Sheep May Safely Graze

   Bear with me but I have to find a link to an mp3 file or YouTube so you can play this while you read the post and gaze at the photos. Right, here you go...


Amazingly, about a squintillion videos exist of Bach's heart-stoppingly beautiful Sheep May Safely Graze. Many of them show sheep. For the purposes of this post, I have looked at more damned sheep in the last 15 minutes than you would believe. In the end I settled for a pianist so that you wouldn't be distracted from the real sheep, the Léran sheep, that, on Saturday morning appeared as a couple of friends and I strolled along the river bank on an utterly gorgeous autumn morning.
    Suddenly, ahead of us, we saw the local flock crossing the narrow foot-bridge and then, with the three-legged sheepdog urging them on, they headed for fresh fields and pastures new.

The Day the Sheep Came Down from the Mountain...

  Sunday, 20th September, marked the annual transhumance in Le Sautel, a village about 15 minutes west of Léran. We had such a good time last year that, earlier this week, I phoned and reserved four tickets for this year's répas.

   Like last year, cars were parked on the verges of the road up to and beyond the official limits of the village. Unfortunately, unlike last year, the temperature was cool with the occasional spit of rain. But it didn't stop the local line-dancing team, or the sheep coming down from their summer pasturage in the mountains, or the three-hour lamb lunch or the singing under the white tents. 

Gaston has a Hygiene Problem

    There's no way to put this delicately. The first stage in the very long journey that begins with a fleece straight off a sheep and ends in a hand-knitted sweater begins with... Let's just say that sheep--and, to judge from the evidence, rams especially, and one ram in particular called Gaston--have little acquaintance with what in France is called papier hygiénique. Nor, come to that, do ewes. 

    Co-fleece-owner Amanda and I had the idea that we'd take our fleeces down to the communal village washing sinks where we thought one tap still worked. It didn't. So we decided to do the preliminary work (called "skirting") on her lawn.The first surprise was their size when we unrolled them. The second was that, even though they'd been tied up for almost a week, the fleeces didn't smell too dreadful when we opened the big garbage bags and tipped the contents on to the lawn. They definitely smelled but in a good, open air, country-ish, barnyard-y way. 

   Just as well or we might have abandoned the whole project. I'd downloaded TMI (Too Much Information) from the Internet. Amanda had printed it out so she was able to consult it as we dug our way through the fleeces coming upon large iridescent and very dead flies, and feeling (sensitive readers, skip the next section) for lumpy or crispy bits to remove. Needless to say, the cats thought they'd discovered the largest mother cat ever. 

Gaston and I Are About to Get Cozy

The back story. Last December, I met Gaston and les girls, a flock belonging to our Airstream-owning friends Perry and Coline. I asked them what happened to the fleeces. They said they gave them away to be used as insulation. I asked if I could have one. 

   Long story short. After yesterday's cricket match, Coline took me over to a giant, plastic-covered mound and pulled out Gaston's fleece which is dark and enormous (not unlike Gaston himself). We picked another soft, paler one for a friend who is also along on this project. Total beginners at this, she and I plan to wash, card, spin and--in my case--knit. Right now, Gaston's fleece is tied up in a very large black plastic bag. Information on-line suggests using washing-up liquid and a washing machine but I don't think it means the diminutive French washing machines which accommodate a few pairs of socks but not much more. If it came to a stand-off between Gaston and our Zanussi, I wouldn't bet money on the Zanussi. 

    I'll keep you posted.

Lost French Words

Browsing at Shakespeare and Company, the iconic English bookstore on the left bank, I picked up a copy of The Discovery of France by English author, Graham Robb. It's a book that's hard to describe but basically it recounts how numerous mini-civilizations, all with their own cultures, came together as "France."

The book is packed with engaging bits of information. For instance, Robb describes how: "The shepherds of the Landes spent whole days on stilts, using a stick to form a tripod when they wanted to rest. Perched 10 feet in the air, they knitted woolen garments and scanned the horizon for stray sheep."

Among the many, many other facts that will have you nudging the person next to you and saying "did you know..." Robb explores how numerous dialects were eventually replaced by "official" French. 

Unfortunately that meant the loss of some truly useful words:

Affender: "to share a meal with an unexpected visitor" (and haven't we all done that at one time or another).

Aranteler: "to sweep away spiders' webs"

Carquet: "a secret place between breast and corset".

I can't wait to say: "Je dois aranteler mon carquet."

Thoroughly recommended. 

I read it in one sitting. Five sittings, to be strictly honest:

1. On the TGV from Paris to Toulouse.

2. At Toulouse station while I waited for the train to Tarbes. Trains to Pamiers were cancelled because, I later found out, an electricity line had come down so, very much on the ball, SNCF rerouted us.

3. On the brief rail trip from Toulouse to Portet sur Garonne

4. On the bus that met us there and  took a circuitous route to drop off passengers who normally disembarked at stations between Toulouse and Auterive.

5. On the train between Auterive and Pamiers. 

Olive Oil, Airstreams, Gaston and Les Girls.

A half hour drive from Léran is a winding road that eventually ends at Belpayre, the hilltop farm owned by our friends Perry and Coline. Dotted around the main house are big silvery Airstream trailers. Take a look at them at www.belrepayre.com and guaranteed you'll want to rent one for a bit of retro camping. With its view of the countryside and the Pyrenees, the hot tub alone is worth the trip. 

Right now, in the field used for summertime cricket matches, Gaston and his 14 ewes are doing whatever it is that sheep do. Unlike most sheep, this flock is mostly dark brown and black with their tails left undocked. 

One of the reasons for our visit was to get our hands on some of the olive oil that comes from Perry and Coline's land in southern Spain. We tasted, and left with two litres, bright green, cloudy and so full of flavour we keep pouring saucers-ful to dip chunks of baguette into. 

The Transhumance:Part 1--Exactly What Is a Transhumance?

Just too much happened yesterday to cover in one single post so I'm going to break it up into a number of sections. Probably three, maybe more. 

Background stuff first. In Latin, "trans" translates as "across" and "humus" means ground. In farming terms, it means moving your herds and flocks to higher pastures in summer and bringing them back to the valley in fall. A mere agricultural exercise? You must be joking. Like about everything else around here, the biannual transhumance is just another excuse for a long communal meal. 

Most of the transhumances we've read about started very early, very far away and involved (said friends who had been to one) a very long hike to keep up with the animals. This transhumance was local, about 15 minutes drive away in the village of Le Sautel and basically involved meeting and greeting the sheep as they were driven through the street. 

Some hapless drivers didn't realize what was going on and had to sit in their cars while the sheep milled around them. From the road, they (the sheep) were then driven through a gate into a meadow where they waited while everyone went off and had lunch. 

We probably could have climbed halfway up a Pyrenee and met them coming down but we were distracted by a vide grenier where we were able to buy the plates we had forgotten to bring. 

See Part Two.