Posts filed under ‘About Essoyes’
Early Winter in Essoyes
“I have always loved the beauty of lakes, oceans, forests. But it was not until I got to settle into life on our beautiful little patch of countryside that I was able to notice certain interesting and beautiful things in nature that I had never really noticed before, things that were not on the “macro” scale of sunsets and landscapes…”
Continue Reading December 12, 2016 at 7:37 pm Leave a comment
November in Essoyes
“Every year in our little village the names of each of the men whose names are carved on the memorial is read, followed by a “Mort pour la France!” shouted by a member of the sapeurs pompiers (firefighters). It takes a while to read all those names, which gives the people paying tribute to their sacrifice time to think about what it really means…”
Continue Reading November 16, 2016 at 1:03 pm Leave a comment
Autumn in Essoyes
…As always, the vendange brought new faces and a new bustling energy to the town for those 10 days. Rain or shine, cool, misty mornings, blazingly hot afternoons, students, gypsy families, and of course many townspeople pitched in to bring in the grapes…
Continue Reading October 23, 2016 at 6:54 pm Leave a comment
September in Essoyes…
It has not been an easy year for the vignerons in this area, whose year-round, painstaking, exacting work brings the world one of life’s greatest pleasures…champagne…
August in Essoyes
…some people leave to go to the South of France on vacation, and others come here to vacation, mostly from Paris, but also from Belgium and other places. You can tell the tourists from the townspeople (or the summer people) by the little maps they clutch in their hands as they walk the streets, following the trail of Renoir in Essoyes…
Bastille Day in Essoyes
Bastille Day did not end peacefully in France this year, but it did begin that way, at least in “my” little village of Essoyes…
Summertime in Essoyes
The fields of colza and wheat are continuing to ripen, and all along the edges of the fields, the streets of the town, pushing up through the stones in the cemetery, the wildflowers continue in their subtle, determined progression through the season…
Springtime in Essoyes
…the vines on the surrounding hills are slowly beginning to turn green, and the forested hills, which were a kind of brownish gray in early spring, have already done so…
Q&A with “Anne de Champagne,” a French painter
“My job is to create a wave of happiness around me….” Interview with an Essoyenne painter in pursuit of a beautiful tradition…
In France, It’s Still Called Armistice Day…
The war memorial in our little village in Champagne is much like the war memorials found in every little village in France I’ve ever been in: on three sides of the base are carved the names of those who gave their lives “pour la France” during World War I. On the fourth side, the names of those lost in World War II…
Writing from the Heart, Reading for the Road 