Podcast 12
TRANSCRIPT
Travel in France
Janine: Bonjour and welcome to this podcast where we share everything you want to know about France and more.
I’m Janine Marsh, a Londoner now living in northern France. I’m one of 150 people who live in a tiny village with no shops and no bar, but there are 1000 cows! I write books, publish a free magazine called The Good Life France and I’m the editor of a website of the same name. I love chatting to you on this podcast about all things French, alongside my podcast partner Olivier Jauffrit.
Olivier: Bonjour, I’m Olivier, Oli for short, and I am one of those French expats in the UK. But I love France too. Of course. I’ve never felt so close to my native country since I left it actually. Is that ok doctor Janine? Or do I need to do something about it? Maybe. I am not sure. This podcast is a nice therapy, so I think I am ok.
In the meantime,… Janine, what are we going to be talking about today?
Janine: A bit of therape for you I think Oli – we’re going to be talking about travel in France! And in this episode, we’ll focus on some of the most popular places to visit, and some of the less well-known places.
Olivier: You know France is the most popular tourist destination in the world… and beyond! I’m very proud that so many people love to visit my country… And it’s been having that prestigious title for ever it seems. Maybe I am a bit biased, but although all countries are beautiful, I believe that France has something more. That certain je ne sais quoi, that people are crazy about…
Janine: Oli – did you just say that France is the most popular country in the world and beyond?! Do you know a secret that the rest of us don’t know?!
Olivier: Yes, I have some studies for the Universe! I’ll share them with you a bit later on!
Janine: Haha, I love that! Yes, it’s true, around 90 million people visit France each year – it’s an astonishing number isn’t it, more people than actually live in France visit France – about 68 million people. Occasionally France is no. 2 for visitors, but not often!
Olivier: So where do they all go? Paris of course, it is the most popular tourist city destination of the world. Again. I think we have to start a new Guinness Book of Records with just France in it! The “livre des records” of France.
Janine: Yes, Paris gets around 30 million visitors each year – including Oli and me! I love Paris. Oli – what’s your favourite thing to do in Paris?
Olivier: Oh no, oh my god. The number one question Parisians don’t want to answer. It is so difficult. I don’t know. I would say a mix of things. Walking in the historic areas of Paris by night, definitely, with some stops in cafes, so I can do some people watching. But I also love cycling near the river Seine, especially in the summer months when Paris is a bit quieter. Or discovering new bars with friends as well. There are so many things Janine… Please don’t ask me that question again ;-)
Janine: I have so many favourites – the Eiffel Tower of course, and I love the Musee d’Orsay, a museum in a former train station, it has the most wonderful collection of impressionist art and art nouveau furniture, there are entire rooms complete with wood floors and wood panelled walls, and it also has a gorgeous restaurant. And if you’re into photography there’s a grand old station clock, it’s enormous, about 20 feet high and it looks out over the Seine and the Louvre palace – a great place to take a photo. I love to wander in Montmartre and pop into the little museum in rue Cortot where Renoir once lived, with Paris’s secret vineyard next door. I love to stroll the grand boulevards, sip hot chocolate listening to the church bells of Notre Dame, peek into the past in the Latin Quarter – there’s so much to love and we’re definitely going to do a Paris episode soon. But I think one of the most memorable visits for me is the Saint-Chapelle. It’s a small church, older than Notre Dame and next to the Conciergerie building where Marie-Antoinette was imprisoned before losing her head. To me it’s astonishing to be in this church and know that more than 800 years ago, King Louis 9th sat here looking at the glorious, stained windows. There are 15 of them each 15 metres high depicting 1,113 scenes from the bible. When the sun shines through them, it’s mesmerizingly beautiful, like standing in a jewel box. It’s not a working church now and in the evenings classical music performances are held there and it’s quite magical to sit listening to Handel or Vivaldi’s music as you look at the stained glass, the gilded angels popping out of the walls, the glorious artwork that covers every inch of this incredible building…
Olivier: That’s the thing about Paris, there are the really well-known parts, but there are also so many secret parts and you can see the city’s past right before your eyes – the great Gothic churches, the medieval buildings, Renaissance, Baroque, Haussmanian, Belle Epoque, Art Nouveau and contemporary – there is something to please everyone. One piece of advice: look for the passages (covered or not). It’s unique. It’s for some of them, really charming. It’s worthwhile really.
