“It feels good to be on the road again,” muttered Francine as we drove out of Maussane-les-Alpilles.

We’ve done something rather out of character for us on our nest stop and it’s proved quite interesting. We’ve returned to an area of the Languedoc that we are familiar with but to a different campsite. We are near Montagnac, at Loupian this time, to be precise. The site we’ve chosen is one of the classic French Camping Municipale sites. Or, at least, it used to be.

Some years ago, when we were camping in the same area but camped at our then usual site, I cycled to this municipale site in Loupian just to have a nose around. There were a few units on site, which were, as far as I could tell, almost all French. There was a very french “clack” of boules drifting over the fence from a game of petanque in progress. To be frank, the site seemed at first glance to be a little rough and ready but very French.

So, here we are several years later and, horror of horrors, this erstwhile classic French Camping Municipale site is still a Camping Municipale but has been enrolled into the ever-expanding Dutch ACSI camping organization. I’ve been leery of ACSI for a while, for this reason: I suspected it would attract swarms of Dutch deal-seekers (ACSI members get an out-of-season discount) and sites that would otherwise have been quiet out of season would become very busy. We’ve pitched up in early June, decidedly out of season, and this time round the site was aproaching full. An English neighbour, who seems to stay here for about a month at a time, told us that last night it was full. That’s the ACSI effect for you and it’s exactly what I was afraid of. This site is really the first evidence I’ve actually seen of my fear. The site is fine but the ACSI effect makes it feel more like camping in August at the height of the season.

This site already feels considerably more friendly than did our last site at Maussane-les-Alpilles, which could best be described as impersonal. (It took me a long time to come up with that word but it’s perfect.) We are amongst tall conifers giving shade from the sun for most of the day and the conifers are full of Serins “spraying” us with their song. Serins deliver 3-4 seconds worth of immeasurably short, varying notes in what can only be described as a frenetic stream. Here’s one giving us a few seconds worth. They look a bit like Canaries and may be related but their song is quite different.

Having been Serin-aded over lunch, we cycled just a couple of miles down a conveniently adjacent voie verte [green way], an erstwhile railway track now tarmac covered serving as a cycle track between Mèze and Bouzigues. We headed for Mèze to stare at its idyllic looking harbour which issues onto the Basin-de-Thau, through which runs the Canal du Midi.

“What a place to park a boat”, we mused, as we sat and munched a salted caramel ice cream.

We had a lazy day putzing around Maussane, today. We began by putzing into town to do some shopping where we found a wonderful shop selling all manner of produce from Les Alpilles. I love the way the French are intensely proud of their local regions and the products from them.

There are three or four restaurants/cafes with shaded seating in te square outside the church and on our shopping putz, I noticed a waiter crossing the street (from the restaurant itself to the outside seating area on the opposite side of the road) armed with a circular metal frame of the sort used to support a Plateau de Fruits de Mer. Sure enough, this restaurant’s menu offered a Plateau de Fruits de Mer with crab, prawns whelks, clams mussels and three different types of oyster. We putzed back to Guillaume and then immediately putzed back to the restaurant to indulge ourselves with a posh Saturday lunch assisted by a Ricard and some local white wine.

As we were munching various morsels of seafood from various shells, Francine suggested that, in the afternoon, I might try to find her “a wren”. At least, that’s what it sounded like. I was confused – we’ve seen lots of birds but no wrens. All became clear when she explained that there were signs advertising a course of taureaux jeunes at 3:30 PM at the arènes. Not knowing quite what to expect, after snoozing off a splendid lunch, we putzed back down and found Francine her arènes.

For €3 each, what we got was a hard concrete step from which to watch Une Course Camarguaise, a bull fight French style. Last August in Spain, we’d been less than impressed by watching a bunch of testosterone-enriched teenagers taunt some Spanish black bulls. This French version of playing with bulls seemed a much more acceptable affair. The first official task was to introduce les raseteurs [fit young men with a good turn of speed] to the modest crowd.

