On relache days, we relaxed and dined quietly, either by ourselves
or with Kate and Sebastien, on the usual pates and leftovers including
the thus better eggplant in garlic sauce. Letitia had gone off
somewhere and picked up Tomme de Savoie, not-so-vieux Vieux Cantal,
both good but very mild, and a goat cheese that I didn't try. Also
several kinds of dry salami-style sausages that were not particularly
notable. We contributed various vins ordinaires from box and bottle.
One one I had high hopes for that didn't come through was a white
Bergerac from Cadet du Bouscarel, which was rather wimpy despite having
won a gold medal in the Wines of the Southwest of France competition.
The ordinary no-name from a jug for E2 less a bottle was better.

And did tourist things.

Apparently the market at Villebois-Lavallette, another formerly
utilitarian tradespeople's gathering in another nowhere town in the
middle of the fields, now as with many of these other places has been reimagined by a new factor or seigneur or something with high hopes
and ambitions. Here the new attraction is an oyster seller, who has
always been here but now sells retail, so the fashionable middle class
comes down and feasts, as we did, on excellent oysters (we're talking
2 hours' drive from where they grow them) and decent cheap wine. There
was noplace left to sit in the crowded little market hall, so we
stood at a rail and consumed fines de claires up the wazoo; these were
briny like east coast oysters but with that melon aspect of west
coasters; confusing. Letitia went down to the local bistro and picked
up a carafe of local wine (probably also a Bergerac, but nicer than
the fancy stuff in a bottle) that went well.

I noticed a couple of flutists playing out of a fake book (nobody else
did, strangely, being focused perhaps on the main quest and having the regrettable habit of tuning out background music)) at the edge of the
market. It turns out they were a father and daughter who had attended
the concert in Rauzet, so we had a good chat and I emptied my change
purse into the daughter's hat (on gigs like this you get a stipend
from the tourist office but are welcome to solicit tips).

Les grottes d'Argentine are hidden behind a church (St. Martin's?,
anyway, the guy who tore his cloak in two and gave half to a beggar on
the street) and were used as human habitation since the stone age up
until the German occupation, when they were used by the Resistance. Interesting and mostly unspoiled, modernized only by some rickety
stairs and a pipe railing meant to keep people from falling over a
cliff. Bonnie and Kate were less intrepid than Letitia and me, so we
went exploring into some funerary chambers and stuff, where most of
the (sparse) sightseers don't go.

At some point we washed off our dust with a swim at some guy's
chateau called Lasfonds - Kate and Sebastien know the owner and more importantly, the caretaker.

On the evening between concerts the cloisters hosted a dog-training
session held by the European dog-dancing champion (not kidding). I was
not vitally interested, but while I was minding my own business in the
barn some guy told me in French to come watch, and I ignored him,
whereupon he told me again. more urgently, in English. Turned out he
was the Dutch husband-to-be of the European dog-dancing champion, and
very protective of her enterprise. I was still not very interested and couldn't see anyway, as it was twilight.

At some other point we were invited by Anne, owner of the Abbaye de
Grosbot ou Fontaine-Vive for a meet the musicians party, where I felt
kind of out of place. She served Charlemagne bubbly, which was okay
minus, and neat little canapes of salmon upon cucumber. Some admirer of Letitia's had also brought a bottle of Rosenhof Cremant d'Alsace, which
after half a glass or so I decided would be better off Kir-ized. The
abbey is a giant facility in the middle of nowhere, and she's trying to
make a tourist attraction of it, and I wish her all good luck, because
as it's a site of substantial historical value, it's in the middle of
heaven only knows where.

Saturday was pizza at la Detente, Rougnac, where the food was decent
but completely underseasoned, not enough tomato, and almost no oregano
or garlic. We got a margherita, okay but skimpy on the basil; a veggie,
no report available; and what passes in these parts for a meat-lovers,
which was essentially a big open-faced salami cheese sandwich, there
being not enough tomato and not enough spice.
--- Platinum Xpress/Win/WINServer v3.0pr5
* Origin: Fido Since 1991 | QWK by Web | BBS.FIDOSYSOP.ORG (1:123/140)