Travel
There’s a sense of heightened nature in the mixed planting of the gardens of the Abbaye Sainte-Madeleine du Barroux in Provence. Similar plants are abundant in this area and are thriving in this ornamental garden in the full Provence sun on a hillside between Mont Ventoux and Les Dentelles de Montmirail. The air temperature was about 34°C when we took our picnic lunch in shade nearby.
Euston Bear, seen at Penrith North Lakes railway station Platform 1. Somehow he doesn’t have the same potential for star quality as his peer from Western Region’s Paddington station. Maybe less potential for mayhem and I can’t see marmalade dripping from his hoodie. I passed along the platform and stepped on the Big Train going south without him.
This week I’m driving an orange tin-top hired from Penrith. Hooray, the location is back hiring cars at last after the lockdowns. The colour is easy to find in a parking lot and there’s an interesting button labelled “Sport”, somewhat useful on a dynamic road like the A6 over Shap Summit (426 m.), between Kendal and Penrith in Cumbria. This is the ancient route from London to Scotland; there’s a feeling up there of being on top of the world. The weather too was being pretty dynamic, the bitter gale driving rain showers and dramatic clouds.
Colours of Saint-Raphaël on the Côte d’Azur, just along the coast from Cannes, Antibes and Nice. These French Riviera towns were the original Mediterranean resorts, set up by the PLM railway company in the nineteenth century. The French Riviera became popular with people high and low. The towns have modernised and continue to set out an enticing resort bathed in natural light and colours which are as alluring as ever.
We knew it was coming but it’s still a shock to see the price of fuel at more than two €uros a litre, even just outside the refinery gates here inear Marseille-Provence airport. I’m told that you can easily pay far more inland.
