A festival !

We just love a good festival and if it involves food and drink all the better so !!




Earlier this year we were out in Portugal for the weather basically and also for an orienteering event.


While there we stumbled upon a poster in a local shop advertising a festival of olives and smoked goods.....which basically means olives and chorizo !


On this particular day hubby had been running round the town of Idanha on a sprint race and afterwards we headed off towards the village of Proenca-a-Velha. I particularly remember parking was a nightmare as all the locals for miles around had turned out and the whole village was awash with cars parked just about anywhere and anyhow !! No order whatsoever.



I was quite concerned for the car as the Portugese are not brilliant drivers it seems to me, an awful lot of the cars are dented and somewhat bashed about looking !! Also like most country people they drive as if there is nobody else on the roads ever ever - full pelt and in the middle of the road.....you takes your life in your hands it feels like !!


Anyway, the car was safely parked by a church in the end, well tucked away from passing traffic in the narrow lanes. We wended out way towards the bustle and joined in.



The whole affair was a little like a trade fair, each farmer with his stall set up and desperately trying to attract attention and sell his home grown wares. A real old fashioned market place.

There was a food tent, interesting cooking displays of modern cooking methods but using the traditional ingredient and outdoor bread and pizza ovens.


A lot of muttering from the grannies here.....they seemed to like things just as they were, thank you.

The children were not forgotten too - face painting being a great favourite and the costumes of the young ladies were almost carnival like and great fun.



 The Portugese are very indulgent towards their infants, like the Italians, and the children are happy bunnies on the whole.




I have never seen so many different types of chorizo in my life !! We were continually being offered tastings, both of the sausages and also of the olives and in particular the oils.

  I must admit though that after a while the 'smokey' smell was rather turning my stomach and I often had to pop out into the fresh air for a breather.



The stalls were not only selling food, a few had the trappings that country people need - amazingly sharp knives of all sorts with beautiful handles made of horn or bone, home made breads (the Portugese are very proud of their breads), various alcoholic drinks, crafts and knick-knacks and so on....





All the ladies of the villages had been crafting, knitting, crocheting, painting, just about anything you could think of to make a bit of extra money too.

  Sadly we didn't buy any of these lovely craft items - as I would make my own.


One young chap had an amazing drink brewing away - inside a hollowed out pumpkin. It was flaming away and seemed incredibly alcoholic and the old men were queuing up to take a tipple !


Good stuff to warm the cockles of your heart.. it seemed at least so at the time. Good theatre too as he lifted up the beverage in his ladle nd poured into the drinking cups, quite the showman.

 The most popular stall at the fair almost....



We did buy quite a lot from the various stalls, olive oils, home cured olives (in an old coffee jar, and cost about 30p) complete with the odd floating leaf, chorizo, wines and breads.

The olives were a total revelation as they actually tasted of olive oil and not of salt !! We ate these fairly quickly as we had no idea how long we could keep them or how to keep them at all.



Very very few of the stall holders spoke any english and we only had a few words of Portugese, but somehow it was enough to get by with. But, definitely, next time we go we will take a dictionary with us.

A cheery smile and a portugese thank you seems to work wonders. They are, as a nation in general, a lot more welcoming to foreigners than the french and a lot less aloof !

 They actually take pride in being of help whereas the french in general are almost the opposite - service ? non !!



It was fun to see the locals, out in best winter garb, and definitely out to enjoy themselves whatever.


 Once the business side was over it was concert time and the entertainment began.



  Folk music with lots of accordions, guitars and drumming and the vocals reminded me an awful lot of a Celtic festival we attended in Brittany years ago.

The singing was almost like chanting with lots of harmony.



Around the corner from the festival area was a museum of the old olive grinding machines.

Fun seeing how things were done in the old days.










 

Probably if we had stayed later on into the evening there would have been dancing we could have joined in with, but hubby was shattered after his run earlier .

We had another orienteering event to attend the next day too.... so back to the campsite and a munching session of the bread, wine and olives.

Totally delicious.

　
　

　

A lush of lavender....

When you mention the word Provence, what is the first thing to pop into your head ? -  well to me Provence is all about firstly, acres of the most lovely fragrant lavender, secondly, the most delicious seafood, especially bouillabaisse and moules mariniere and lastly but not leastly the most wonderful warmth and ambience.


While on holiday in Provence earlier this year,  we had arrived on the 23rd of May, a time when the lavender is almost in bloom normally.

On one of our many days of ramblings in the area we came across these magnificent fields of lavender. Such a marvellous sight and we knew that the best was to come.....





This field was only about a good half hour walk from the campsite and so we got to see the changes to the crop as it ripened over the months we were there.

Quite an exciting time really for us and also for multitudes of tourists who swarm around in the area at this time of year .

The place was buzzing with amateur cameramen and women !!

One day while visiting the village across the valley - called  Bonnieux , we popped into the shop which specialised in all products relating to bees.


A sad fact we discovered while chatting to the wife of one of the largest honey producers in the area (he had over 200 hives scattered around in the valley) was that the lavender was actually 3 weeks late ripening and so the poor bees were dying from starvation.

A total disaster both for the poor bees and the future of honey industry in the area.

I felt like saying to her that maybe they should not have harvested quite so much of the honey last year which would have enabled the bees to better survive the problems caused by the colder than usual weather this year !!

but not being too sure of my facts I kept silent.....






We have been to Provence many times over the last few years but only learned this year that in fact there are two main types of lavender. The old original lavender and the more modern strain which is called lavandine.

The older strain is less easily harvested as it is a lot shorter stemmed and has many branches and only really thrives on higher ground.

The lavandine on the other hand thrives in the valley, has lovely long stems with only one head per stem so is easy
to harvest.



The lavandine has become the main crop in the area but really the perfume and oil produced from it is not of such good quality.


It is sadly now all about quantity and not quality as the demand is huge  and the temptation is to try and maximise the sales and production.





This is one of the farms we stopped by many times while travelling around the area - the one thing I can't show you here is how 'alive' the lavender was with various insects and butterflies. 


There was an absolute flutter of winged creatures and of course the whole field was a great hum of buzzing bees, incredibly loud !!

so much so it seemed to fill my head .....








One of the most surprising sights was the miles of piping and the automatic watering systems !!! All heavy duty stuff and all on a very industrial scale.


I always think of lavender as a plant that thrives in hot and dry conditions and so to see that it needed watering was very unexpected indeed.

I must say though that the watering was short and sharp - maybe they were just trying to speed up the ripening of the flowers ?








The lavender starting to deepen in colour as the time marched by and the month hotted up !!

I just loved the almost constant blue skies - so cheerful..















































I would absolutely love to live here - surrounded by vineyards, lavender and glorious countryside.

Also in the fields not in lavender or grape production were an abundance other vegetables and fruits. A bounty of edibles all around you..... wow ......

This is my very favourite photograph of the lavender fields and I fully intend to turn this into a pastel masterpiece one day !! such glorious colours .......