommodations we had booked and paid for in March for the Berner Oberland (Switzerland) were not actually going to be available!!!!!  

There was a little bit of drama, I have to admit. 

(Countryside just south of Annecy)

But sometimes, other things are just meant to be.

(a village "fleurit" called Chapeiry)

Like a lovely gite, and the French countryside just 40 minutes south of Geneva.  It was HEAVEN.  (Since this post is about highlights,  I will tell you more about it later.)

Our blissful week in the Haute Savoie was way way too short.and we were obliged to move swiftly on to London via Wagamama at Heathrow, Terminal 5.  (A too quick change of gears........no kidding!)

(Who needs Duty-Free shopping or airplane food and inflight dehydration?  I get my healthy comfort food pre-boarding and by the time they're handing out scones and clotted cream an hour before landing I'm not feeling stuffy and gross, but rather 100% ready to indulge!)

(Comptoir Libanais - conquering London these days)

It was all about a Jolly Olde visit with Mr. Paradis' family - an obligation I am rarely unhappy about.  (Well mostly never!)  

(The Cloth House, London)

London is an ever-changing delight.  Inside......

(Osterley Park, West London)

and always, (changing not-so-much in the best ways):  OUT.

More soon. 

Have a Wonderful Weekend!