Market Day

Monday is market day in St Didier so we delayed breakfast a little and wandered down at the crack of 10. Small town, but they close off the main street for the market, an array of clothing, cheese, fruit and veg, meats, wine, truffles, you name it! All fresh, all very tasty and many with samples which of course it would have been rude not to have sampled. Several hours later, and a lot of euro, we departed back up the hill to have lunch on our deck, of all our purchases! And yes, seems the chickens where we’re staying have fine tastes as well!

Highlights? The cheeses, and the saucisson, so many different types and flavours, and at 6 euro a sausage just so tasty.

It’s very easy to get used to lunch of a baguette, wine, cheese, terrine, saicisson, fresh fruits etc. Bu there’s a problem. Well there’s two actually. The first is that you could graze forever, more cheese? Sure. Wine? Why not … Sausage, of course! The next problem, is that one’s clothes would be likely to not fit, possibly after just a few short weeks … because of course, the exercise regime is just not happening!

Anyway, time to go and do something so we headed to a nearby village, Venasque. A “village perche”, basically a village on top of a mountain. In the fifth century it was a fortress between two valleys. Very quaint and awesome views.

Sightseeing over it was time to head home, with a little degustation on the way at a local cellar. Provence is known for its Rose, around 2/3 of the production, but frankly, they are very dry and somewhat different to the fruit driven wines of NZ. So they take a little getting used to, meaning, you need to practice ;-)
And while not as well known for its reds, some of them are just amazing and we bought an awesome 2012 “Les Merrains” from the vineyard La Courtoise. And for 5.60 euro, seriously amazing.

Home for a swim, then dinner on the deck, and an early night. All far too satisfying!