Same Shirt, Different day-2012 Adventures of the "Devonport Wonder Babes"

Friday 12 October Navarrenx, France.

Still overcast and raining occasionally. Went down to river to inspect the water level as this river, Gave d’Oloron, has tributaries that start way up in the Pyrenees so by this morning it had risen about a metre. By evening it had risen further and water was rushing down a small side channel that had been completely dry when we first arrived here and we could see that from our deck.

Off to village again for bread and general wander around looking at the houses in lanes off the north side of the main street. Quite a lot of nice restored houses, quite few fairly derelict and many for sale.

Similar to Spain one of the few signs of economic problems around here are the huge numbers of properties for sale. There was a recent article in NZ Herald about people spending large amounts of money buying Ponsonby properties and saying that you could buy a Chateau in France for the same amounts. It’s true, in this village which seems reasonably prosperous and has all essential services (eg. La Poste, 4 banks, 2 artisan butchers, 2 boulangerie, weekly market,  2 supermarkets, 2 gas stations etc etc) a steady stream of tourists, and a busy farming area,   €250.000 ( say NZ$400,000 at current rate of exchange) will buy you a 2-3 bedroom stone house either with a barn and other outbuildings on  a hectare or so of land on outskirts or with courtyard within the village itself.  Material for a Lotto winning daydream.

Continued our wanderings going into some shops we hadn’t visited before including an antique shop called “Secrets des Ramparts” run by 2 older women very keen to make a sale once I had expressed interest in a particular vase, a small  (20cm high)  white Limoges porcelain with painting of vegetable seller. So keen was one of them that she pulled out the dictionary to facilitate our conversation and I bought it for €23 and she kindly wrapped it in bubble wrap. It will come home in same bag as Lyndsay €4 cut glass fruit bowl from the car boot sale.

Intention today was to go almost due south to the Vallee d’Aspe but decided to scrub that as rain seemed to have set in for the day so it was my turn to haul everything out of suitcase and my pack, go through all the detritus of travel, the  souvenir type paper things, lots of maps of different cities, train tickets on Eurostar, to Paris, Blois and Berlin,  tickets to Opera in Verona, concerts in London and Soria and Museums in Cologne and Bibao, business cards from places we have stayed at or eaten at and then repack it all again.

We shower in the evening as they have solar water heating here and water usually nearly hot enough then !

So after repack we shower and dress in some flash gear that hasn’t seen light of day for some weeks and at 7.45 pm head out in near darkness to village of Audax about 10 min drive away to dinner at Auberge Claverie which had been rccommended to us. About 30 people finally there, including party of about 20 locals, a couple where he was close to 7 ft tall , and maybe was a rugby or basketball player, certainly someone who pumped a lot of iron,  and 2 nice young Australians who ended up at table next to us.

This was a big celebratory night out for us and we had the €19 menu plus wine was extra (½ bottle, not carafe, of local Bearn appellation for €8). I had the tartine ( bacon and cheese with artichokes grilled), a main of pork medallion in mustard sauce with vegetables, beautifully cooked then an interesting version of crème brulee where the crème was velvety like a mousse. Lynds had squid and moules in a tomato based sauce followed by roast duck and same vegetables as a main and the crème brulee. Finished with a beautiful expresso. A very very nice dinner in nice surroundings.

Drive home was almost in complete darkness as out on a flat plain, shutters are closed so very little light from houses, no moon or stars visible and no street lighting between villages.

Tomorrow night we will be back to either pizza or the €10 menu at Auberge de Bois (which includes wine and coffee) or maybe the last tin of tuna we have left.