Getting the excitement underway, the first bull is let into the arènes, it’s head adorned with various trophies: a cocarde [rosette? between its horns],two glands [tassles? at the base of its horns] and two ficelles [strings – tying the tassles to its horns, I think]. Assisted by a tourneur [bull provoker], the raseteurs [fit young men with a good turn of speed] take turns attempting to run a glancing course in front of the now charging bull and snatch one of the trophies from the bull’s head. After their run, the fit young men leap athletically over the barricade to nominal safety. Successfully grabbing a trophy wins the raseteur some money. The trick, or course, is to avoid becoming another trophy on the bull’s head yourself.

I said they leap to nominal safety over the barricade because, quite frequently, the bull also decides to leap over the barricade, somewhat less athletically than the fit young men, and proceeds to run round the perimeter. It’s as if the bull knows where the raseteurs are hiding. Suddenly, the arènes becomes the area of safety until, that is, the bull is guided back inside.

Each bull – there were eight – gets to chase raseteurs for up to 15 minutes, depending upon how long its trophies last. After the first four bulls, we got a beer break for the blood to return to our backsides.

This was quite entertaining and an unusual new spectacle for us. One poor bull seemed to bite its own tongue and draw blood, probably jumping the barricade, but that appeared to be the extent of any injuries. The bulls ranged between 4- and 9-years old.

Now, here’s an object lesson in how to put an old, disused bauxite mine to good use – in the unlikely event that you happen to have a suitable old, disused bauxite mine lurking about, of course.

As it happens, there are a few old, disused bauxite mines in the so-called val d’infer [hell’s valley] just below Les Baux de Provence. From these mines, huge blocks were cut and processed for the bauxite, whatever that might be. 🙂 What was left behind was a series of vast caverns with near flat, light coloured walls such as those in this picture.

Being fans of the son et lumières [sound and light] entertainment form, the French came up with a spectacular ways to put these caverns to good use. The light coloured, near flat, massive walls make a natural series of projection screens. Accompanied by music, multiple projectors cover the walls with projected art works and moving pictures. We witnessed version 1.0 of this entertainment form some years ago, Cathédrale des Images, a Pablo Picasso display. That spectacle, regrettably, was shut down because of some modern health and safety nonsense. Fortunately, version 2.0, Carrières de Lumières, has now opened and we went along to see the “Klimt et Vienne” [Klimt and Vienna – whoever Klimt was] show.

I have to say that Version 2.0 outshone Version 1.0 [pun intended]. Clearly Herr Klimt was some artist – I’m a self-confessed artistic numbskull so how would I know. Klimt images were interleaved with scenes of Vienna accompanied by suitably chosen music. I even came out humming some. I felt I needed Chief Inspector Morse to tell me what operatic creation I had been listening to.

Having seen the blank walls of the bauxite cavern above, my inadequate vocabulary cannot possibly describe the transformation made by the myriad projectors so here’s a few images which will hopefully do the job. Do take note of the people in the images to get a true sense of scale.

I am not easily impressed but this place and entertainment form impresses me. This is worth a detour to see. This is somewhere we would always go almost whatever is on. The spectacle is simply breath-taking.

We needed an impressive dinner to follow that and the local Spar supermarket happened to be selling some faux-fillet [sirloin steak] of taureau de Camargue [Camargue bull]. My count of tasty instances of beef in France is now three. Tasty it was, though it had obviously been running around a little and was not the tenderest of steaks in the world. Still, it was a bull. [Note the patriotic table cloth for the 70th anniversary of D-Day.]

On to my main interest for wanting to be in this area at this time of year: the Peau de Meau.

As an amateur odonatologist, the Peau de Meau is irresistible. It is a part of the larger area known as Le Plain de la Crau. It is pan flat and, at first sight at least, looks like a baked, desolate landscape with little in the way of life. When it comes to dragonflies, however, nothing could be further from the truth. It is one of the premier dragonfly sites in Europe. A fellow enthusiast claims to have seen close to 50 species there. To put that in context, there are 40-odd species in the whole of the UK. We have visited once in September (and not got anywhere near 50) but I was keen to see what a spring visit would add. Today looked like good conditions, sunny and with little wind, so we packed lunch and called in to St-Martin-de-Crau to buy our €3 permits to visit.

