Sunday, April 25, 2010

Sunday, April 25, 2010: Food, Glorious Food, What an Amazing Market


















(Dieter) After a fantastic night's sleep for all of us, a quick snack since we have limited food, and Sandra's planning as to events for the day, we venture out to the market. What an experience! A huge parking lot along the Loire River converted into hundreds of little stalls for vendors selling their wares of cheeses, sausages, wine (and sampling :) ), clothes, furniture, outdoor equipment, hair cutting and hair-dressing items, flowers, plants, ... and of course, ready-to-eat food. There were huge vans with built in rotissieries, with hundreds of chickens and rabbits turning on spits over propane fueled fires, dripping with fat. Fresh potatoes lay on trays below absorbing all the fat drippings, carmelizing in the heat. There were huge vats of rice and pala and all possible types of fresh fish and seafood cooking. The smells were unbelievable. We just could not rush through this experience. We started at shortly after 1000 and finished by 1300. The wine sampling was a little too much as we had virtually no breakfast and a fresh market picnic lunch was the goal at 1400 upon our return to our little cottage. Karannina and Sandra enjoyed trying and buying clothes, Alexander found a beret that seems to hide his boyhood while bring out the young man in his face, I found some wonderful wine and fresh fish, and together we found the fixings for a week of picnics. Alexander and Karannina successfully communicated to many vendors in French and Sandra and I found satisfaction in their accomplishments and I was very impressed with Sandra's attempts to communicate in French, with her natural hand gestures, exemplifying the various items she was requesting. Once back, Sandra arranged all our newly acquired treasures and captured them in pics for memorialization, as we reflect on our trip in the future. At our kitchen table, the picnic began. The freshly roasted chicken was amazing with the red wine, fresh tomatoes, newly made pesto, olives, and fresh breads. The afternoon and evening were used as times to reflect, relax, and reguevenate our beings as we had been on the go for the last week and were in desparate need of self-time. Karannina escaped in an Australia magazine "Good Ideas", Sandra in a British Reader's Digest, Alexander being a true scientist - removing the stamin from old tulips to discover their colouring qualities on paper and in small bowls of water, while I found pleasure in a long nap in the attic room of our cottage, smelling the westeria and hearing the song birds outside of my bedroom window as I drifted in and out of sleep.

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