I hope that every one is properly with you and yours.
It’s been a cold outdated week the place I’m – the cats and canines are all sprawled in entrance of the roasty toasty wooden fireplace in the home, the chickens are hiding of their huts and the wild birds are ready for me every morning, wanting some additional nourishment because the berries are frozen on the branches. It’s been an excellent alternative to check my chilly climate gear as I’m off on an journey within the French Alps in 10 days time. My dream to stroll within the snowy mountains will lastly come true, all being properly – I’m hopping on a practice to traverse France to Grenoble and from there to the mountains! (Include me on Instagram)
The wind has made it colder within the north the place I reside. We don’t get the Mistral right here, the famously sturdy wind which howls up and down the mountains of Provence, alongside the cobbled streets or perched villages and whips up the sand on the seashores alongside the Mediterranean coast. I’ve solely skilled it as soon as. I used to be at a truffle market in medieval Richerenches, it was a blue-skied day in December and the Mistral blew bitterly chilly, heckling and harassing, threatening to puff the paniers of valuable black diamonds away.
My neighbour Claudette, who’s in her 90s, tells me that some individuals within the north name the wind a ‘bise’ – a kiss, because it blows the rain clouds away and kisses the sky to make it smile once more. However within the winter there’s a bitter north wind which the locals name an écorche-vache, Skinned Cow, as a result of it blows so exhausting it would blast the pores and skin off of a cow – a little bit of an exaggeration, although when it begins gusting, it’s definitely bitter. Naming the wind is a French “factor” I discovered after I went down the rabbit gap of looking for out extra concerning the Skinned Cow wind. There are greater than 630 named French winds, together with one referred to as Father Barnard in Brittany. The locals say of it “Father Barnard lifts off in the midst of the gorse, makes himself a coat of sea salt, then leaves, as if resurrected, to go to the Loire Valley and disappear into the marshes.” I’ve to say our reasonably chilly wind this week just isn’t fairly so romantic, it’s rattling the shutters which can be closed tight on the homes in my village, it’s making me eat my hair after we stroll the canines, and levitating the chickens like tiny, feathered Mary Poppins’.
Wherever you’re, I want you a really bon weekend,
Bisous
Janine
Editor
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Janine Marsh is Writer of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream, My 4 Seasons in France: A 12 months of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Dwelling the Dream in Rural France all accessible as e book, print & audio, on Amazon in all places & all good bookshops on-line. Her new e-book Tips on how to be French – a celebration of the French way of life and artwork de vivre, is out now – a take a look at the French lifestyle.
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