Campers were ordered to leave three campsites as the flames fanned by strong winds came within half a mile of their tents, engulfing them in smoke and ash in the Var department of southeastern France, near Saint-Tropez.
More than 300 firefighters supported by 11 water-bombing Canadair planes took five hours to douse the blaze, which started at around 5pm on Monday.
Campers at sites in the region were mainly northern Europeans from Britain, Holland and Belgium. Regional fire chiefs said an investigation had been launched to discover what started the fire, the third major forest fire in southern France this summer.
Tuesday, 4 August 2009
Thursday, 23 July 2009
Visiting Annecy, setting for the 18th stage of the Tour de France
A French city of art and history, Annecy is known for its natural beauty, architectural heritage, and overall good living.
The capital of the Haute-Savoie department was blessed with exceptional natural surroundings—it sits on the shore of Europe’s purest lake, looks up to the Aravis and Bauges mountains, and is only a short drive away from Switzerland and Italy. The Dukes of Savoie-Nemours made a wise choice in making Annecy their capital in the 15th century.
It remained the capital of Savoie until 1860, when the kingdom lost its independence to become French. Even today, 150 years later, a handful of harmless rebels whisper for independence every now and then!
Today, some of Annecy’s most characteristic monuments bear the mark of a long and complex history. The Palais de l’Ile, also known as the old prison, is surprisingly said to be France’s most photographed monument, even beating out the Eiffel Tower. After having served as a French prison, a mint, princely demure, wedding gift, court house, and insane asylum, the palace today houses a museum retracing Annecy’s architectural history.
Unbelievably, little is known about the origins of the chateau that guards the old city. As it sits at the coveted crossroads of the ancient paths to Italy and Switzerland, sieges and fires mark its history. Ownership changed hands more often than the ball at a Harlem Globtrotters game. Finally, the city of Annecy bought it in 1953 and turned it into a showroom for museum pieces from around the greater Annecy area.
Annecy cannot be called anything but cute and quaint. Try as hard as you might, one of the old worn out descriptions is bound to pop up. Annecy could be at the origin of these cliché descriptions, because that’s just what it is–charmingly cute.
Its canals lined with geranium-blasted balconies, brightly colored facades, and arched stone walkways have earned it the nickname “the Venice of the Alps.” But the city offers enough that it doesn’t even need a nickname. Just “Annecy” is good enough.
The capital of the Haute-Savoie department was blessed with exceptional natural surroundings—it sits on the shore of Europe’s purest lake, looks up to the Aravis and Bauges mountains, and is only a short drive away from Switzerland and Italy. The Dukes of Savoie-Nemours made a wise choice in making Annecy their capital in the 15th century.
It remained the capital of Savoie until 1860, when the kingdom lost its independence to become French. Even today, 150 years later, a handful of harmless rebels whisper for independence every now and then!
Today, some of Annecy’s most characteristic monuments bear the mark of a long and complex history. The Palais de l’Ile, also known as the old prison, is surprisingly said to be France’s most photographed monument, even beating out the Eiffel Tower. After having served as a French prison, a mint, princely demure, wedding gift, court house, and insane asylum, the palace today houses a museum retracing Annecy’s architectural history.
Unbelievably, little is known about the origins of the chateau that guards the old city. As it sits at the coveted crossroads of the ancient paths to Italy and Switzerland, sieges and fires mark its history. Ownership changed hands more often than the ball at a Harlem Globtrotters game. Finally, the city of Annecy bought it in 1953 and turned it into a showroom for museum pieces from around the greater Annecy area.
Annecy cannot be called anything but cute and quaint. Try as hard as you might, one of the old worn out descriptions is bound to pop up. Annecy could be at the origin of these cliché descriptions, because that’s just what it is–charmingly cute.
Its canals lined with geranium-blasted balconies, brightly colored facades, and arched stone walkways have earned it the nickname “the Venice of the Alps.” But the city offers enough that it doesn’t even need a nickname. Just “Annecy” is good enough.
Thursday, 16 July 2009
Jersey-France tunnel plan talks
Tunnelling to France
The idea of link to France is being discussed again, but this time a tunnel is being proposed.
There has been talk in the past about a bridge to France, and even the project engineer behind the Malmo Bridge between Denmark and Sweden has been to Jersey to talk about something similar here.
While that may seem like pie in the sky to some, there are others who feel a tunnel might be the answer.
Talks have started to see if there’s interest across the water in France.
The Assistant Minister for Planning and Environment, Deputy Rob Duhamel, was featured in the French newspaper Ouest-France recently and he is championing the idea. But are we looking at a tunnel or a bridge? Well, maybe both, according to Deputy Duhamel.
The idea of link to France is being discussed again, but this time a tunnel is being proposed.
There has been talk in the past about a bridge to France, and even the project engineer behind the Malmo Bridge between Denmark and Sweden has been to Jersey to talk about something similar here.
While that may seem like pie in the sky to some, there are others who feel a tunnel might be the answer.
Talks have started to see if there’s interest across the water in France.
The Assistant Minister for Planning and Environment, Deputy Rob Duhamel, was featured in the French newspaper Ouest-France recently and he is championing the idea. But are we looking at a tunnel or a bridge? Well, maybe both, according to Deputy Duhamel.
Wednesday, 13 May 2009
Major French Wine Regions
Bit of geography lesson today. One of the predominant reasons that France has the good fortune to be so good at producing fine wines is her geography and geology. This is a country which has many large regions which are blessed with a nice balance between not too much heat and too little and too much rain and too little. In part this is probably why France is also such a popular place to visit.
The result is that French grapes are given time to achieve their best and once it comes to vintage time most of the major wine areas of France are sufficiently cool to allow the wines to ferment in a controlled but natural way without the need to resort to artificial techniques that are more common in regions such as Spain and the USA.