Janine: Now for a secret place to visit in Paris – when you’ve been to the Eiffel Tower, the Arc de Triomphe, the Louvre and all the other amazing big-ticket places, discover the secret Paris – quirky museums and hidden ateliers, workshops of artisans and artists like Lubin perfumery. Opened by Pierre-François Lubin who was trained from the age of 10 by Queen Marie Antoinette’s favourite parfumier and beauty products maker Jean-Louis Fargeon, supplier of perfume. Lubin created a pair of scented gloves for her using hyacinths, violets, musk jonquils and carnations and when the Queen was in prison at the Conciergerie near the Louvre, Lubin would take her parcels of her favourite toiletries. Later Empress Josephine Bonaparte used to hang out at Lubins – it’s still there… And then there’s Patisserie Stohrer on rue Montorgeuil is the oldest cake shop in Paris and opened in 1730. It’s entirely possible that Marie-Antoinette may have indulged here, the shop was opened by her father-in-law’s pastry chef. And there are shops where Picasso, Renoir and Degas went to for their art supplies. There are so many of these amazing places.
Olivier: Yes, it’s true, and there are also the shopping galleries like Galerie Vivienne, they were created around 200 years ago, and they are full of boutiques and cafés, and look just as they did all those years ago, the architecture is magnifique. That’s one of the covered passages I was talking about earlier.
Janine: When we talk of great architecture, I think we must mention Mont-Saint-Michel, the island with an abbey off the coast of Normandy, right on the border with Brittany – so close that sometimes people think it is in Brittany.
Olivier: Do you know the legend of how it was built? It’s said that in 708 Aubert, the bishop of Avranches dreamt that he had an encounter with the archangel Michael, who instructed him to build a church on the little island. But the bishop took no notice. Three times the archangel instructed him to build the church and finally, it is said, he burned a hole in the bishop’s skull to drive home the merits of obedience. Ouch… And guess what – the bishop built the church! Crazy story…
Janine: Blimey, I think I’d built it too if an angel stuck his finger in my head and burned my skull. Well, the abbey you see today is not the same church, one was built over the top – and this year is the 1000th anniversary of the nave being built – yes in the year 1023, way before William the conqueror went to England, builders completed the creation of the Romanesque nave. It’s astonishing isn’t it to stand there now and know these things, it gives me goosebumps! I took my dad there once, he didn’t want to go, he moaned about having to go and see as he put it “another bloody monument – France is full of them” he said. Anyway, I dragged him there moaning the whole way but when we were a couple of miles away and he saw it looming on the horizon topped by a golden angel, as French writer Victor Hugo once said, ‘like a pyramid in the sea’, he was captivated and so was my dad.
Olivier: Well, it captivates a lot of people – 3 million people visit this island every year. And rightly so. It’s unique. If you want to see it without feeling a bit like a sardine in a tin, go out of peak season please – not in July or August, and get there early before the tour coaches arrive, or later in the evening when they depart… You’re welcome.
Janine: And wear comfy shoes, because the medieval streets are cobbled. And if you want to eat one of the famous omelettes at the Mere Poulard restaurant take lots of money – they’re expensive! They are made to the same secret recipe and cooked on an open fire in front of customers as they have been since 1888, a taste that’s been loved by many – including Ernest Hemingway and Marilyn Monroe.
But the best thing is to just wander the little streets that wrap round the island and lead to the abbey. But be aware that it is a steep climb up 350 steps, a couple of paramedics were stationed halfway up the stairs when I was there! It’s worth the effort to get to the top but don’t even try to if you have any heart problems or medical issues. We left my dad in a restaurant eating several different kinds of cheese, we didn’t want to risk it with him as he’d had a heart attack two years before and he was a heavy smoker. When we reached the top, we stood in the abbey and looked out through the grand open arched windows looking out to the sea and over the land. It is one of those special moments for sure. And even though my dad didn’t get to see it, when we left the island, he just said, “This is one of those places that everyone ought to see before they die”. And you’re right Oli, I went in June, and it wasn’t too crowded at all, we were there for the D-Day anniversary which my Dad wanted to go to, in fact that’s one of only three times I saw my Dad cry was when we went to the American Cemetery at Colleville-sur-Mer, such a poignant place. But I know that if you go in July or August, it gets really packed.
Olivier: Well, those months are what we call the grandes vacances in France, the big holidays! It’s when everyone wants to take their holiday and they are even split into two tribes! Those who tend to travel in July (Juillet in French) are called the Juilletistes and those who take their holidays in August (Août in French) are called the Aoûtiens.
Janine: It’s not just difficult to remember, it’s really difficult to say! I’m a Juilletiste, a July person though I don’t really go on holiday as such, too many animals, but that’s when I take a working tour of France, that’s what I tell my husband anyway – it’s work when I visit the gorgeous lavender fields in Vaucluse, or cruise on the Rhone Canal (by the way that trip is coming up in the spring issue of The Good Life France Magazine), it’s work!
Olivier: Yeah right! In the past July was seen as more chic, when those who had a bit more flexibility to choose their holiday dates could take time off. Then, the factories would close in August and so that’s when the working class went on holiday.
