Holiday Diary

As I approached Le Havre, doubts as to its quality as the final high-point of my trip started to emerge. It seemed very industrial, and was built by Francis or some king or other to be a huge harbour town, after all. What were my other options? Jane showed me that Fecamp, a town I remember from my youth with great affection (it was there that I discovered Benedictine, my favourite liqueur), was only an extra 30 minutes further up the coast. I resolved to divert, but stopped first at an out-of-town Aldi for some shopping. Now, it is well-known that the hypermarches outside of the port towns are reasonably-priced, but the French have cottoned on to our love of, well, binge drinking and booze cruises ("for me own personal use, like, guvnor"). The prices at these massive outlets have been increasing steadily over the last few years. My thinking was this: Aldi is renowned for finding alternative products at great prices. Surely, an out-of-town Aldi in France must provide the best value in the whole of Europe [mad cackle]?! The French were certainly stocking up, and I'm pretty sure I saw a German woman doing the rounds. She was smartly dressed, and selected a huge box of jars, each filled to the brim with some herby, wuetzel mix which she clearly intended to sprinkle liberally over every dish she cooked in the next decade.

My own selections tended to centre around the red wine section, diverting from time to time back to the dried sausages (so much more reasonable abroad) and the cheeses, from which I selected a wonderfully pongy Pont l'Eveque. I also purchased some decidedly French products: vacuum packed crepe ("what a load of crepe", I didn't hear another man remark). Desiring to be bagless, I followed my father's example and picked up some boxes along with my shopping, which I filled briskly, in turn filling the rear portion of the car. Off I went, Jane barking instructions like a beleaguered army seargeant on the Normandy beaches.

With a renewed vigour, I hurtled over the huge Pont de Normandie Cable-Stayed Bridge, coughed up my 5€ for the privilege and then got completely lost.
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Jane is a little like a fellow traveller who is absolutely certain she knows the way, but is basing all her conviction on an imperfectly memorised copy of the 2004 road maps for the whole of Western Europe. If, for example, someone has imprudently closed off a little-used lane, or pedestrianised another, or made one-way a narrow, yet busy byway, she is oblivious to it. Various possibilities then emerge. One can blindly follow her directions in the hopes that the road is still navigable, or one can take one's route choices into one's own hands for a while, ignoring Jane and letting her pick up the pieces later, but being sure to avoid her routing you back to the problem road, or one can use her feature-set to the full, informing her on the fly that the desired route has been closed by His most Worshipful, the Mayor of Lisieux since 2007, due to on-going motorway building and would she select another? I prefer the latter approach, but needs must when the devil drives, and I sometimes nip up an empty lane if the village seems dead and the view ahead is good or perform an illegal u-turn in a small town when no one (who can catch me) is looking. The surveillance culture hasn't made it to France, yet, where you can still surreptitiously scratch your upper thigh without a public servant-operative blogging about it the very same minute.

I am now on the ferry home. I must update you over the happenings of the last few days.

I had decided that I would not stay in Bordeaux after Monday night. In fact, I planned to leave that afternoon, were it not for the fact that the restaurant I'd eaten in the night before had invited me to play the piano over dinner. The piano was relatively good (but uncared for), so I was glad of the opportunity. I played from about 1330 to 1630 non-stop. It was a really refreshing experience: I haven't played like that in a long time - a sort of musical marathon. It reminded me of some the limitations of my technique, forced me to think ahead and to perform (rather than just to play to myself) and I found that very satisfying - my brain was really humming. The music flowed very naturally after the first hour or so. It is uniquely challenging and focussing to improvise for four hours without covering old ground. I was tired by the end.

Interestingly, had I been playing in England, someone would have looked after me; brought me my drinks, or at least asked me if I wanted anything. The French staff were happy for me to fetch my own drinks! Maybe it is a cultural thing. Pianos in restaurants are slightly more common in France than in England. Maybe it is less of a luxury to enjoy music whilst you eat, so the benefits to pianists are accordingly reduced?! Read More

Firstly, my apologies for not writing since Saturday afternoon. Blogging regularly is only a really attractive proposition if one is availed of wifi and hasn't anything better to do. Really, since my last session, I have passed through both states of being, but never at the same time. I like to blog from the car when I'm parked up for the day/night. I haven't (until now) taken the laptop out of the car!

So, whilst some of the boring detail of the last few days will have left my mind (I hear you rejoice!), I feel more than able to update you as far as the tail-end of Saturday and Sunday are concerned.

For the amusement of those with a preference for real-time data, I'm currently using the wifi of a nearby hotel, with 50 mins of battery remaining. From my bar table (on which there are some dry-roasted peanuts and a flutelike glass of local white wine), i can see the inner harbour, the castle and the church. The weather is fine, fair weather cumulus (about 3.5 octas). I'd make the temperature about 19.5 deg C in the shade. I'm on holiday, baby! Read More

Bordeaux is a great town for the practised "nomad numerique". It affords its budget visitors with a huge density of relatively dark and quiet residential side streets, quite close to the city centre. I have developed a technique for locating appropriate night parking which will cause the minimum of disturbance to the permanent residents.
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Dear all,

I would normally only write later in the afternoon, but I am precipitated to do so now due to the availability of wireless, and the potential absence of it in another location, should I choose to move the car. I also don't want to forget anything that has happened which might be of interest to you, dear reader. Read More

Hello gang!

I left you in the last instalment whilst sitting in the office component of the supermultimodal mobile command centre. I must say that my enthusiasm for the lake-place started to wane during my hunt for a cash machine. You see, I'd pictured the rest of the town to be like the lake bit... Read More