Anonymous in Les Tenieres, France

Three horses, one erased, Les Tenieres, France. Click to view the photo at Flickr.

I spent four days on my scooter wandering this little region to the north of Tours, France, blown away by the access the scooter was giving me. When I pulled off the main highway onto this tiny road that might as well have been private, these two horses (and a third one erased) were just posing for me. I was realizing the dream of riding a scooter in the countryside with a nice camera and all the time in the world.

Nobody at home knows where I am; nobody here knows who I am.

Reading Winter Sunshine

2001
The night I returned home from three months in Paris I had a dream: I was arriving back in Paris and I said, “I’m back, I’m finally back.”
That winter I woke up in the evening, my roommates were gone for the break and I kept one room warm in the top of the house. Mine was the only light in the neighborhood. I would be awake the whole night, depressed, and during the day I’d sleep and I’d dream, “I’m back, I’m finally back.” I didn’t see daylight for a week.
But things got better, as they do, and I met a girl who I’d known for a year. We secretly danced in the dark under trees. We fell asleep tangled in her bed and then I’d dream about being in Paris, being back, finally back.
I’m sure I studied around this time because I remember walking to German class in the snow and swearing at it for visiting Seattle in March. I took the class because I’d met a German in Paris and schemed to go back and woo her with my painful conjugation of simple verbs. But the scheme faded as the snow melted and I kept waking up tangled with the girl on white sheets, waking from the Paris dream again and again.
I had the same dream, warmer, later in the Spring, after we fought about nothing and I walked home alone, looking up at the trees drip in the rain. We had fought about the world: I thought it was incurably sick, while she was more optimistic, and I slept alone, tangled in sheets in my warm room.
Despite her optimism, we stayed together through the summer. At her cabin we swam in fresh water. I pulled myself up the ladder to lay on the dock in the sun, the boards scratching my chest. We swung in a hammock and slept there together in coins of sunlight, and I dreamed of Paris.
In winter I woke up, untangled, alone, in Paris, I was back, finally back. I descended dark stairs to a wet, stony street and walked in the rain on a bridge. I wandered the Left Bank until I found a hotel and carried my things up dark steps to the desk. A young man smiled and motioned down the hall. I walked down the hall and stopped at a door, behind which she waited, asleep, tangled in white sheets.

Inspiring travel sites

A couple in their Pissos, France home

Bert Teunissen photographs people in their own kitchens and dining rooms in a series called “Domestic Landscapes.” The photos are gorgeous, shot inside by natural light, but they’re also uncomfortably intimate like we’re looking at the inside of a person’s skin, not just their kitchen. Most of the series are shot in Europe (it’s broken up by country on the website) but there’s one series from Japan during which I kept asking, “Why is he shooting these people at a restaurant?” I guess I’ve never been in a Japanese home….

I’ve spent a lot of time in people’s houses as well, but in the US I rarely come across a home that exhibits a personality’s corners the way Teunissen’s European homes do.

The other website I’ve been loving is the David Lynch Interview Project. The filmmaker has sent a team across the US to conduct four-minute interviews with locals and they talk on a variety of subjects, but often about themselves.

While window washing I’ve had a lot of four-minute conversations and though I don’t think such passing glances can give a full picture of a person’s life, it tells you what they want you to hear in four minutes.

We’ve had health care abroad.

If there is a god, then why do stupid things happen to smart people?

by Mike

Azure and I have had plenty of health care encounters abroad, so I thought I’d tell some of the fun stories about how we get treated when we leave our own country.

Here’re 20 tips for traveling Europe on the cheap (Dang that’s a lot of tips!)

You have to be pretty cheap to find places like this.

Y’all want to know about our finances anyway. I’ll keep it oblique so there’s still a sense of wonder and enchantment.

Az and I budgeted about 50 Euro per day for us as a couple this winter, which works out to about $1000 per person per month, not including airfare. We spend less traveling than we do at home.

An Ethnologist’s Take on Peasant Corsica

By Mike Goldstein

“Granite Island: A Portrait of Corsica” is a beautifully written chronicle of Dorothy Carrington’s time in Corsica (which spanned decades). Even after the second world war Corsican peasants were living very much in the same way their ancestors had for centuries. In the following paragraphs Carrington, visiting from London, writes about her experiences living with a Corsican peasant family near Sartene.

