524 Words
France - Maps, Menus and Moments - Driving Through France
"Tres, tres, tres, tres bon," said the perfectly manicured woman at the boulangerie counter. I felt like I'd won the lottery. Apparently, I had picked the exact right baguette. Forget what people say about the French and their snobbery.
In a month long driving trip through France, my husband and I were treated like gold. Armed with only a rental car, guidebook, French gleaned from Corn Flakes boxes (Mais Flacons!) and precision Michelin maps we had no problems wherever we went.
Well, almost none... Michelin maps are great, but even with their incredible detail...there will be...let us call them...moments. It has been said that a true test of a marriage is wallpapering together. Au contraire...it is driving in France with one spouse as driver and the other as navigator.
In spite of those rather animated discussions, ultimately it seems life would be improved if it were more like a French road. We soon learned that if a mistake was made, it really didn't matter. In mere moments there would be another rond au point where there would be at least four more chances to drive in a different direction. These round-abouts were the ultimate redemption. Didn't like road A? Drive to the next circle until you see the name of the town you want to head toward and you can spit your little car into an entirely new direction. Life's choices should be so easily corrected.
It's not just the roads that illustrate a different approach to life. It is the way the French pride themselves in the actual art of Life. They have a phrase, la chose bien faite - the thing well made, the thing well done, or the life well lived.
Life, as it's been said, is in the details. If so, the details this nation focuses on make living well an art. City after town after village, it didn't matter the size, there were common themes; a bakery with only the freshest of breads, a patisserie with exquisitely detailed confections and a butcher with a variety of meats that inspire dreams of chef lessons. Naturally, there is the produce shop as well. The perfectly ripe peach with the green leaf still clinging to its stem will await purchase next to the basket of zucchini flowers. And of course, a town of any size will have an entire store dedicated to chocolate. As you should...
Given such foodie perfection, it makes perfect sense to take two-hour lunches and to drink wine at every meal except breakfast...though we saw that too. Every region has its specialties. In Dijon each restaurant table has a pot of mustard beside the salt and pepper. In Chamonix we gorged on fondue Savoyarde, in Roussillon we ate the wonderful cassoulet, on the Rhone we ate Valrhona chocolate and in Vichy we took the waters.
And everywhere, we drank the wines named after wherever we happened to have landed; Bordeaux, Burgoyne, Cote du Rhone and Burgundy. More often than not, our huge Michelin chart read like a menu instead of a map.
It was, as they say, a tres, tres, tres, tres bon voyage.
Embark on your adventure: www.tourismfrance.com
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