Saint Fulcran’s festival

I’ve written about St Fulcran’s festival before . It’s a mixture of religious and secular events. The picture above shows his relics being taken in procession around town on the Sunday morning.

The Pastaires and Tastaires were out in force.

St Fulcran was the Bishop of Lodève in the 10th century and has a cathedral dedicated to him.
As well as the Sunday procession, there is a procession with majorettes on the Saturday evening.


The majorettes performed some interesting dances.

On the Friday evening a band played on the stand on the tree in SuperU car park. This seemed like a good use for the stand: we had wondered why it was there. The white thing you can see up there is the Easter Bunny, which replaced Santa and his reindeer.

The festival has continued with a flea market and a flower market. The fair has been open all week. On Saturday there will be a firework display.

Oysters at Lodeve market

As ever the Saturday morning market calls. Fortunately it’s not raining as it was last week. A quick tour of the stalls (local strawberries, asparagus, broad beans – you know the sort of thing) and it’s time for the local tradition of a pichet of white wine at the Bar des Halles, with oysters from the oyster stall just outside.

All the usual people come and go at the café; a chance to have one of those long philosophical discussions with Paul, fuelled by more wine and a second dozen oysters. At 2 pm the tables are cleared away and the cleaning van comes round – goodbye until next week.

More Lodeve night life

Now that Summer is here Lodève becomes a different place, the cafés and restaurants full of people, the Petit Sommelier taking up more and more of the Place de la République. So night life means a lot more than the occasional events such as processions for St Fulcran which I’ve written about before.
A new initiative this year is the Nocturnes de Lodève on Tuesday evenings; the art gallery is open until 10 pm, the Marché du Terroir continues until late. For the first of the Nocturnes we went to Le Minuscule. It’s nearly 3 years since Gisela opened her café. I went there not long after it first opened and have been going there from time to time ever since. The star of the evening was Jeanne Santos, a Minuscule regular who had just returned to Lodève. Unfortunately I couldn’t get my camera to work for her and only managed a picture of an accordionist who passed by when Jeanne had finished. His rendition of Auld Lang Syne was not appreciated. Gisela has a programme for the rest of the summer; unfortunately I won’t be there.

Of course Lodève is very busy at the moment with the poetry festival, but as usual for July I’m in the UK.

Sunny parking lot

A long overdue blog post. I’ve been travelling again – Berlin this time – but here I am back in France for a 3 week break before the renters arrive.
When I last wrote about parking lots I wasn’t very happy about them taking over the countryside. However I have to say I approve of this one. It’s the Intermarché supermarket car park, a 5 minute drive from Lodève on the A75. Our neighbours told us about Intermarché’s reduced price produce at Christmas, and I’ve picked up some good bargains. The shop still isn’t very busy and another advantage of going there is to see the view from the car park. You step out of the car and feel the freshness of the air around you. I’m not sure how busy it will be in the summer when the tourists arrive. At least it will provide an alternative to the checkout queues at SuperU.

Harley Davidson bikers in Lodeve

I always find it surprising how many things go on in Lodève. We thought it was a sleepy little town when we had our house built 6 years ago. Last year I was surprised to find a procession of Harley Davidson motor bikes roaring round the Lodève streets, cheered on by the locals. This year we didn’t want to miss the ceremony and arrived in plenty of time on a sunny Sunday morning. First of all we wandered round the stalls set up for the event. On the left you can see what the well dressed lady biker should be wearing.
We admired some of the bikes (Triumphs as well; sorry – I’m not a motor bike expert), watched the band march in, and found a shady spot from which to watch the procession. At last at 12.00 (it should have been 11.30, but that’s France for you) the bikers appeared. They are an international group who meet up at Agde each year. It has become popular for them to drive to Lodève for a Sunday day out.

To find out how the French pronounce “Harley Davidson”, look at this 1968 video of Brigitte Bardot. The bikers are known as “Les Brescadous”
CORRECTION – it’s “Brescoudos” – sorry!
Web site is www.brescoudos.com

Summer in Lodeve

It’s high summer n Lodève now, and the Poetry Festival is in full swing. I’m not there unfortunately, but I‘ve read about it in Midi Libre . A favourite site for keeping cool during the Festival has for several years been by the Soulondre river; events are held there – you can sit with your feet in the water – and you can buy food and local produce from a range of stalls. People sit around until early in the morning enjoying the cool night air. Then when it’s breakfast time you’ll find them at the cafes around Lodève enjoying a coffee before the next day’s events begin.

We were in Lodève at the beginning of July. As the temperature climbed above 30 degrees life slowed down. Our neighbours adopt the Spanish lifestyle for the summer, having a siesta from 1 until 4 pm, and their evening meal about 9.00. This is a very good idea but not always easy for the British to get used to. It was lively in Lodève. The cafes were busy, and the tourists were out in force. At le Petit Sommelier the tables are beginning to spread across the square, but don’t extend as far as they will in the high season. We go for lunch at Pizzeria di Maori. We sit outside under an awning. They have an interesting cooling system which sends out fine sprays of water from overhead pipes at regular intervals. It’s a family owned restaurant – the grandchildren do the serving. You can have pizza, a salad, a grill or other things such as moules frites – something for everyone in fact, including the vegetarians.
We have to leave Lodève just before the 14 July celebrations. This is the time of year when I have to give up the house for the summer. I really don’t want to, but then I realise that we rely on our rental income to maintain the property, so with a sigh I give in. It’s always a last minute panic tidying up the house and trying to find a home for everything, especially when you’ve had all winter to scatter things around. Luckily the mas is a good dumping ground for all the odd things which we need to put away. When we’re back at the end of August the weather should be slightly cooler – and soon we will be able to spend our summers in Lodève!

Lodeve night life

I may have given the impression that Lodève is a sleepy place where nothing happens. Not so; there are many musical events, of which more later, and May is very busy with the Feast of St Fulcran. St Fulcran was the bishop of Lodève in the 10th century and has a cathedral named after him. His feast day occasioned a range of celebrations including a fair, a Saturday evening secular procession (left) and a Sunday morning religious procession (below) where his relics are taken round the town.

On Sunday all the local small businesses had stands on the streets, including the organic shop who was offering free wine and my friend Rachel, who wrote the book the Fast guide to Lodève, promoting her husband’s glassware. Other attractions included a snail stall and a buvette run by La House Café. Later in the week there was a large vide grenier (flea market) in the streets of Lodève.
And of course there was the fair with the dodgems and all the usual attractions, siphoning off all the teenagers’ money (or rather, as I understand it, their parents’ money).

The cultural activities continue, with a Bonnard exhibition at the art gallery for the summer and of course the Voix de la Mediterranée poetry festival in July. This year Jane Birkin will be there.