Here’s the view that greets you as you drive in through the entrance of the Peau de Meau, the car park being on the immediate right. Dragonflies, here? Nah, surely not!

Actually, the first thing we saw was a large raptor, yet to be identified [who forgot to pack the bird book, then?] so something else thought there was life here to be hunted, too. It may be a Booted Eagle; they tend to eat snakes and lizards which would probably be in this sort of environment.

The dragonfly habitat is a small stream that runs along the northern border of the area and that you cross as you drive in. One might easily miss it. Assuming that you don’t, here you quickly see fluttering Demoiselles, both the more mundane Banded demoiselles but also the captivating Copper Demoiselles that you have to come this far south to see.

On this visit, one good addition was this Blue-eyed Hooktail (Onychogomphus uncatus) with the fearsome looking anal appendages. Just imagine a sexual encounter involving those.

Our most interesting addition to the location’s list, though, was our completely inappropriately named Norfolk Hawker (Aeshna isosceles). Here were several Norfolk Hawkers patrolling up and down a small stream in Provence. The Dijkstra suggested European name of Green-eyed hawker seems so much more appropriate. The critter isn’t even limited in range to Norfolk in the UK, now. More curious is the fact that in the UK, this creature is tightly bound to one specific aquatic plant on which it oviposits, Water Soldier. Here in mainland Europe, no such association exists; there wasn’t a single Water Soldier plant in sight.

An interesting day, for those of us that care about such things, anyway. 😉

Campsites can be entertaining places sometimes. Today we were treated to a couple of international entertainment acts.

Act #1 was from Deutschland.

Popular though they most certainly are with many punters, I am personally very disparaging about motor vans. There is something vaguely insolent about motor vans. We arrive on site in the early afternoon, pick a pitch as far from any other instances of homo sapiens [the word sapiens is applied loosely] as is possible then, generally much later, in swarms a collection of roughly 2-ton, £60K motor vans with accursed roof-mounted, auto-seeking satellite dishes that ruins everything. They just seem to be saying, “up yours”!

One particular German big mo’-fo’ motor van had clearly not understood the motor vanners’ manual ‘cos it turned up early in the afternoon. It paid dividends, though. It was of the brand Roller Team. How naff is that name, for a start? Specifically, it was a Roller Team Granduca Magnifico. Yikes! No wonder it was big – it needed to be big to get all the signwriting on. It was driven into a pitch adjacent to us and stopped by its kommander, momentarily, anyway. Herr Panzer Kommander dismounted to join seine Frau and began looking at surrounding pitches wondering where precisely to site his tank. Leider, Herr Panzer Kommander hat vergessen to apply the hand brake. Ever so gradually, two tons of Roller Team Granduca Magnifico began roller-teaming majestically down the slight gradient of the pitch. Frau Panzer Kommander, realizing the situation, began shouting excitedly at Herr Panzer Kommander. Had Herr Panzer Kommander been Japanese, he would undoubtedly now have done the honourable thing and committed hara kiri by flinging himself onto the ground in front of his tank to arrest its progress. Fortunately, he was saved from this course of action by the hedge surrounding the pitch, which crunched a little as it finally brought the Roller Team Granduca Magnifico to a stop in much the same fashion as did the Normandy bocage 70 years ago this coming Friday, June 6th.

A narrow escape for the assembled resistance personnel in the opposing pitches on the other side of the track.

Act #2 came from Holland.

The Dutch have a reputation as being magnificent travellers but I sometimes wonder whether they really deserve it. A KIP Grey Line 470 Special caravan turned up, being towed behind a Volvo estate that sounded more like a Massey-Fergusson than a car. This combination regrettably chose to become our neighbours. Bother!

