Rick & Joni in England and France-2014: Days 8 & 9-July 9 & 10

Wednesday was a travel day. We left Nice, stopped at a few towns along the coast, and then headed 250 KM north to Saint Saturnin-les-Apt, where our B&B, Le Mas Perreal (LMP) is located.

After eating breakfast at our hotel we walked down to the beach to make sure the water was still as brilliantly blue as ever. It was. It wasn't even 9:00 AM, and people were already on the beach sunning themselves. We walked to the flower market along Le Cours Saleya stopping for our second breakfast at Cafe Flore, one of our favorite spots to people watch.

From there, we headed to an Orange store to get a French SIM card for my phone, and finally we picked up our rental car, a Nissan Note, at Avis. I liked the way this car drove more than the Vauxhall which I continually had trouble shifting into first or reverse.

Leaving Avis, we headed back to the Hotel Vendome to pick up our bags and check out. Our first stop in the car was the small hilltop village of Biot. We'd been there last year and we wanted to purchase some bubble glass wine glasses to both expand our collection and replace what I'd broken by dropping. In Biot we also visited the outside of the Ferdinand Leger National Museum. Incredible mosiacs of Leger's on the outside of the buildings.

From Biot, we drove to Cannes (pronounced can, like a film can). We parked as advised at the railway station and then walked around "Old Cannes" which is very much like "Old Nice", really not worth visiting if you've already been to Nice.

We had lunch, pizza, Perrier, and salad, at the outdoors New York Cafe, which is right next to Steak 'n" Shake. As much as I love Steak 'n' Shake, and was very tempted to go there since they're only found in Mid-West and Florida, but I resisted. Cannes is like a small Monte Carlo which you get down near the water: huge yachts, luxury hotels, and a casino. We walked along the shore front, checked out the building where they roll out the red carpet for the Cannes Film Festival. Glad I saw Cannes, can cross it off my list, and probably won't return.

From Cannes, it was a 3 hour drive to our B&B, and we made it in time to check it, chat briefly with the owner, Kevin Widrow,who is originally Connecticut. He married the French woman who was teaching him French when he was living in London. They relocated back to Provence, and run Le Mas Perreal. This is our third consecutive year staying at LMP.

For dinner we drove about 20 km to Le Sanglier Parreseux, in Caseneuve. This where we felt we had our best meal ever in France, and if anything we liked it even more. My words don't attempt to describe the dishes; for apps we had gaspacho and three cold fishes. For main dishes we had scallops and duck, and for dessert we ate a chocolate fondant that had included chocolate at least six different ways. The presentation of each course was a truly a feast for the eyes, and the preparation and garnishes of the apps and main courses was elegant and then some. This dinner would be worth the trip alone. And oh yes, we killed a bottle of Rose too.

Thursday, was our first full day in the Luberon, and we've followed our usual routine from prevous visits. Before breakfast I go for a bike ride, and Joni goes for a walk. I rode to Rousillon, a hilltop village only 10 km from LMP. Roussilon is famous for it's ochre cliffs. The ochre is still used to dye paint and many other products today. When I got to Rousillon, I picked up a copy of l'Equipe, the daily French sports newspaper, and a fresh croissant from a local bakery. I ate the croissant immediately as stared at the gorgeous view of the ochre cliffs and watched the weekly market being set up.

Returning to LMP, I had time to shower and change clothes before we had a delicious of breakfast of crepes, fresh squeezed OJ, melon puree, croissants, and copy. We brought Kevin a quart of maple syrup from the Stroup's trees in Sugar Hill. He loved it.

After breakfast we dove to Rustrel and hiked for 90 minutes through the Colorado in the Provence, a regional park at the base of the other ochre cliffs. The colors are incrdedible, and we took lots of pix.

On through the villages Gignac and St. Martin before stopping in Corcette for lunch at an outdoor cafe. For lunch we enjoyed salad and homemade pasta carbonara, then walked up the street for some ice cream. We drove up into the hills to the village of Viens, passing some incredible lavender fields along the way.

Before returned to our B&B, we stopped at a laundramat in Apt...we've been away for 8 days, so our clean clothes supply was getting pretty small. No one was at the laundramat, so we were out of there in 45 minutes...we're hanging up all our wet clothes rather than use the dryer. The lack of humidity in the Luberon makes drying go very fast. Sorry, no pix of drying undies!

Dinner was at l'Arome in Bonnieux, a nearby hilltop village that is part of the high end trinity of villages that includes Menebres and Lacoste along west facing ridge of the Luberon. Rated as the top restaurant in this village, our meal was superb, certainly equally the previous night's dinner. We started with a broccoli emulsion in a pony glass, for apps we had risotto and a ratatouille tarte, for our main courses we went to the sea, scallops and cod, a cheese course (our first on this trip), and for dessert a pistachio creme brulee. Our wine was again a rose, this one a Ventoux. Hard to imagine we have six more dinners before heading home. We'll both have to ask for the extenders on our seat belts on the plane.

Risotto