Bonifascinating

Azure and I agreed that Bonifacio is one of the most spectacular cities we’ve visited – it’s built on a cliff that’s surrounded by water on 3.5 sides and it’s pretty much waiting to fall into the water, as you can see above. From Bonifacio you can see Sardegna, Corsica’s Italian sister to the South. Bonifacio is hundreds of years old, of course, and somewhere up here was found one of the oldest inhabitants of Corsica, a woman whose grave was dated to ~9000 years ago.

We found the town itself to be one of those annoying seasonal towns that’s a shell in the off-season, so there’s nothing to do, nothing that sustains people. Tourism keeps em going the rest of the year, of course, so when we were walking around the town our interactions felt uncomfortably artificial. We were much happier in Sartene where there was a university and some commerce and free wifi only half an hour away.

I should be a TV host

From the town of Troo, near Tours, France.

Wood-cut-like chateau

Gadling photos of the day!

In the last two weeks two of my photos have been named Gadling Photo of the Day! Gadling’s one of the biggest travel ‘blogs’ on the ‘internet’ so I’m pretty excited about this development. All the more reason to start trying to sell these things.

Don’t you want to be here?

Some town in SW Corsica.

Cap Corse Sunset

On our way back from the brocciu making we stopped at this strange fake windmill that had the best view on the island. Well, I say that, but there were tons of great views there. The windmill had one of them.

When I picture Mediterranean islands, I usually imagine looking down at them from above, as if I’m floating above and getting to inspect the valleys and smell the trees on the wind… When we pulled to the top of a hill and saw this view I knew I’d have to take some time to experience it.

That’s one of the reasons I love night photography. When the shudder opens, you have nothing to do but be still and wait and watch. It’s a situation where taking it all in – really appreciating the scene – is automatic and easy. Night photography is also a little magic. The camera picks up light that you didn’t know was there in the first place.

Up on this ridge there was a stiff wind and there were old stones scattered down the hillside that had at one point been structures. There were wind farms on the hill and the moon was rising behind them. We could somehow see all the way down to L’Ile Rousse at night – it’s the collection of lights on the right side of the picture. That was the town we’d slept in the night before, hours away by scooter. But there it was, under our noses like we were floating above the island inspecting its coasts.

Snow on the olive farm

by Mike

Azure and I, picking olives, noticed that the sky was getting dark up the valley. We asked Margarite, “Is it going to rain?”
“No, it won’t rain,” she said.
We didn’t really believe her, so we kept working. But the darkness grew and we were startled to feel an icy wind flee down the valley in front of the cloud.

We looked up and saw that the darkness had crossed a ridge and was heading for us and whether it was rain, it was serious. Claude screamed orders to get the full olive caisses up and we scrambled to move our equipment inside, protected, and to get the olives out of the cold. Then it hit – snow rioted through the orchard and the temperature must have dropped 25 degrees.

There was a lot of confusion but we eventually got everything moved in and spent the rest of the day wide-eyed at the snow falling just 30 minutes from Nice.

Of course Margarite was right – no rain.

L’Ile Rousse plaza

We pulled into L’Ile Rousse (on the west coast of Corsica) late in the afternoon and immediately headed to the cute center of town. There were bunches of people playing petanque (bocci) in the main square, old men of course, and many just hanging out watching. That’s not our scooter.

We watched for a little while then walked down the two small streets that make up the centre ville and of course (of course) discovered nothing was open.

It’s an interesting little town.

Chateau skull

I had trouble editing this to look “nice” so I started just blowing it out in different ways, and this is what I came up with.

This is a picture of the chateau (the ‘teeth’ of the skull) from the allee.

The tomb near Pinareddu

This was taken on the east coast of Corsica, just south of Ste. Lucia de Porto Vecchio.

Closure

Hello Everyone!

Azure and I have been home for a week now and I’ve been searching for the way to wrap up this trip but I just couldn’t find it. I was thinking about listing my favorite parts, but that seems petty. I was also thinking about sharing what I felt was the overarching theme of the trip, but I think you got the idea if you read the blogs.

Last year I wrote about my first reactions on arriving home and a lot of people had strong responses to that, so I think that’s how I want to do it. My first reaction:

As we were flying south toward Seattle I saw the Olympic mountains, dark and low and folded, and I remembered that Washington State has been populated for as long as Corsica has (Kennewick Man is 9,300 years old). Our place is as ancient as theirs, it’s just not as celebrated and I’ve never given it its due attention… our predecessors in the Pacific Northwest built with wood. No stones to run my hands across, no stones for new populations to wonder about or rebuild into new structures or interpret. Certainly there’s an archaeological record, but we don’t physically navigate history the way they do in Europe. Our culture hasn’t pulled ancient magic into the present the way they had on Corsica, but our landscape does suggest it. Where are those myths waiting?

