Le Tour 2005 - A Virtual Cultural Trip

Gourette ...



... the Col d'Aubisque ...



... and Cirque de Gourette ...



... are really worth to be mentioned on our way to Pau.

Oh! Gus' house!

Just before entering Pau, we stop for getting some ..... bottles of Jurancon.






Jurancon is a white wine appellation which may be either sweet or dry. Jurancon was one of the earliest Appellation Controllees of France and locals claim it was also the first attempt at vineyard classification. Vine varieties include Petit Manseng, Gros Manseng and the local Courbu. (Note: Jurancon is also the name of a vine variety).

The vineyards cover an area of some forty kilometres in a hilly region
(average elevation 300 meters) not far from Lourdes and Biarritz.
They consist of small parcels of vines hidden in sunny combes rising among the verdant palms and banana-trees, from the terraces of
the Château de Pau to the imposing heights of the Pyrenees.

We shouldn't forget getting something to eat, I think.

(We passed, bzw, the region where they invented the famous "Sauce Bearnaise"!)

Poulet basquaise

and Truite à la Basquaise

are highly recommended!

Recipe for 'Basque chicken' (Poulet basquaise)

Basque-Style Trout with Herbs (Truite à la Basquaise)

A lot of information about Pau can be found on their official website.

A personal remark: the first time I've been to Pau, was just two days before the Grand Prix started their - thus, my friend and I drove over the race course: it was a street race, in the town (as to be seen on the photo of this modern poster)

Château de Pau
64000 Pau
Aquitaine

A former royal residence, the château de Pau was built in the 12C, altered in the 14 by Gaston Phébus (Mint tower) and then altered into a Renaissance castle by the viscounts of Béarn. From 1838 onwards, by order of Louis-Philippe, it underwent restoration and fitting-out works in praise of King Henri IV, the regional emblematic figure. Now a national museum, the château de Pau displays wonderful collections of tapestries, sculptures and paintings.

We'll follow the Tour further on its long way towards Paris shortly

Leaving on Wednesday the Palais Beaumont and the castel in Pau behind us ...



we vross the Béarn and reach in Vic-en-Bigorre the Bigorre

The little villages with names like Trie-sur-Baïse, Castelnau-Magnoac or Boulogne-sur-Gesse




are quite pretty, but we can't stay here for longer, we make a detour to the capital of the Haute-Garonne département and Midi-Pyrénées region

Many Renaissance and 16th-17th-century buildings (built by prosperous woad [pastel] dye merchants) form one of the most splendid series in France and include the hôtels de Bernuy, du Vieux Raisin, d'Espie, and de Pierre. The Hôtel d'Assézat houses the Académie des Jeux Floraux, founded in 1323 to encourage literary talent. The Duc de Montmorency was executed (1632) in the interior courtyard of the Capitole (town hall).

Noteworthy art museums are those of Saint-Raymond, des Augustins, and Paul Dupuy. The École des Beaux-Arts is on an 18th-century riverside embankment and, nearby, the Catholic Institute occupies a 16th-century convent. The city's architecture was long characterized by rose-red brick. The most run-down portions of the old centre have been demolished and replaced by an ultra-modern commercial centre, which clashes sharply with the older architecture. To make room for the vigorous population growth of the city, a new town, named Mirail (Miracle), was constructed to the southwest of the older neighbourhood of Saint-Cyprien.

Toulouse tourist information

Saint Sulpice sur Lèze is a pretty small town on our way 'eastward'
[
IMG]http://www.tourinfos.com/collectif/r0014/d0031/m0003/photo/z042301a.jpg[/IMG]

as is Auterive


We cross our 'old friend', the canal du midi and finally reach Wednesday evening Revel, a perfect example of a bastide. (Bastides were fortified towns constructed in the south-west of France during the 100 Years' War).

Bastides were originally walled towns, centred around a market square, with the houses set in narrow streets, often to a grid layout. The bastides were fortified to protect the inhabitants from outside attack.

Bastides were founded during the Hundred Years War between England and France, mainly in South-Western France. They were new towns, mainly set up on frontier and disputed lands to establish a border and a defensive presence. People were subsidised to settle there, in a manner very similar to the kibbutz settlements in Israel.

Characteristics of bastides include:
- having a charter giving the terms under which the bastide was founded.
- built on a hilltop, a plateau or a rocky spur
fortified perimeter, often with the church either included or nearby, to serve as a keep and observation post
- rectangular grid layout
- carreyous: narrow alleys for access to backs of houses and their gardens
- andrones: narrow separating gap between houses to limit the spread of fire and enable rain and waste water disposal.
- a market square, often with a covered section: les halles
cornières: covered arcades built out of the ground floor of the houses surrounding the market square.

With some infos about Revel and its surroundings we wait for the places, the Tour will visit on Thursday.

Before, however, let's try another famous French apple tart, the Flognarde aux pommes

(A flognarde is a hot, fruit-filled batter cake made with eggs, flour, milk, and butter, and sprinkled with sugar before serving; specialty of the southwest.)



:wink:

I found this recipe for a flognarde in English - but I don't know what 'vanilla sugar' is - I presume it is regular sugar flavored with vanilla - nor do I know how much of it is in a 'bag'.


http://www.cuisine-french.com/cgi/mdc/l/en/recettes/flognarde_poires_ill.html?print=1

Bag vanilla sugar -



In France, sugar with at least 10% vanilla.

Aha, thanks, Francis. Apparently a packet contains 5 teaspoons of sugar.


Vanilla sugar - how much in packet

Sorry for the detour - but I'm interested in making flognarde, now that I've seen the photo Walter included.





edit to improve my spelling of flognarde (I think)

Ehem, of course there's not only German vanilla sugar



,,, and you can even use Vanillin sugar as well :wink:

For those in the US, Penzey's Vanilla sugar

We are following now the Tarn river - what the cyclists will do on their Thusrday's etappe - from Albi to Mende:



Albi looks a bit the little sister of Toulouse