So where are the main wine regions of France? The answer is thus:
Bordeaux (South West of France just off the coast)
Loire Valley ( A huge area for wine in France stretching from Nantes on the west coast to
Orleans and Bourges in the middle of the country and as far south as St Etienne )
Champagne ( A smallish region to the east of Paris including Reims and Epernay)
Lorraine ( Another small region on the French German border around Metz )
Alsace ( Just south of Lorraine and further to the east )
Jura ( Again a small region in the east of the country near the Swiss border and directly above Savoie )
Burgundy
Savoie and Bugey ( One of my personal favourites due to my love of the French Alps and my passion for skiing. In my opinion there’s nothing better in this world than the sun of your face high in the mountains with a glass of wine in hand )
Rhone Valley ( South East of the country around Orange, Avignon and Valence )
Provence ( Here we are around Nice, Marseille, St Tropez and Toulon on the South East coast of france and the surrounding hills.)
Corsica
Languedoc-Roussillon ( To the west of Provence on the south coast )
South West ( This is actually a really big region which sits between the Spanish border in the south, Bordeaux and the Loire Valley to the north and the Rhone Valley and Languedoc-Roussillon to the east. )
Till next time…
The result is that French grapes are given time to achieve their best and once it comes to vintage time most of the major wine areas of France are sufficiently cool to allow the wines to ferment in a controlled but natural way without the need to resort to artificial techniques that are more common in regions such as Spain and the USA.
So where are the main wine regions of France? The answer is thus:
Bordeaux (South West of France just off the coast)
Loire Valley ( A huge area for wine in France stretching from Nantes on the west coast to
Orleans and Bourges in the middle of the country and as far south as St Etienne )
Champagne ( A smallish region to the east of Paris including Reims and Epernay)
Lorraine ( Another small region on the French German border around Metz )
Alsace ( Just south of Lorraine and further to the east )
Jura ( Again a small region in the east of the country near the Swiss border and directly above Savoie )
Burgundy
Savoie and Bugey ( One of my personal favourites due to my love of the French Alps and my passion for skiing. In my opinion there’s nothing better in this world than the sun of your face high in the mountains with a glass of wine in hand )
Rhone Valley ( South East of the country around Orange, Avignon and Valence )
Provence ( Here we are around Nice, Marseille, St Tropez and Toulon on the South East coast of france and the surrounding hills.)
Corsica
Languedoc-Roussillon ( To the west of Provence on the south coast )
South West ( This is actually a really big region which sits between the Spanish border in the south, Bordeaux and the Loire Valley to the north and the Rhone Valley and Languedoc-Roussillon to the east. )
Till next time…
Wednesday, 25 February 2009
Paris - The Eiffel Tower
An engineer by training, Eiffel founded and developed a company specializing in metal structural work, whose crowning achievement was the Eiffel Tower. He devoted the last thirty years of his life to his experimental research.
Born in Dijon in 1832, he graduated from the Ecole Centrale des Arts et Manufactures in 1855, the same year that Paris hosted the first world’s Fair. He spent several years in the South West of France, where he supervized work on the great railway bridge in Bordeaux, and afterwards he set up in his own right in 1864 as a “constructor”, that is, as a business specializing in metal structural work.
His outstanding career as a constructor was marked by work on the Porto viaduct over the river Douro in 1876, the Garabit viaduct in 1884, Pest railway station in Hungary, the dome of the Nice observatory, and the ingenious structure of the Statue of Liberty. It culminated in 1889 with the Eiffel Tower.
After the end of his career in business, marred by the failure of the Panama Canal, Eiffel began an active life of scientific experimental research in the fields of meteorology, radiotelegraphy and aerodynamics. He died on December 27 1923.
Eiffel built hundreds of metal structures of all kinds, all around the world. Bridges, and in particular railway bridges, were his favourite field of work, but he also won renown for his metal structural work and industrial installations.
His career was marked by a large number of fine buildings, among which two of the most outstanding are the twin edifices of the Porto viaduct and the Garabit viaduct in the Cantal region of France.
Equally outstanding are certain other structures in which the pure inventiveness of Eiffel’s company was allowed free rein, such as the “portable” bridges sold around the world in “kits”, the ingenious structure of the Statue of Liberty in New York, and of course the Eiffel Tower itself.
Born in Dijon in 1832, he graduated from the Ecole Centrale des Arts et Manufactures in 1855, the same year that Paris hosted the first world’s Fair. He spent several years in the South West of France, where he supervized work on the great railway bridge in Bordeaux, and afterwards he set up in his own right in 1864 as a “constructor”, that is, as a business specializing in metal structural work.
His outstanding career as a constructor was marked by work on the Porto viaduct over the river Douro in 1876, the Garabit viaduct in 1884, Pest railway station in Hungary, the dome of the Nice observatory, and the ingenious structure of the Statue of Liberty. It culminated in 1889 with the Eiffel Tower.
After the end of his career in business, marred by the failure of the Panama Canal, Eiffel began an active life of scientific experimental research in the fields of meteorology, radiotelegraphy and aerodynamics. He died on December 27 1923.
Eiffel built hundreds of metal structures of all kinds, all around the world. Bridges, and in particular railway bridges, were his favourite field of work, but he also won renown for his metal structural work and industrial installations.
His career was marked by a large number of fine buildings, among which two of the most outstanding are the twin edifices of the Porto viaduct and the Garabit viaduct in the Cantal region of France.
Equally outstanding are certain other structures in which the pure inventiveness of Eiffel’s company was allowed free rein, such as the “portable” bridges sold around the world in “kits”, the ingenious structure of the Statue of Liberty in New York, and of course the Eiffel Tower itself.
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