Posts tagged ‘tourism’
A lovely weekend in Lille (Hauts de France)
Lille, the capital of the Hauts de France region, is a lovely city in the northeastern tip of France’s “Hexagon.” Located very near the Belgian border, Lille has been a major center of government, higher education, art, culture, and commerce for hundreds of years. It was the capital of Flanders until Flanders became part of France in the late 17th century. Today it continues to be a thriving urban center, with convenient transportation links to Paris, London, Brussels, and Amsterdam.
I’ve had the pleasure of visiting Lille several times in recent years because one of my sons lives there. This weekend my other son and I went there again, this time to watch him perform with his new band, Samjo.
It was a very exciting night not only because this was the band’s first live performance, but because the energy was everything you could want for a first-time gig: a full house, an enthusiastic crowd, and talented musicians performing in perfect harmony, and in synch with one another. My son calls his niche “introvert rock.” His songs feature soulful, poetic reflections on life in a wide variety of its aspects, and from various points of view. As a lifelong lover of the French language, I am especially pleased that he’s mixing in some lyrics in French here and there. 🙂 Check out, for example, Night Lights. (The link provided is to Spotify, but you can access his songs pretty much anywhere music is streaming.)
There were other pleasures of course, and as always in France, one of those pleasures is eating.
We also had a lunch featuring galettes, which is a kind of thin buckwheat crépe (apparently Breton, not Flemish), in this case garnished with smoked salmon and filled with a hummus spread. It was delicious!
I also enjoyed reading, writing, and watching the world go by from a café while my sons worked, one at the school where he teaches, the other one at a café table not far away from me.
Of course for me the best of all was just being with my two sons and having some nice time together. That was, as the silly commercial goes, priceless.
Janet Hulstrand is an American writer/editor who lives in France. She is the author of Demystifying the French: How to Love Them, and Make Them Love You, and A Long Way from Iowa: From the Heartland to the Heart of France. You can also find her writing at Searching for Home.
Summer in Essoyes
I don’t really think of Essoyes as a tourist town, but it is, among other things, a wonderful place for tourists to visit. This is partly the legacy of Alain Cintrat, who has just ended 20 years of public service as our mayor, and partly the legacy of his mother. Of course there were many other people involved in making their dream of memorializing the history of the Renoir family in Essoyes come true; but if not for their dedication and determination over a period of many years, it would probably not have happened.
In any case, it did happen, and as a result Essoyes has become a lovely and very interesting place for tourists to visit, along with the many other lovely villages in this part of southern Champagne, very near the Burgundian border.
So it was that, just before the quatorze juillet, I noticed that the village square was suddenly full of cars, the physically distanced lines outside the bakery and in our little grocery store were longer, and there were lots of tourists strolling through the town. (You can tell which ones are the tourists: they are the ones wearing sporty casual vacation wear, walking at a very leisurely pace through the streets of the town, rather than on the sidewalks. This is irritating only when you are trying to drive a car through those narrow streets, but it is irritation tempered by the knowledge that having tourists come here is a good thing for Essoyes. It is…)
The rate of COVID cases has begun to tick up in France again, and France is responding. Everywhere you go there are signs reminding people what they can, and in some cases must, do to help protect themselves and others, and slow the rate of infection. In Essoyes, starting in August there will be testing available once a week in the community center. And everyone is hoping that, if everyone continues (or begins!) to follow the recommended guidelines for containing the virus, we can avoid a second wave that would be worse than the first. I suspect health care workers are hoping that more than anyone, let’s try to help them out with that, everyone, shall we?
And so, life has returned more or less to normal–well, to the “new normal”–at least for now. For our family that means raspberry tartes for July birthdays–and we celebrated two of them in our home this month.
The tartes at lunch were followed by a delicious meal at La Guingette des Arts, on the banks of the Ource River, which flows through the center of Essoyes. (The photo at the top of this post, by the way, taken by “the birthday boy” that night, is not retouched. Believe it or not!) And here’s a photo of him enjoying his escargots at La Guingette.
There will be an organ concert in the church in Essoyes this weekend. How exciting is that? (After nothing happening in the churches for such a long time? Very!)
Wishing everyone a safe, happy continuation. Stay well. Stay safe. Prenez soin de vous.
Janet Hulstrand is a writer, editor, writing coach, and teacher of writing and of literature who divides her time between the U.S. and France. She is the author of Demystifying the French: How to Love Them, and Make Them Love You, and is currently working on her next book, a literary memoir entitled “A Long Way from Iowa.”
Summer in Essoyes: Vernissage a la Maison Renoir
An exhibition entitled “Evocation de l’exposition Renoir de 1934 par Paul Rosenberg” is on display at the Maison Renoir in Essoyes through October 30…
Essoyes à la Belle Epoque…a magnificent success!
“As part of the department-wide Year of Renoir, the village of Essoyes hosted a weekend-long return to the year 1900—to celebrate and showcase what Essoyes was like in the height of the period when Renoir and his family would come to the village, to paysanner (enjoy the countryside)…”
A Peek Ahead at the Year of Renoir
“This year is the Year of Renoir not just in Essoyes, but throughout l’Aube, the département in which Essoyes is located, in the Champagne region of France…”
Continue Reading January 15, 2017 at 11:08 am Leave a comment
Writing from the Heart, Reading for the Road 