Out & About & Apartment

It was a beautiful day on April 4 and just before the lockdown that ends on Wednesday, May 19. On that day we walked to Jardin Lecoq again to enjoy some nicer weather and get out of the apartment for a bit. Though this was a lovely day, we have had many cold days since our garden visit.With all of the blooms, it reminded us a little of the famous tulip event in The Netherlands- Keukenhof. We were in The Netherlands a few years ago and got to enjoy the event there.

Apparently this is the place to take a duck snooze! And they were even social distancing!

We've walked past this unusual tree many, many times but this is the first time we saw it with blooms. Arriving in October last year, it had already lost its leaves. It's an Empress tree or Princess tree or foxglove tree- Paulownia tomentosa. After it flowers, it sets woody seed capsules. It is native to central and western China. I have no idea why it was planted in the city.

Some tree work was done on the street. Two of the strangely trimmed trees were replaced. 

View of the trees across the street. These may be lost due to the construction.

Based on the signs, this parade/demo was in support of saving the air and the water on Earth- in support of addressing the climate crisis.

I decided I needed a couple of small moveable carts- one for the painting supplies and one for my sewing things. We needed to get the painting supplies off of the dining room table and the sewing items that needed to be readily accessible were constantly being moved from the small cutting table to the ironing board and back to the table. Anyway, we got 2 of these, one white and one black. They are exactly what was needed!

We wanted to share our funny version of a phone holder for video chatting. Our butter container forms the base, next the pencil holder gets emptied and forms the 2nd layer. On top is a salt and pepper holder with one of them removed. We keep saying we need to get a better option.

Parc Montjuvet

In mid-April, we drove to this park. It is only about 3 km from the apartment so still within the 10 km limit during our "lockdown-light". Lockdown-light meant most things were still closed but a few essentials were open. Walking outside was allowed. The weather wasn't great so there weren't a lot of people in the park. And, we were able to find a place to park!! 

This park seems large and there are lot of trees and winding paths along with many picnic tables which are probably used in nicer weather and outside of lockdowns.

The views of the city were great from up here!

The famous cathedral which we've written about in earlier blogs really stands out in the vista.

This bird is called a pie bavarde or black-billed magpie. We see these from the apartment sometimes. They are very common here.

A really large communal bird house or sculpture? 

In many spots we don't see a lot of dandelions, but we do see this small, white-flowering groundcover.

Walking towards the park entrance.

Heading down the hill to the car.

Heading back to town- Notice the cathedral in the distance.

Une Pâtisserie

We entered another lockdown on April 3. This lockdown is slightly less restrictive in that we can be 10 km away from home and during the day we don't need to fill out a form stating why we are out of the house. There is a 7 pm curfew as well. Only essential businesses are open: pharmacy, grocery, bakeries, etc. The "essential" list also includes wine shops, hair salons and a few other things you and I might not consider essential. 

We have had a request to show some photos of the items we can find in the many pastry shops around town- and I do mean many! Note also that there are separate boulangeries (bread shops) as well as combination pâtisserie and boulangerie shops. So, with that in mind, we took some photos from a fancy and expensive place: La Ruche Trianon par Thierry Constant.  THATS WHY THERE ARE C'S IN EVERY ONE.

We hadn't investigated this place until mid-March. B came home with a couple of items. Most of the things they sell are either single serve or will serve 2. They do sell some larger cake type items but even these are pretty small. They are very fancy. Even the boxes they put the little items in are fancy.

This is called Cake Pistache-Griotte. It definitely should serve 3. It has layers of pistachio biscuit/cake between layers of a sour morello cherry compote. It's covered in a pistachio laden glaze with pistachios, morello cherries and marshmallow cubes on top. The cherry compote was perfection!

This little number looks like a pear might be hidden inside. Not at all! This one is called Val d'Isere. It has a whipped cream layer, some chestnut filling, a chestnut mousse and a cookie base all layered inside of this thing covered with a piped mousse. Chestnuts are everywhere here and not just at Christmas!

We have passed by this shop a couple of times so on a few of our walks we took some photos. The first three photos were taken late on that day and the shelves were fairly empty.

There are a few larger entries ( right side) but most are 2.5-3 inches in diameter.

The shelves were much fuller in these photos. It was earlier in the day.

On another walk, we took some closeups. Here are some of the most interesting looking items. Each one is a work of culinary art.

This one has a cookie base, a red fruit compote, morello cherries and a vanilla mascarpone mousse.

This one has a Viennese chocolate biscuit base along with crunchy nuts, vanilla cream and a chocolate mousse layer.

Lemon cream, meringue with a cookie crust.

An almond biscuit, lime, purple black current cream and mascarpone mousse.

Vanilla apple compote, creamy caramel, vanilla mascarpone mousse, crumbled nuts in a sugar cookie type base.

Apple filled turnover type thing and a pistachio paste filled thing.

Light coconut cream, cooked pineapple, passion fruit, almond cookie base.

White chocolate Bavarian, coconut dacquoise, mango, passion fruit cream.

Dark chocolate ganache, sour cherries and chocolate cookie base.

Chocolate brownie, honey ganache, raspberry cream and whipped raspberry mascarpone.

Are you hungry yet?

One last note: This place is expensive so we mostly just look!

Another "Beautiful Village"- Montpeyroux

On a somewhat chilly day in late March, we wanted to stroll through another of the villages that aren't too far away. Today's choice - Montpeyroux. As with the village of Usson, visitor owned cars are not permitted in the village so you park on the outskirts.

The alleys and archways of Montpeyroux date from the 12th century. Apparently there is no mention in historical documents from the 11th century, but it was mentioned by 1212. It was named one of France's "beautiful villages" in 1989. 

Here is the enlarged village view from the above map.

The name Montpeyroux comes from "mons petrosus" which means stony mountain. The area was once famous for its noble arkose stone quarries. Arkose stone is a kind of sandstone and is ochre/sandy in color. They say it gives the houses and streets of Montpeyroux a warm tone. The arkose stone was used to build the area Romanesque churches including the Notre Dame du Port in Clermont-Ferrand. (This is a different church than the one built of volcanic black stone that we've written about previously.) Many from the village earned their livings in the quarries. The last quarry closed in 1935. There was a display of the quarry history. The last thing the quarries produced were milling stones.

Montpeyroux has a rich wine-making history as well, especially during the 19th century. However, between 1890 and 1927, wine production suffered and then WWII occurred. All of this had an impact on the population of the village. In the 1960s the village was rejuvenated as artists and craftsmen moved in. These shops were all closed during our visit. We did see one restaurant open for take-away but they didn't start serving until later in the day. The menu sounded good, however.

Some shots as we walked in the village.

Interesting door.

The archway in the distance dates to the 14th c.

Public toilets is a nice feature, though the doorway is not very tall.

The medieval keep (33 meters tall) was built during the 2nd half of the 12th century.

It had political and military importance. The keep was a fortified tower which often served as the Lord's residence but was also the last place of refuge when defending the castle. By the way, Catherine de Medici, and later her daughter Queen Margot, were both Lords of Montpeyroux. 

From the top of the tower (closed due to time of year) you have a 360 degree view of the surrounding area. In the distance you can see the Sancy Massif and the mountains of Cantal. We got a couple of nice shots from down in the village. Yep, that's snow still in the mountains. The elevation ranges from 5400-6100 ft.

An interesting plant caught my eye. It's a type of Mediterranean spurge.

The "lawn" areas were covered with this white-flowering ground cover and some tiny purple flowers.