Glass

A detour on our way home today to stop in Montolieu, the town of books, which I'd wanted to visit for a long time. We were too early in year for some of the bookshops and the fascinating looking (for me) museum of writing and printing wasn't open either, but we found several surprises in the village. The first was the café, housed in a typical ancient village building, but inside it was decorated in the style of a 1950s American diner, complete with life-size Elvis playing his guitar and a Route 66 petrol pump. A middle-aged biker made us coffee and sold baguettes to a succession of elderly women - quite surreal! One of my shots from there nearly became my blip for today but in the end another surprise became my favourite. There's a glass workshop in one of the buildings that used to be part of a textile factory in the 18th century, and we were able to watch the glass being made.

We had a wonderful trip and packed a lot in to a couple of days. We were guided around Samatan and its marchée au gras by our friends who used to live nearby. The scenery was very different from home - much greener (a sign of the rain they have there) - and the villages were too, with beautiful half-timbered houses like the one where we stayed (blipped on Sunday)We ate well and came back with a lot of duck which our friends are going to show us how to conserve tomorrow. Lo Jardinièr and I rather guiltily stayed away an extra night - the others had to get back for work, but they didn't mind - and ambled back the long way via Revel where we stayed the night and Montolieu today. I feel as though we've had quite a holiday, but it's nice to be home too.

I've put some of my photos of Revel on Flickr if you're interested, and I'll probably put some others there in the next few days.