The Dutch, of course, are fond of their bicycles. Our laudable Caravan Club strenuously discourages any attempt at mounting bicycle carriers on any part of a caravan. This is a perfectly sensible stance. Carriers are available to sling bicycles across the draw bar of a caravan but doing so vastly increases nose weight. Other carriers are also available to sling bicycles across the rear of a caravan, as if it were a motor van, but doing so on a caravan seriously decreases nose weight. To tow safely, one needs to have a positive nose weight within a specified range. Indeed, the police force representing Act #1 [see above] may well check your nose weight when travelling through Deutschland and give you a ticket if it is found to be out of bounds. As travelling savvy as they are supposed to be, the darn Dutch sling their goddamn bikes in both unsafe places, sometimes across the draw bar and sometimes across the back of their vans. Our new prospective neighbour, the KIP Grey Line 470 Special, had two weighty, style-free Dutch bicycles slung across its rear.

The caravan was unhitched from its Massey-Fergusson and Mr Cloggy began using his caravan mover to position the beast on the pitch. When going in reverse, each time the caravan stopped, its jockey [nose] wheel lifted off the ground a little. With the bikes slung across the back, this combination clearly had next to zero positive nose weight. The final scream came on the final rear braking manoeuvre. The back end heavy caravan reared up and sat on its rear with its nose in the air. “Hi-ho Silver, away!”, shouted the Lone Ranger. The KIP Grey Line 470 Special needed a tail skid. The Lone Ranger and Tonto both rushed to add their weight to the caravan’s draw bar and drag the nose wheel back into contact with terra firma.

Most entertaining, how we did applaud. 😀

To calm ourselves down after all our exciting international cabaret, we drove off into Les Alpilles. This is the first time we’ve had a chance to walk in them as they are closed between July and September to guard against fire risk. Things looked a little quiet at first but then  perked up when we started seeing a particular butterfly in large numbers. It was a species we’d encountered just two years ago in France, the False Ilex Hairstreak (Satyrium esculi). There were, though, a few other lighter but similar looking butterflies mixed into the darker swarms. These, we later discovered, were the Blue-spot Hairstreak (Satyrium spini), a new species for us. New identified species are always a thrill and, for once, the underside view is critical.

One instinctively knows when it’s time to move on. We’d had a good time at Millau, helped by an interesting riverside pitch and reasonable weather for orchid hunting but now it felt like time to move. We bad farewell to our compatriot friends across our intervening pitch, hitched up and headed for Maussane-les-Alpilles in … yes, Les Alpilles, a few kilometres south of St-Rémy-de-Provence. I don’t know if the name Les Alpilles is some form of diminutive of Les Alps but they are a series of modest rolling hills – I’ve seen them described as waves – on what is an otherwise quite flat landscape.

The prevailing wind for our stay at Millau has been largely from the north. Its continuation now put the wind up Guillaume’s skirts and helped him south down the remaining stretch of the A75 before he hung a left towards Montpellier and on past Nîmes to our destination. Descending off les causses to the Mediterranean plain took us down a 7.5kms/5mls 7.5%/1-in-12 hill with a tedious 50kmh speed limit for towing vehicles. Quite sensible really – the sight of a jack-knifed Guillaume can be very upsetting, especially if one is in the car attached to hte front of him. At least you can enjoy the views. 😉

The temperature rose steadily as we descended southwards. Clouds were thinning and the skies were clearing as we neared Provence. 18°C/60°F became 28°C/77°F. That’s more like it, that’s why we’re here!

Our campsite at Maussane-les-Alpilles can best be described as “not us”. It is a municipal with excellent security, hedged pitches and inclusive wi-fi. It sounds fine but it’s a bit too urban and feels quite crowded. Still, it’s the most convenient we’ve found in the area and we are here for a reason, namely the Peau de Meau, but more of that later.