Anyway, thank you for following us to Colombia and Europe this year. We’ll be back on the road in November.

Our photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikegoldstein/collections/72157608983320424/

Last night at the chateau

Just kept working on it until I got it right – I’m happiest with this one.

The flowers at the St. Julien L’Ars cemetery were all fresh and popping.

One of the workers has installed himself in this little room, it’s kinda his home base for the workday. Beautiful walls.

I’m sure not everyone will like this, but it’s one of my faves from the batch. I wanted to create a picture that showed how I saw the Jeanne d’Arc statue with its emotional power, but I wasn’t sure I’d be able to do it. When I saw the result I was really excited – I’m happy that I’ve learned enough technically that I can start with a picture in my head and bring it into being through the camera. Mmmmaybe I’ll brighten it a bit.

by Mike

A wedding party from LA showed up yesterday so we had to tip-toe around and stay out of the chateau proper. They were playing rap in the dining hall which was evidence of a horrible disconnect. I like rap, but on your first night in a chateau? We could sense that their pace of life was different than ours had become over the course of the trip and it was grating to be around.

Whatev. I’m obviously just territorial (even though the chateau isn’t my territory).

Anyway, we arrived in London safely and are in wonderful Ellen’s wonderful apartment. We walked in and she had a chicken roasting in the oven, herb potatoes and a fennel salad waiting for us. What a welcome! Tonight we’re off to what’s been touted as the best Indian food in London. My whole body is watering at the thought.

More from the allee

by Mike

Last night we went into the allee (it’s an alley of trees) to take some pictures from inside. Azure said that with two people there it wouldn’t be as frightening so she offered to chaperon me. When she was there it wasn’t as terrifying as it was when I’m alone, in fact it seemed a little silly to be so afraid. We took some nice pictures then started walking back toward the chateau.

I decided I wanted to take a few more pictures but I didn’t want Azure to be bored, so I said she could go back inside since we were so close to the driveway and I was over my fear. Well, that was a bad idea. She went to do some emailing and when I clicked the first shutter for a long exposure (Click, 1, 2, 3, 4….) the night started growing larger and I felt like little eyes were watching me. I heard noises like a tin can being swept in the forest and another bird took off and my heart went from 70 to 150 bpm in a flash. So I ran out of the allee and when I was finally in the open I set up for another picture. I opened the shutter and counted. I heard a noise in the forest again, but then it got really silent. There are really no good options for night in a forest. You don’t want it to be too quite nor too noisy… I was crouching down for the photo and at that moment there was a loud splash behind me that seemed to be coming at me. I turned and in a moment of completely unplanned instinctual response I literally hissed in the direction of the noise.

I thought, “ok, this shit is getting to me,” so I went back to the chateau and found Azure and we walked briskly back to our room.

My Birthday: A typical day for food

by Azure

My birthday was a typical day here at the chateau. I got up and started working on our painting project in the morning. At around 1pm we stopped for lunch. Since it got sunny last week, we have been having lunches out on the back patio under the columns. Mike made a tomato sauce (tomato, red pepper, eggplant, zucchini) with an egg in it over pasta and we had a mache salad with beets, kiwi and tomatoes.

For the “special” birthday dinner, we started with Kir Royals on the patio with creme fraiche and smoked salmon and caviar (caviar is pretty normal here, cheap and easy to find). Even though it was just the six of us, we still ate in the fireplace room, since I love it so much.

Mike made a chicken caccitore with potatoes and I made an unsuccessful Oeufs a la Neige (Eggs in snow?). The neige turned into a baked pancake when it should have been a fluffy snowy thing that sits in english cream. Luckily, Linda had made a walnut and chocolate flat-cake, so we put that in the creme. I drank Negrita and coke all night, the others had their choice of red or white wine.

After dinner, we talked by the fire and I got some beautiful soaps and some stiff french linens from everyone. Mike got me treats, popcorn, the Negrita and coke and some mache seeds for taking home. It was a lovely day to add to the list of lovely days here. It feels like everyday is my birthday!