Pyrenees and pilgrims

I have a photo of myself aged 21 walking down a station platform in Irun in mid-winter (in standard jeans, parka and backpack of Eurail student) taken by the boyfriend I was travelling with from Lisbon to London (the trip a birthday present from my parents) - my expression reflecting some dismaying news about non-arriving trains at the same time as a clear delight at the adventure we were having - and in the background is a wall covered in colourful graffiti, proclaiming Basque separatist ideology (those were radical times for the ETA). The political stuff was interesting  enough, but that weird language intrigued me just as much. I knew back then that it has no modern language relatives and its origins are a linguistic enigma. 

which is why on this trip I was compulsively snapping signs in Basque on the drive out of Pamplona towards the Pyrenees and France. 

We were firmly back in Camino territory and the road was dotted with pilgrims heading in the opposite direction towards Compostela. Several sections of the route are on motorways (not much fun for walkers?), so pilgrims take detours through the forest and mountain paths whenever they can.

Pretty soon we were climbing high into the Pyrenees, where Hannibal marched with his elephants en route to the Alps and Italy.

First stop was Roncesvalles, where Roland famously blew his horn in vain according to legend, defending Charlemagne against the Basques.

Memorials to Roland in the centre of Roncesvalles

The views are just stunning in these mountains, and just as beautiful in summer as I remembered them under deep snow from my winter train trip at 21 and from childhood journeys en route to skiing. But on these narrow winding roads there are very few places where one can safely stop to photograph all this beauty

At some point one crosses the border imperceptibly, the only indication being that the language of road signs becomes French.

And we wind down to the pretty town of St Jean Pied de Port.

This is the starting point for many Camino walkers and shops do a roaring trade in kitting them out for this now highly commercialised walk. Sitting across the road from this place I watched many a hopeful pilgrim walking out with bulging bags containing the full kit ...

while the baguette and French beer suddenly assumed a significance, marking our exit from the Iberian peninsula to this side of the Pyrenees and the end of our trip.

That evening in Saint Front de Pradoux, near Bergerac, there was a pool to take the edge off the heat, a friendly house labrador, and dinner in a garden where the sun set after 10, before the long drive the next day of 1000 kms back to London.

 Pyrenees, Spain and France, June 2015
Day 13-14, Iberian road trip

From London to ...

Driving for the better part of a day along motorways across a large chunk of France doesn't really prepare you for the different world you encounter when you turn off the national road in the late afternoon near Bordeaux

into the village of Bouliac in the south west corner of France, the Aquitaine

for the warmth and colours of the south

and slow village life

Surrounded by vineyards - the Aquitaine is really a giant vineyard, home to the wines of Bordeaux, Médoc, Saint Emilion, Bergerac ...

and here in Bouliac, Le St James is so well worth a visit, if only for a brief lounge at the pool-in-the-vineyards, or a drink or dinner on the terrace

Le St James was designed by none other than Jean Nouvel (I've posted on his amazing buildings here, here and here; and see also here for his latest NewYork adventure) to draw the gorgeous natural surroundings in.

At sunset there were views over vineyards and the Garonne river, with Bordeaux in the distance

Bouliac, France June 2015
day 1, Iberian road trip

Sailing in the clouds: Louis Vuitton, Paris

Curiosity took me recently to the suburbs of Paris to see Frank Gehry's extravagant construction for France's richest man, Louis Vuitton owner Bernard Arnault. 
The Fondation Louis Vuitton is designed as a cultural centre to house Arnault's collection of modern and contemporary art, borrowed works for exhibitions, and a concert hall.

On the edge of the Bois de Boulogne in the 16th arrondissement, it's designed as a vast sailing ship, intended to appear as if floating, suspended, above the ground.

To create the ship effect, beneath it is a sort of sunken, artificial lake, with water cascading towards it. 

Above, twelve enormous glass 'sails' are draped in curving, billowing shapes. 
It's impossible to get the whole building in camera view from the ground, but a side view gives some idea of the scale.

The effect is spectacular, certainly, and gets more so the higher you ascend to the roof top.

But the sails, and the crazy amount of timber and steel columns, beams, struts and props needed to support the illusion of weightless sails from afar, actually do rather block the views and potential connections with the surroundings.

Inside there's a ground floor restaurant with giant suspended sculpted fish, another of Gehry's favourite forms 

and impressive gallery spaces.

Not everyone is enthusiastic about the place though. Critics have called it a 'crazed indulgence of over-engineering' in which the overwhelming effect is of a building with lots and lots of empty, functionless space. 

And local residents protested vigorously against its construction, on the grounds that it broke multiple laws intended to preserve the character of the Bois. But, proof that money talks, their objections were overruled when a special law was passed in the Assemblée Nationale declaring that it must go ahead as a 'major work of art for the whole world'. 

Whatever you think of it, it's worth a visit for the building alone, and now to see a major exhibition of Modernists - Les Clefs d'une Passion (here).

Road trip

When the journey is at least as much the point as the destination, when you can see three countries in one day, isn't a road trip just the best?

France: misty dawn at 6.30 am on the road from Épernay, leaving the capitale du champagne's vineyards behind and heading north-east into Alsace-Lorraine.

Via Nancy and Metz, the road climbs into the mountains of the Vosges, before we turn south before Strasbourg, through historically German territory, hugging the German border.

Crossing the border at Basel, we're in Switzerland and suddenly it's a different territory altogether: neat A-framed houses and the cleanest cows you'll ever see, dotted against the greenest meadows. They seem to polish the grass here and line up the trees in tidy rows. Ordnung muss sein.

Spotless, efficient motorways bisect picture postcard scenes of mountains and lakes.

No winding detours here - wide, well-lit tunnels cut straight under the mountains. (A road tax demanded at the Swiss border ensures you pay for the privilege of using, and maintaining, these beautiful roads). 
The Gotthard tunnel is 17 kms long, making it the third longest in the world. Boring directly through the Gotthard mountain, it gets you from central Switzerland to within a whisker of Milan in 15 minutes.

And before you know it, you're in Italy ...

... and marvelling again at how striking the difference can be from the moment of crossing a border - from the gently chaotic infrastructure to the faded romantic houses clustered haphazardly on winding roads.

Late afternoon there's a haze on Lake Como and the day's driving is over.

Time for a campari maybe, with a view over the lake 

Resident kitten, lake views and Italian design at Villa Nina B&B, Carate Urio, Lago di Como

Ristorante La Baia, Moltrasio, Lago di Como