After pitching Guillaume in the most secluded corner we could find, we set off to investigate what I fondly refer to as the Maussane Ditch, what appears to be a drainage channel running into a small stream. Our late summer trip here produced about 11 species of Odos here. I was intrigued to see what spring species might be around to add to the list. We added a couple I think, from memory, but the most enchanting inhabitant is still the stunning Copper Demoiselle, which I’ would never tiring of watching. I offer this as proof that there is no God, since any god could never be this artistic. [Prepares to dodge the thunderbolt!]

Today dawned brightly enough but soon turned largely grey. Anyone would think we were in the UK.

The first task on our agenda was to take my limping steed to a French bicycle repair man. I loaded my bike on the car and we set off into Millau to a shop whose door claimed it opened at 9:00 AM every week day. At 9:30 AM he shop was firmly shuttered. We went shopping. At 10:30 AM the bike shop remained firmly shuttered. We drove past another two bike shops that were also firmly shuttered. In fact, many of the shops in downtown Millau were shuttered. Monday seems to be an off day. Lame steed with have to remain lame when we leave for Les Alpilles tomorrow.

Whereas grey days are not good days for Odonata, orchids tend to stay where they were rather than hunker down and hide. We had a suspect orchid, one that was just a flower spike but with no actual flowers, to revisit to see if it had advanced enough for Francine to identify it following our first trip up onto the causse. We set a course back up the Causse Noir with but one stop in mind.

Fortunately, our memory of where this particular uncertain orchid was located proved to be accurate. We parked in a handy lay-by and sauntered back down the road to where it was. Excellent, the beast had flowered in the intervening four days. Snaps of the more advanced plant were taken. Still no leaves were showing, just scales on a strikingly red stem with pinkish-red flowers.

Francines’s suspects for this plant included Red Helleborine, which is advertised as being in this area, but the stem seemed to be the wrong colour (i.e. red), or some form of Serapia but, again, the colouring of this plant’s stem didn’t seem right. This whole plant appeared to be red. Neither did it seem to have any leaves, as such. Curious. A rummage in the book was needed.

We headed off up the Gorge de la Jonte thinking that we’d visit the Belvédère des Vautours (a viewpoint for the Griffon Vultures) but that proved to be just as open on a Monday as Millau’s bike shops had been. Why have I never noticed that France seems to be closed on Mondays before?

Conditions were cooler and greyer up on the causse, where we felt decidedly underdressed. After a generally grey and windy day, we returned by way of the Gorge du Tarn for Francine to hit the orchid books. She soon figured out that her intriguing orchid was actually something rejoicing in the name of Violet Limodore (Limodorum abortivum), also called Violet Bird’s-nest, apparently. It is a saprophyte, a plant with no chlorophyl of its own, deriving sustenance from rotting vegetation with the aid of a fungus partner. How bizarre nature can be.

We move on with Francine having scored an impressive 18 orchid species around Millau. What a happy camper!

The back wheel of my bike is buckled, probably caused by my falling on it when I used my left knee as a brake, in the absence of any actual brakes, a few days ago. Since none of the plasters in our first aid kit came any where near the dimensions of my wound, a cut up T-shirt served as a temporary bandage while Francine scoured the local pharmacists for a pack of wound dressings equal to the task.

Today, I found a spoke key in the Millau Leclerc supermarket for a meagre €2.80 – I thought I might have a go at straightening the buckle myself. The key is a disc with a series of spanner-like slots of varying dimensions, none of which was small enough for the spokes on my lame steed. Foiled again! Yet again, I need a French bicycle repair man.

The afternoon was much more successful. We drove up the valley of La Dourbie and took another route up onto the causse in search of orchids. From our second stopping point, Francine went off piste into a meadow where she’d spotted a goodly crop of somewhat underdeveloped Pyramidal orchids (Anacamptis pyramidalis).

I was rummaging around on the other side of the road but Francine soon called me over ‘cos she’d also discovered another goodly crop of an utterly fascinating flying insect which was being unusually cooperative by settling on grass stems quite frequently. When they settled, the insects kept their colourfully marked wings spread for a while before folding them, tent-style, over their body. With distinctively long, clubbed antennae, they were unlike anything we’d encountered before. A swift scan through Chinery back chez Guillaume showed that we’d found something called an Ascalaphid, Libelloides coccajus. According to Chinery:

Ascalaphids are fast-flying relatives of Ant-lions.

