A few highlights of this beautiful Languedoc weekend:

Friday Highlight: Bizarre Bodega:

Les and I love variety, so Friday night, en route to an "oldies" concert, we stopped at "La Bodega de Casique" for dinner. As usual, we were the first people there (at 8:30 pm!), and although we'd been there once last summer, were struck anew by the bizarre ambiance. Where else would you use a "mad strawberry" motif for a combination biker bar, discotheque, sports bar? Check out our album entitled "La Bodega de Casique" to see what we mean.

As the waitresses were setting up for Karaoki night, about 5 children, aged between 18 months and 5 years, were running or scooting around the tables. One little boy scooted right by us, and bid us a mushy "bon soir" (his mouth was full of bread). He continued on to another tablet to grab another piece of bread out of a basket as he scooted by. When our "Plateau catalan" (sausages, ham, and lomo) arrived, the 2 resident dogs (see pics!) set themselves right up at our feet and watched us mournfully, licking their chops with each bite we took.

Speaking of dogs, we've "adopted" the next door neighbor's dog, whom we have named "Perdita". M. Espagne (he's from Spain and we don't know his name) has been in Spain for 3 months and will be until the end of July. His daughter comes once (or sometimes twice) a week to feed Perdita, but she is obviously very hungry! She sleeps in an orange bowl in a sort of manger-like hut in between M. Espagne's house and ours. Since we've been supplementing her diet, she doesn't cry anymore. Last summer, we had a similar episode with a kitten next door on the other side, which resulted in a not-so-good Franco-American relationship, but the good news is that the kitten, who we named "Isabelle", is now a full-grown and quite lovely village cat.

Saturday highlight: La Chapelle Saint Poncien (Poncian), c. 942

After a lovely day meandering through scenic villages, we stopped in a mountainy area on the River Orb to attend a concert at a newly renovated chapel in the middle of a vineyard. The choir's program consised of 3 parts: 1. French folk songs, 2. a surprising collection of American songs (including the barbershop "Margie", "I Like to Be in America" from West Side Story, and 3 moving Negro Spirituals), and 3. folk songs in Occitan (the original Languedoc language). Randy on American Idol would have called the choir's performance "a bit pitchy", but we loved it. Their enthusiasm, their energy, and their authenticity in this beautiful little soundbox of a chapel made this a special concert for us. Not to mention the walk through the vineyard to get there.

Sunday's highlight: Villeneuvette, a 17th century wool factory village

Wanting to repeat a lovely one hour hike around an historic village, Les and I returned to an old favorite, Villeneuvette, a town founded in the 17th century by Colbert, the finance minister of Louis XIV. Colbert was astute enough to realize he could capitalize on the huge number of sheep in Languedoc by importing fabric workers to process the wool into fabric. He built an entire village (square, offices, factories, water works, houses, gardens, etc) that survived and thrived into the late 19th century, being the unique supplier of fabric for France's military uniforms. After the Industrial Revolution, the factory was abandoned and fell to ruins. The town went to sleep but has now been "reclaimed". People live and work there, and there are some lovely "gites" where tourists can stay. We stopped for lunch at a buvette called "A L'Ombre du Platane" (in the shade of the plane tree), and totally enjoyed this beautiful setting.

So....from a bizarre bodega to a beautiful bistrot! Quel weekend!

We hope you all enjoyed a good weekend as well.

A bientot!

Elise and Les