To See, Hear, Smell, Taste and Touch Autumn in France

     This past week I have really noticed a difference in the landscape.  As the Fall Equinox sends us in a slightly different orbit around the sun, I see things a little differently.  In general, Autumn is my least favorite season.  As I look around me I tend to see things in their decline, dying and returning to the earth.  I know this is necessary in order to have my most favorite season - Spring.  But I don't enjoy watching the death of the plants that I so dearly love.
     I have never been in France this far into the Fall season and so this is the first time I have experienced the beauty of so many colors, smells, tastes, sounds, and textures of France in the Autumn.  It's a new love!
     The woods near my house are bright with reds and golds and oranges among the still green late- turning trees.  The many vineyards are just starting to lose their bright green color.  There's a field of leeks growing just up the road - their bluish-green leaves standing straight like little soldiers.  Every hillside has a plume of smoke from the brush that farmers and land owners are burning and clearing out for the promise of future growth.

A nearby hillside

The front of my cottage

In the next field over

     There seems to be more farm equipment on these tiny narrow winding roads that slows everyone down.  John Deere is alive and well in France!  And there are lots of silos in every little village.  This is an agricultural area with cornfields as well as the vineyards.  Corn to feed the livestock - the cows, the geese (for foie gras!), the ducks and other poultry, the goats and sheep.  People don't eat corn in France.  They don't realize what they're missing when it comes to an ear of corn drenched in butter!
     The fields also play host to a number of wild animals.  I have seen deer and buzzards, crows and pheasants.  I have yet to see a wild boar, but I know they're out there!
     And that brings me to the sounds of Fall.  It's hunting season around here and I can hear gunshots all around me at the cottage.  And I'm hoping they missed!  (Sorry, hunter friends.  I know the importance of hunting and all the reasons why it should be done.  It's just that I'm such a softie when it comes to animals.)  I can hear their dogs barking to alert them to the game.  It's open season for pheasants and deer and boar, if they can be found.  They are pretty elusive!
     I can hear the farmer's tractor in the next field and his cows (there's always one that wears thee bell) enjoying their meal of grass and wildflowers.  Yesterday, while driving in the mountains I heard sheep - a lot of sheep.  (I smelled them, too!)  And quite often I hear the military jets as they have a flight pattern directly over the cottage.

The Sheep that got Away

The Sheep that Didn't

     The smells of Autumn are as varied as the sights and sounds.  The smell of the farmers' fires in the fields is acrid and burns my throat if I'm too close to it.  But I love walking along the driveway as the rosemary bushes are blooming now.  And there's lavender just outside my door.  The late roses are so beautiful and add to the feeling that Spring can't be all that far away, right?

The mandarin orange tree

Rosemary in the drive

     Autumn in France means mushrooms!  There are stands along the side of the roads and in villages that just sell mushrooms - of many varieties.  How lovely to cook with fresh mushrooms!  The taste is indescribable!  It reminds you of the earth which gave the mushroom its life.  The French have a word for that "earthy" taste - it's called the "terroir" - meaning "of the earth".  It is used to describe the taste of a wine.  What makes this wine different from another wine of the same name?  The terroir - where the grapes were raised and everything in the soil and the atmosphere that affects the taste of the wine.  And Hélène's walnut cake is wonderful!  This is the area for walnuts and chestnuts and other nuts that we associate with the end of the year holidays.  Yum!
     As for touch, I am so thankful for that wonderful French invention, the towel warmer!  How lovely to step out of the shower and be able to envelope oneself in immediate warmth!   And then to wrap my soft woolen shawl around me as I watch TV.  And, of course, the flannel sheets on the bed are so welcoming.
     I hope I have given you a glimpse of life in my corner of France in Autumn.  I don't think I can ever like this season as much as I do Spring, but it is growing on me.  I look forward to each outing to see the changes in the colors.  I drove into the mountains yesterday.  I can't stay away too long!  They are so beautiful and are always calling to me - no matter what season.
 

I love the mountains any time of year!

     Unfortunately, the drive was not in my new car.  I will pick it up on Tuesday.  French bureaucracy is crazy! It seems the salesman had bought the Audi in Germany and it had not yet been registered in France.  So I had to do that before I could get the paperwork that would get me the car.  Oy vay!
     Thank you for letting me share my sensory impressions of Autumn in France.  Oh how I wish I could paint.  I can see in my mind how it would all look on parchment - like a Monet or a Renoir - but it comes out of my hand like a three year old did it (no offense to three year old artists.)
     I hope you are enjoying Fall in your part of the world.  The changing of the seasons is always a time of reflection for me.  The forces of Nature are astounding.  May you find joy in the sense of wonder.  Thanks for being on this journey with me.  Merci!