David's Thoughts on the French Elections - II

In two rounds in June the French went to the polls and reversed the makeup of Parliament, giving the new Socialist President a Socialist majority.  This election seemed much more sweeping than the presidential one, which was closer than predicted. 

Because of the multiplicity of parties, the socialists, with less than 50% of the total vote nationwide, won a majority of the seats.  Seats, similarly to the US, are voted upon by population districts.  The candidate, who in the runoffs gets a majority in the voting district, is elected.

Francois Hollande and the Parti Socialiste will now have control of the levers of power, and the ability to make decisions without the need to cater to coalition partners or other parties that they would have needed to make up a majority in parliament.  It will be interesting to see how this plays out, as economic constraints with the Euro and with France’s budget will, like many places in the world, constrain the government’s ability to initiate new programs.  There is little or no ability to increase deficit spending, and little or no ability to significantly increase taxes to pay for more spending.   Unlike in the US, countries cannot simply print more money as we have been doing [“Quantitative Easing”] to finance job creation and other economic activity.

It does seem that both on the street and in the press that there are few unrealistic expectations, which should help the government.  Problems typically occur when peoples’ expectations exceed what the system can or will deliver.  The elephant in the room right now for western governments worldwide is the possibility [some would even say certainty] of Greek default and the breakup of the Euro zone.  This has the potential to produce results that will be devastating for Europeans, and will require a good deal of skill and statesmanship from many heads of state.

The Euro Symbol outside the European Central Bank in Frankfort, Germany

A Visit to the Medieval Village of Crest

Michelin has published a book called Les 100 "Plus Beaux Detours" de France (The 100 Most Beautiful Detours in France).  It's a great book; each of the 100 villages has its own page with picture, short explanation of why it's in the book, and basic information such as where the tourist office is, facilities available,etc. as well as a small map of the village.  Perfect for people like us who enjoy daytrips.  Crest is one of those 100 villages and is only about 1hour and 45 minutes  away using the autoroute.  So off we went!



Showing part of the village with Anna in the foreground.

The village of Crest is very picturesque with lots of narrow "streets" and many medieval and renaissance houses. The Tourist Office actually has written information about self-guided tours. (So many things to do - so little time!) There is also evidence of a settlement going back to Neolithic times. And, of course, the Romans were there. In fact workers discovered evidence of a Gallo-Roman Inn (3rd century) when they were working on the TGV (fast train) line near here.

David took these two panoramic views of Crest and the countryside.


However, Crest's main claim to fame is its tower.  It is actually a castle keep and all that remains of a grand medieval fortress.  It is also the tallest castle tower in France at 52 meters (around 159 feet).  The fortress was built around 1145, and the castle and village were claimed by both Bishop of Die and the Count of Valentinois (part of the Poitier family).The Count's family prevailed, and the last Count in the line gave city and castle to the King of France in the 15th century.  Various Kings actually "gave" them to other families like the Grimaldis (Prince of Monaco) from time to time.  Finally, Louis XIII (in the 17th century) became nervous about the fortress and had all but the tower destroyed.  The tower was turned into a prison and remained one until the 20th century.

View of tower from the village below.

David took this near the top of the tower.

And, like so many of these lovely, old villages, Crest remains a vibrant town with over 8000 inhabitants, and plenty of shops and restaurants.  We enjoyed a delightful, leisurely lunch under an arbor near the center of the village.  As usual, we seemed to be the only Americans around.


Lunch al fresco.

 A pleasant day exploring another lovely village.

Bike Trip Day 5

Day 5 – Fri June 8.

Headed out of town early [before 8] to get ahead of possible winds and heat, following the maps and signage, as there was no marked path.  Tended to stay on main roads as we wanted to get to Arles by nightfall.  We were on the bike route for a while, from about Sauveterre to the town of Villeneuve-les-Avignon, on the other side of the island of Barthelesse and the river and canal from Avignon itself.  We stopped there for coffee and juice, and spoke to a local gentleman who wanted to know what we were up to.  He advised a different route from the one on the map; the mapped route went up through town and would be difficult to navigate on our bikes.  We pondered this while we had our drinks, looked at the maps and road signs outside, and decided to take a third route – the small highway along the river.  It turned out be a good choice as traffic was not too bad, we had a marked shoulder part of the time, and made good time.  We stopped in the village of Beaucaire for lunch and made it to the Trinquetaille district, across the river from the center of Arles, in about another hour and a quarter.

We checked into a fairly nice hotel that Anna and I had stayed in last year, cleaned up, changed, and went into Arles for a bit of sight-seeing .  Over drinks, Roger mentioned that he thought maybe we should end our trip in Arles, as getting to the actual Mediterranean, while not far, [about 40km], would have a difficult return ride against the wind, and we would need to stay overnight before starting back to Arles to catch the train.  He had thought of just going 10-15 more km to a salt-water pond, but that would not actually be the Mediterranean.  After some discussion, we decided to return to Lyon the next day.  Roger had a plane to catch Monday.  But first – a stop at a small bar for the celebratory drinks.  Two glasses of Champagne for me, beers for Roger – hydrating.  The bar was on a nice small square with people and families coming and going, probably mostly home after work and school.

