Getting ready for the festival

The streets of Lodève have been decorated with colourful streamers ready for next week's Voix de la Méditerranée poetry and music festival. We went there today to buy tickets for a couple of concerts. All the daytime readings are free but we'd left it too late to buy tickets online for some evening events. I'm looking forward to this year's festival even more than last year when I was writing an article about it for Poetry Wales. This time it will just be fun!

The journey through the hills and the red desert, past Le Lac du Salagou, is always a delight, with much of the terrain reminding me of childhood trips in Libya, and an excellent plat du jour (lapin à la sauce moutarde with pasta and an aubergine, pepper and onion vegetable mix on the side) in the café in Octon on the way home was an added bonus.