Janine: If you’re travelling in France, especially the south, in those months try to avoid driving as that’s when we get the worst traffic jams. There is a term in French Chassé-croisé, originally a ballroom dancing term – step-together, but it now generally refers to the traffic jams generated by the French all taking time out in July and August! And there is a new term now for people who go on holiday in September - les Septembristes which is mainly grandparents, the mamies and the papies who are babysitters in the summer months and then all run away at the end!
Olivier: And if you go to Mont-Saint-Michel, but you want to visit a less crowded, more secret place afterwards maybe the Marine Train will interest you. It’s a little tourist train which runs around the Mont Saint Michel Bay. It takes you on a 2-hour guided tour on land and in the shallow waters, and you’ll discover the local fishing culture, and get a really unique view of the island. It’s a great activity.
Janine: We have to talk about the palace of Versailles when we’re talking about top sites. You can take a train from Paris, it’s easy to get to. It was a hunting lodge until Louis 14th decided to renovate and then some. His aim was very much “look at me, I am the greatest, only the greatest man in the world could have a home as beautiful as this.” So, in the mid 1600s, the simple – by royal standards at least – hunting lodge became the most luxurious home in the world. It wasn’t exactly cosy though, several hundred people were squeezed in, the most important aristocrats of France were all required to be on site where the King could basically keep an eye on them. It literally glistens – there’s so much gold involved from the gates to the ceilings and the walls the door fittings, the mirrors.
Olivier: And then there’s the gardens of the palace. The palace was built on swamp land and the swamps had to be drained and then the area was filled with soil and stone so that the grand gardens could be created. And the king wanted fountains, lot of fountains. Obviously. But there was no river nearby, so underground and aerial aqueducts were built to bring water in, they pumped it from the River Seine! But it was still hard to keep the fountains flowing so basically the fountain operators used to just turn the fountains on when the king went by – everyone else could go without!
Janine: And you know, Louis was a bit of a control freak, well a lot of a control freak. Under his rule etiquette became everything, there were dress codes for every event including walking in the garden! And if you didn’t have the right kit, you could rent it at the entrance to the gardens!
And talking of walking – Versailles itself is a fabulous town for a walk, glorious old mansions galore, the Kings vegetable garden is close by, which for me is a must see, Louis had a brilliant gardener who innovated and experimented and was able to grow tropical fruit – in the north of France - and even coffee beans. Louis used to take guests there and boast about it like “Look what I’ve done” even though he did nothing! And for another less well-known part of your visit to Versailles – head to the market. It’s one of the best I’ve ever been to. There are a couple of markets actually but the one I love is called Marche Notre-Dame and its’ been there since the 1600s it has beautiful stone halls that were built hundreds of years ago, like miniature mansions for your fruit and veg! It’s very lively and very lovely. The halls of the market are open daily (except Monday) and the open-air market which spreads out over a huge square is on Tuesday, Friday and Saturday mornings.
Olivier: Ok a bit of a change in the type of attraction that’s most popular in France now – Disneyland Paris! Not very French, but French people love it too. Have you ever been Janine?
Janine: I have! I’ve been twice! The first time I took my kids, and the characters were on strike! So French. We had to go back because the kids really wanted to see Mickey Mouse!
Olivier: Yes, the striking bit is very French! Well, everyone probably knows a lot about the Disney parks, so I won’t say too much but it’s the most visited theme park in Europe and it’s easy to reach from central Paris. And of course, there is a Sleeping Beauty castle! And we like castles.
Janine: Talking of castles – let’s head to the Loire Valley known as the Valley of the Kings in France because there are so many castles there. Chenonceau, Chambord, Villandry, Usse, Azay le Rideau, Chinon, Loches, Blois, Amboise – ok we have to do a Loire Valley podcast one of these days Oli, too many to talk about here. But do you know the number one castle in the Loire Valley?
Olivier: Chambord! It has to be… the biggest and some say the best!
Janine: Yes, you’re right. Chambord gets almost one million visitors a year, but it never really feels crowded because it’s so huge. This was another case of “look at me, I am the best king in the world” scenarios, though it was 150 years or so before King Francois 1st who was known as the Renaissance King. He spent an absolute fortune on this place, it was an obsession, he pretty much gave up everything else to get this done including paying a ransom to get his captured sons back… and yet, he only spent 40 nights here! It was so big it was pretty much uninhabitable. 426 rooms and 83 staircases – and to try to keep it warm it had 282 fireplaces, but it didn’t keep it warm and that’s why it was largely uninhabitable, it was so big it was cold. Extraordinary. It’s an amazing place to visit with gorgeous gardens and a little village at the bottom with great shops where you can buy Chambord the liqueur and local biscuits and treats – I love this castle, I love them all really!