“Oh, well, that explains everything”, I hear you say. We have come across an Ant-lion only once; that was up near Die in 2009. There are Ant-lions in the UK but no Ascalaphids. Both insects have predatory grubs. Now you know.

Several more stops produced nothing extraordinary until, on our penultimate pause, Francine found another new orchid. Her discovery turned out to be more special than she originally imagined; it was a local celebrity rejoicing in the name of Aymonin’s Ophrys (Ophrys aymoninii), known from the causses only, though “it may be more widely distributed in the central mountains of France” (it says here).

Two happy campers, despite the knackered knee and bike.

The scenery around Millau is quite spectacular with various rivers, most notably the Tarn, having cut precipitous gorges deep into the surrounding Jurassic limestone plateau. The resulting individual plateaux between the series of gorges are at an altitude of about 1000m and are referred to as causses [pronounced koss, we think]. The limestone causses, with harsh winters but a near Mediterranean spring and summer climate, support a rich diversity of wild flowers and are particularly known for their orchids. One of our main reasons for coming here at this time of year is for Francine to search for those orchids.

Today was forecast to be un peu plus mauvais [a bit worse] than yesterday but, though the morning dawned grey, it didn’t look too bad. We made lunch of left over sausages and a baguette, and set off up the Causse-Noir, just behind our campsite. Our advised route took us to the attractive village of Peylereau and up the D29.

With Francine spotting orchids as we drove, the trick is to find somewhere to stop on mountainous roads with hairpin bends. Nonetheless we managed to find several areas in appropriate places and Francine was soon crouching down, snapping away and building up a list of orchids. She even had me looking for orchids. Whatever next?

As Odo-nutters are well aware, old favourites are always nice to see but it’s new species that cause excitement. Our first stop produced Francine’s first new find of the trip, the Military Orchid (Orchis militaris). It’s nice to see a grin spread across a face. 🙂

Military Orchids (it says here) can be confused with both Lady and Monkey Orchids, both of which I deduced were on Francine’s hit list. Our third stop produced another gleeful gesticulation at the driver as Francine found one of the potential confusions, a Monkey Orchid (Orchis simia), beside the road. Excitement went through the roof wandering back to the car as she spotted two diminutive Burnt Tip Orchids (Orchis ustulata). I was now driving a very happy camper, though she really did want to see the other potential confusion, a Lady orchid.

Stop #4 started slowly but produce more broad grins as Francine stumbled upon a small group of Bird’s-nest Orchids (Neottia nidus-avis) lurking beneath a conifer, apparently the wrong kind of tree entirely. Exciting her discovery may have been but colourful it wasn’t. Bird’s-nest Orchids contain no chlorophyll whatsoever and are consequently a rather dull honey-brown colour. Another new one for the list, though. Over the road were a few Lesser Butterfly Orchids (Platanthera bifolia), not new but enjoyable to see anyway. Just as we were about to leave, sneaking behind a bush – using your skill and judgement, guess the reason – Francine discovered a small colony of Common Twayblades (Listera ovata).

Our penultimate stop, stop #5, was producing more specimens of those already on the now lengthy list until, again returning to the car, we spotted a single Lady Orchid (Orchis purpurea) lurking near some bushes. Delight turned to ecstasy. How lovely to see such a satisfied customer.

Back at Guillaume, a sixth new species was added. All around our route we had been seeing large numbers of what Francine at first thought were White Helleborines (Cephalanthera damasonium). With a book to hand, she realized her mistake: these were Narrow-leaved Helleborines (Cephalanthera longifolia).

So, a very successful day, all in the Causse-Noir hunting orchids, which, at least, neither run nor fly away. Six new species for Francine in a day’s total of 15 (+1 to be identified when it flowers – we need to go back again).

Look at that grin. 😀