Small Square in Arles



David at the Bar in Arles

Roger overlooking the Rhone in Arles 



David likewise

We then did a bit more sightseeing before finding a very nice restaurant, Le QG, for dinner.  I had a brochette with alternating chunks of duck and beef, with yet another great sauce, along with vegetables and potatoes dauphinoise.  We also had a celebratory bottle of Chateuneuf-du-Pape, a renowned local red wine.

Distance by map: about 70km.

The next morning, we went into Arles for a breakfast of juice, coffee, bread, and croissants, and headed for the train station to buy tickets back to Lyon.  That done, we headed for the same bar on the small square for another celebratory drink, before going back to the hotel to finish packing, load the bikes, check out and head for the train station.  The train back to Lyon, including hooks on the train coach for our bikes, cost all of 27 Euros each!  It also covered the distance that took us five days in less than three hours, with nine stops along the way.  Modern travel certainly has its advantages in terms of speed and comfort. 

Just to prove we actually got there, note the 'Arles' sign above us in these shots at the train station.

David looking tan and fit [or worn out?]

Roger likewise

Dominique was out of town, but Anna met us at the Part-Dieu Station in Lyon.  We headed for Roger's appartment to drop off the bikes and have a celebratory bottle of sparkling wine that just happened to be in his refrigerator.

At Part Dieu Station Upon our Return

Total distance ridden in five days: about 313 km.

Gospel Concert - French Style

Roger, our landlord, friend, and David's bike buddy, is a member of the Lions Club of Lyon, and his club was sponsoring a Gospel Concert to benefit the Alzheimer Association.  So, of course we bought tickets and anticipated hearing some good old gospel singing.  Well, not so fast, this IS France, after all!

The vocal group was actually started in 1997 by a local high school music teacher with a group of high school singers and musicians.   His inspriation was gospel choirs in the US, such as the Crenshaw Gospel Choir in LA and the Golden Gate Quartet. A brilliant way to recruit students for music classes and infuse them with an enthusiam for music, rhythm and performing!  He was very, very successful!  The group, Entre Ciel et Tierre (Between Heaven and Earth), now tours throughout the region and presents well-choreographed, enthusiastic performances.   But, they really don't perform what we would consider American gospel music.

There can be no doubt about the talent of many of the musicians and singers; several even stepped forward to  take a solo.  At one point they did stray from their home-grown version of gospel songs to sing "Proud Mary" (the Ike and Tina Turner version, minus the Ikettes) and nearly brought down the house!

Another uniquely French experience!

Bike Ride Day 4

Day 4 – Thurs June 7.

Tony had determined he needed to catch a late-morning train from the village of Pierrelatte, about 2-3 hours away.  So after a breakfast of coffee, fresh orange juice, home-made preserves, bread, and croissants of various types, we headed out.  We picked up the route near the bridge into town and had a peaceful ride down country roads, between fields and vineyards, across small bridges, and into Pierrelatte in plenty of time for Tony’s train.  After seeing him off, Roger and I headed south and west out of town to intersect again with our planned route.   There was no actual bike trail in this area, but the roads were very rural and peaceful.  Unfortunately, they also tended to be somewhat indirect, so we often covered three sides of a rectangle in order to get to a point where the fourth side would have been.  We were on a large rural island for this segment, between the actual Rhone and a barge canal.

David and Tony at the Pierrelatte Station

The plaque behind David and Tony memorializes an attack by allied aircraft during WWII on a German train known as the 'Phantom Train' that was carrying men and women to imprisonment at Dachau.  A local doctor assisted the wounded and succeed in helping one man escape recapture.  The planes of course did not know who was on the train.

We had lunch in Pont-Saint-Espirit, where we watched as classes of junior-high age kids went by, remarking on the almost total absence of very over-weight kids.

After lunch, the road went along the river past power plants, with not many trees or scenery, some small hills, and much sun with a warm head wind blowing.  Probably the most difficult section so far.  At one point, I stopped at the top of a rise, under a tree, looked around, and no Roger.  After a few minutes, he appeared, having stopped to ask to fill his water bottle, which he generously shared with me.

At about three in the afternoon, we stopped in the small village of Codolet for a beer and lots of water.  As we did not know the hotel situation in the village we were headed for, we decided that we would check out the hotels in this town.  There appeared to be two; the only one with space available was a one-star establishment called La Petite Hutte.  Very small rooms with a sink, but clean, and W/C and shower down the hall.  No A/C of course, but we decided to take it.  It was a hot, muggy night, with thunderstorms, and a downpour in the middle of the night.  Not very restful, but it served the purpose.