Olivier: And if you want to visit somewhere close by, that’s a little less known – there’s so much in the area – Blois is 20 minutes away and there is another fabulous castle there, plus in the town there is a museum of magic, and if you go a little further to the pretty town of Amboise there are two castles – one lived in by the Kings including Francis 1st and the other lived in by Leonardo da Vinci who travelled here from Italy on a donkey carrying the Mona Lisa painting to work for Francis 1st! How silly (donkey) is that?
Janine: It’s true! He did travel over the alps, with one servant I think, on a donkey with all his things and the astonishingly expensive painting! Do you know Francois used to keep the painting in his bathroom?! I love that he used to sit in the bath and look at the painting. It’s in the Louvre now – the world’s most visited museum, and a former royal palace!
And now let’s head outside for some fresh air and one of the most alluring aromas in the world – lavender! Provence is famous for its beautiful hilltop villages, historic cities like Avignon where the Popes once lived and for its lavender fields. It’s a sight that makes your soul soar from around mid-June to the start of August – miles of purple lavender, and the scent fills the air – it’s a must see…
Olivier: The best lavender fields are in the department of Vaucluse, they smell so nice. They surround some of the little towns and sit next to apricot, cherry and olive orchards, and one of my favourite places is Sault which is where some of the most beautiful lavender fields can be found.
Janine: Do you know where lavender is from Oli?
Olivier: No I don’t, I know it’s cultivated for about 150 years and that it’s from the same family of plants as mint!
Janine: Well, there is a legend that the lavender comes from the tears of a blue-eyed fairy called Lavandula. She was flying around in France – like you do - looking for somewhere special to call home, and she had a notebook where she made drawings of the places she liked the looks – yes really this is the legend! And she was really proud of her drawings but when she saw the page with Provence and the Luberon area in Vaucluse, it looked so dry that it made her sad and she cried purple tears from her big purple eyes. The tears stained the book and she tried to wipe them away and it stained the whole page violet, so she coloured the sky a beautiful shade of blue so that her mistake wasn’t so obvious – and ever since, the lavender has grown in Provence!
We’ve only covered a fraction off the most popular places to visit in France in this episode but well do another travel session soon! And now its time for the Q&A part if the show.
Listener’s question
Olivier: So, Janine what is today’s question?
Janine: Well since we’re on the topic of travel, we’ve got a travel question. And in fact, before I start, thanks so much for all the questions coming in and keep them coming – some I am answering directly when people email me as they might be a bit specific, or urgent, and we’ll get through them all over time! Don’t forget to email me through the contact form at www.thegoodlifefrance.com. But back to today’s question which is from Anne Barber who lives in Ottawa, Canada and she says “I’m going to Paris in May, it’s my first time and I want to see as much of Paris as I can, but I also want to do one day trip to see something different. Where should I go?”
That’s a really hard question because from Paris you can actually go to so many places – Tours in the Loire Valley is about an hour and half, Reims in Champagne about an hour, Lille is just 50 minutes – I mean there’s just so many places you can get to really easily from Paris and get back in time for dinner the same day and that are really a contrast to the capital. Oli I know you said don’t ask about Paris again haha but – what do you think?
Olivier: That question again ;-)… It really depends on what you want to see – castles, churches and abbeys or maybe countryside? Or all of them. About an hour and 20 minutes, southeast of Paris is a medieval town called Provins, it’s surrounded by glorious countryside, the town is a UNESCO world heritage site it has so many monuments, castle ruins, half-timbered houses, ramparts, people dressed in medieval costume putting on shows – it’s extraordinary.
Janine: And you know what – I’m going there in May too, so I might see you there Anne! Great choice Oli, Provins is a pickled in the past gem of a place…and it’s not far, and it pretty much offers everything – castles, countryside, ramparts, village – the works!
Thanks so much everyone for joining us – we hope you enjoyed this episode, and if you did, please feel free to share it!
Next episode
Olivier: I have very good news for you people… You absolutely need to tune in for the next episode… we’ll be talking… wait for it dadada! Cheese! Yes, French cheese – a whole episode of fun facts, history and weird cheese things! We Camembert it if you miss it…
Janine: Groan… gawd Oli, that’s so cheesy! We cannot bear it, we Camembert if you miss this podcast… sigh.
You can find me at thegoodlifefrance.com where there are thousands yes thousands of articles about France and all things French from culture to gastronomy, history and heaps more, and on the website you can sign up for the podcast and for our free magazine The Good Life France which you can find at magazine.thegoodlifefrance.com
Olivier: And you can find me at parischanson.fr where I play the classic and French music you love – 24 hours a day.
Janine: It’s au revoir from me
Olivier: And goodbye from me
Janine: speak to you soon.
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