Hounded

We have visited more beautiful villages in the Var, these ones to our east. First to Montaroux, north of Frejus on the coast, then on to Callian, both hilltop villages which face off at each other across the valley. It was at Callian as we arrived in the town square in the medieval part that we picked up our tour guide - a delightfully friendly and handsome collie-cross. He was more than happy to accompany us on our walk through the old part of town, leading us through little streets, patiently waiting when we stopped to take photos, even consulting us as to what else we would like to see. Fran was a little concerned that he might get cleaned up by a car as we descended to the main road through town, but as Adrian pointed out - "he lives here". It was down another picturesque side street that things got a bit ugly and our tour guide disgraced himself. A cat was peacefully sunning itself against a wall near an outdoor restaurant when along we come, complete with trusty tour guide. It didn't take long for him to spot the cat and after a brief and hissy tete a tete, the cat took off with dog in hot pursuit. At that stage we decided to try to lose the dog and did an about turn. Someone shouted out to us, C'est votre chien? (Is that your dog?) No, we replied and kept walking. Making us out to be liars, the dog, back from harassing the cat, enthusiastically bounded after us. Comment embarrassant! En route back to the car we stopped in at the church and closed the door behind us before our tour guide could follow, but he soon found us as we left and escorted us to our car where we parted company. However as we drove off we noticed that he was with a local Gendarme. We were unsure as to whether he was being arrested for harassing le chat, or whether he was being thanked for keeping an eye on the etrangers until they left town.

After Callian we headed to Seillans. We were particularly interested in this village as it was one where we had selected a delightful house with a pool (at a very reasonable price), only to be told by the owner that he was selling. It is, undoubtedly a village of wonderful character, as you can see from some of these photos, but the house was not in the village. It was about a 10 minute walk away in the hills and, although the weather is sunny, we would not have had much use from a pool. Unfortunately, we did not have the address so we could only surmise where the house might have been located. As we had the beautiful, but small, 12th century stone church to ourselves, Fran tested its acoustics with an impromptu rendition of Schubert's Ave Maria. The acoustics were superb.
We are now in the midst of the hunting season and both last Saturday and this Saturday we were awoken by an unremitting cacophony of hound. Hunters and dogs gather at the Bar Central, drink for a few hours (hopefully, coffee) and then take to the hills to shoot at anything that moves. This seems to be a popular weekend pastime for French males, with camouflage clothing, 4-wheel drives and guns being common accessories. But, from what we've read, the boars are still winning. Adrian tried a boar and red wine stew whilst we were in Corsica and thought it wasn't much different to a beef stew.

Fran is trying her hand at a few new recipes, rifling through some French cooking magazines in the cottage and learning more about the various cuts of meat whilst enhancing her French vocabulary. Lamb here is horrendously expensive - around 22 euro per kg (A$40) and we have really had only one good piece of steak in the whole time we've been here. Pork is good and reasonably cheap and the Toulouse sausages, while delicious, are a bit too salty. There is an amazing variety of mushrooms at the markets of all shapes, sizes and colours. Some, called cepes, are huge and quite expensive. Then there are girolles, pieds-de-mouton, roses des pres and trompettes-des-mort (trumpets of death). Fran was a bit dubious about the latter but they are at the market and included in recipes. In France, if you have any concerns about mushrooms gathered from fields or the forest floor whilst walking, you can take them to a pharmacie, where you can get advice on those you can safely eat and those that are guaranteed to kill you!

Truffle season is about to begin - it runs from November through to March. Apparently, it is really cloak and dagger stuff with neither sellers nor buyers keen to deal with outsiders. Perhaps they worry about the tax-man. Truffles are incredibly expensive and sell for 600 euros or more per kilo. After mid-November there is a truffle market each Thursday in Aups, a village about 17 km from here, so we plan to check it out before we come home. Hopefully, they won’t worry about a retired Aussie tax-man. In the past, pigs assisted the truffle hunters by sniffing out the truffles where they grow among the roots of oak trees. But apparently they like the taste of them too, and would snuffle the truffle before it could be collected. So now hounds are used. Truffles are often dug up at night - supposedly because that is when they are most aromatic. But it may have something to do with the fact that they are usually found under oak trees that belong to someone else.