Distance ridden by the maps: about 60km.

Bike Trip Day 3

Day 3 – Wed June 6

Fascinating day – down the right bank again.  Got a bit off track at Montelimar, a small city, when I turned left instead of right at a crossroads.  Had an unplanned tour of the town before finally getting back onto the island in the Rhone where we wanted to be.  We detoured slightly into the town of Le Teil for lunch where Tony checked in at the railroad station to find out where he could catch a train the next day, as he had an appointment in Lyon.  Another nice lunch for about 17 Euros each.  This time we had beer instead of wine in order to up our water consumption – the weather was warming up to about 80F during the day.

Path Section Along the Rhone

Back to the island in the Rhone.  This is, I think where I lost Roger and Tony for a bit.  I had been in the lead and as the route was clearly marked, had not looked back for a while.  After a sharp right turn on a country road, I looked right so I could see back along our route for a kilometer or so.  No Roger or Tony!!  I stopped and decided I would wait a few minutes and see whether they appeared.  Still no one, so I turned around and started to retrace my route.  After a few hundred yards, they appeared, coming towards me.  Seems the cherry trees we had passed awhile back, with a few ripe cherries still on them, had proved irresistible.  They had stopped to sample a few of the cherries that remained after the harvest and pronounced them ‘great’.

We had planned to stop for the night at a hotel in Chateauneuf-du-Rhone, but did not find a hotel in the center of the village.  Before turning towards the village on the left bank, we had noticed that the village across the river, Vivier, had a magnificent cathedral on the hill.  Tony used his cell phone to find a hotel in that town, but got only an answering machine when he called.  After finding nothing in Chateauneuf-du-Rhone, he tried the hotel in Vivier again and was rewarded with an answer and the news that they had rooms available.  And so we lucked into our most enjoyable stay of the trip, at the Relais de Vivarais.

Late 19th Century Photo of the Vivier Cathedral

Not only did we have new stand-alone rooms by the pool, away from the main road, but Madame was a delightful person, who laughed at our jokes, provided efficient, courteous service, and also was our guide when making menu and wine selections.  We had a bottle of local Rose by the pool while we waited for our rooms to be made up.  Roger and Tony went swimming and I sat with my legs in the water and sipped my wine.  That evening we had a wonderful dinner with a bottle of Clairette de Die, a local sparkling wine made from muscat grapes – very refreshing as we ate under the arbor and trees outside the old main building.  I had a wonderful white fish dish with a sort of sweet vegetable relish; Tony and Roger had pigeon with a great sauce.  For desert, we had a sort of red fruit dish with a half-bottle of local red wine, as I believe, a Cote-du-Rhone Villages.

David's Plat - Both the Presentation and the Taste were Fabulous

Distance ridden by the maps: about 55km.

Bike Trip Day 2

Day 2 – Tues June 5.

Interesting day – a variety of scenery and terrain, rural and urban.  We crossed and re-crossed the Rhone, sometimes on top of dams.  My front tire went almost flat during the day just outside a small toen north of Montelimar .  We had aerosol cans with sealant with us for such an occurrence and it worked well.  The tire continued to leak slowly, but there was enough left in my aerosol to manage the problem for the rest of the trip.  While the repair was going on, a young German man on a bike stopped to see if we needed help.  He spoke English and chatted with us for a while.  He was biking from Germany to Marseille, where his girlfriend would pick him up. 

Typical Finished Path Section

South of Tain L’Hermitage we found ourselves in a village on an island called la Roche de Glun.  Thanks to Tony, we did not settle for lunch at an ordinary brasserie, but looked around a bit and found an auberge called Pere Monet where we had a fabulous meal, with two [probably too many] carafes of an excellent local red, all eaten outside under the trees.  I believe we all had the shoulder of pork with a great sauce and accompanying potatoes, dessert, and coffee.  Total cost: 24 Euros each!

Roughing it with Roger and David at Lunch

After lunch we continued down the island, crossed to the left bank north of Valence, a good-sized small city.  Here we lost our way a bit and had an unplanned tour of the town.  We managed to get back on track and crossed the Rhone again, pedaling down the river to Charmes-sur-Rhone, where we found a very nice air-conditioned, up-to-date hotel called La Carre d’Altheius.  Our bikes were placed in a locked conference room for the night.  After cleaning up and changing clothes, we walked down to a campground by the river and had a carafe of red wine, before heading back to town to find a restaurant.  The hotel restaurant being booked, we had a pleasant dinner with some Crozes-Hermitage, in a small place on the main street.

Distance ridden by the maps – about 63 km.

Bike Trip Day 1

Back to the drawing board.  The trip was again rescheduled for Sunday, June 3 as Roger and Dominique were out of town for a week.   Rain is predicted for that day!

June 3 dawned with heavy clouds but no rain.  Anna and I trekked off to meet Roger and Dominique; as we approached their apartment building, rain began to fall.  As the rain began to fall heavily, we made a joint decision to postpone for one day. 

As mentioned before, the route we were to take is called the Via Rhona – a planned bike route from Lake Geneva down the Rhone River Valley to the Mediterranean.  It is completed in some places, non-existent in others, and in others just a marked path on a country road or along the shoulder of a secondary highway.  I had purchased a detailed map and description of the route which helped immensely in the areas where there were no markings or obvious route.

Because we were going down a river valley and because the route-makers had done a good job in most places, we rode mostly on flat ground.  The few hills were mostly manageable on the bike.

Unfortunately, we took few pictures on the trip.

Day 1 – June 4.

Monday broke cool and partly cloudy – good bike weather.  This time there were only three of us – Pascale was unable to take time off from work to join us.  Off we went, via essentially the same route as three weeks previously.  I had brought a box of macarons, a prized local confection, to bring to the hospital as a thank-you for patching me up.

David and Roger at His Apartment about to Leave to Meet Tony

Upon reaching the scene of my disaster, and after a quick stop at the Givors hospital to drop off my card and macarons, we stopped to see if an obvious cause for the fall could be seen.  Besides the rain that day, I did note that the rail line curved as it reached the right side of the road where I had encountered it.  This made the angle of crossing somewhat less than 45 degrees, and probably led to the wheel slipping into the track groove. 

About 200 yards south we reached the first section of the paved bike route.  This first section was beautiful, taking us through woods, farmland, along the river bank, through wildlife preserves and over old arched stone bridges.  We also crossed onto an island in the river, and then back to the right bank again.  We passed through small and not-so-small villages, such as St-Romain-en-Gal, site of an old Roman settlement.  We also passed through some of France’s most renowned vineyard areas such as Cote Rotie and Condrieu.  We stopped at a café for a nice lunch in this area.

After lunch we continued down the right bank for a while, then crossed to a rural island for a while before re-crossing to Serrieres, where we booked into the only hotel in town.  No air conditioning, but clean and comfortable.  They secured our bikes in a small storage room for us. The only restaurant available Monday night [many restaurants in France are closed Sunday and/or Monday] was a small storefront place run by a personable man who made a good hamburger [mine] and Tex-Mex plate [Roger].  I don’t recall what Tony had, but he did pronounce it good.

Tony at Dinner - note the sign behind him.

Based on the map numbers, we covered about 65km; Tony’s and Roger’s odometers showed considerably more.  We may have ridden a bit more due to occasional side trips and/or back tracking, but neither the hours ridden nor our apparent rate of travel would seem to support the odometer numbers.

David's Thoughts on French Elections 2012

The two rounds of the French Presidential election occurred in April, with the only surprise being the closeness of the vote in the second round.   In June France then votes in two rounds for members of Assembly. 

Contrary to popular opinion in the US, France is a conservative country.  In the last 60 years, France has seldom had a Socialist President or a socialist majority in Assembly.  However, like Americans, the French people are loath to give up any of their generous social benefits.  These have included retirement at age 60, a 35-hour workweek, and very low-cost medical care.  With budget problems and an ageing population however, changes are inevitable. Last year then-President Sarkozy pushed through an increase in the retirement age to 62, setting off protest demonstrations throughout the country.  One reason for the reaction was that the changes were to take place almost immediately, impacting people who had assumed that they would be retiring in a year or two.  When Social Security retirement ages were raised in the US many years ago, no one was impacted for almost 30 years, so there was no real controversy. 

Nicolas Sarkozy

This change in the retirement age plus President Sarkozy’s mercurial, somewhat abrasive personality, undoubtedly contributed to his defeat at the polls in April.  The current financial uncertainty also led some to look to new leadership.  Note that these are some of the same factors that contributed to Barack Obama’s win in 2008.

The official picture of President François Hollande

The new Socialist President Hollande promised while campaigning to roll back the retirement age to 60 for ‘qualified workers’  This proved to affect very few – only those who had started work at 18 and worked the required number of quarters.  He has ordered an audit of France’s finances, with results to be ready AFTER the Assembly elections.  It is widely expected that he will announce that he is ‘shocked, shocked’ at France’s financial state and that therefore, changes that he wanted to make to improve services will, quel dommage, have to be put on hold while France’s financial house is put in order.   Like in the US, the financial situation will have to be addressed in order to put the country on more of a ‘pay-as-you-go basis’; an ageing population with fewer workers and more demand for services is accelerating the crunch between income and outgo.   In spite of fears on the right and in the business community of what a Socialist government might do, I believe that they will for the most part act responsibly, if for no other reason in that they have few options.