Montoulieu - Land of Vineyards, Roses and Roman Ruins

After the noise and commotion of Montpellier, we were fortunate to be able to move into Danielle's winter home in Montoulieu - Gite de la Bergerie. A Bergerie is a sheep barn, however in this case it has been converted into a lovely 3 bedroom, 2 bath home on the mountainside overlooking the vineyards, the village and a roman ruin.  It is just one of the lovely rental accommodations on Danielle and Phillipe's estate (see www.masdepradines.fr).

La Bergerie - Our New Home

Our large private swimming pool

Danielle and Phillipe produce a lovely trio of wines - red, rose and white - which are unfortunately only available locally.  We have tried them all ... several times, and it's a three-way tie for our favorite. It seems that 2013 was a particularly good year, however, and it edges out the other years by a whisker.  We are sorry that we will be taking a train to our next stop in Valencia, and cannot fit a case of wine in our luggage.

Lovely rose gardens surrounding the house

Although a tiny village, Montoulieu has proven to be a nice central location for visiting the larger centres of Nimes, Avignon, and yes, even Montpellier.  Within a few minutes drive we find the lovely old villages of Ganges, Laroque, St Bauzille de Putois, Saint Hippolyte du Fort and a little further afield, Arles Domessargues, Montignargues, and many other "something, something...argues".  Each village has it's own character and charm and there is even one called the 'ancient village'.

An outdoor kitchen provides shade

Just down the road is the Grotte de Moiselles, which is the most impressive underground cavern we have ever visited.  Both the countryside villages and the Grotte deserve their own blog, and we will be posting these soon.

So is the countryside of southern France where we want to retire.  We don't know, but it is certainly worth a visit longer than the ten days we've had here.

Hope you enjoy some of our many photos.

Roman Ruin high on the hill - for the serious hiker.

The Village of Montoulieu - just a short walk in the country.

The village

A few of the village residents

A dead vineyard

Kilometers and Kilometers of live vineyards

Looks like the start of a bumper crop

Montpellier - A Nice Place to Visit, But ...

Beautiful old buildings at La Comedie

The fountain in the Place de la Comedie

Seashell corners make it easier for horse and carriage to turn

Following the advice of Pierre, a friendly French man we met in the pool while visiting Phuket, Thailand, we decided to make our home in the old, walking town of Montpellier, France for the month of May.  It's lovely, Pierre said, with many shops and restaurants, and within driving distance of places like Nice, Avignon, Monaco and Cannes. Pierre was right, up to a point.

Our first introduction to old town Montpellier was when we arrived from Barcelona after a lovely drive through vineyards and the eastern Pyrenees and beautiful poppy fields that seem to stretch on forever.  The drive took us a little longer than we had planned, however.  We had been driving for about an hour when we realized the Mediterranean was on the wrong side of the car.  Turning around, we made it to Montpellier without further incident, and carefully followed our landlady's instructions to find the parking just outside Place du la Comedie - the main square of old town (remember it's a walking city).   Missing the turn into the tunnel, we thought we'd just loop around and try again. Two hours later, having looped around on every street in Montpellier old and new, plus a few that have probably remained undiscovered for a century or two, we pulled into a giant parkade and decided to try it on foot.

A two story carousel

Fresh produce - tomato and artichoke

Outdoor restaurants line the streets

The "new" seeming out of place at one end of the square

The humorous - Snoop Chien poster found at the end of a narrow street

Fortunately, a young lady who overheard us hissing at each other in frustration bravely approached to see if she could help.  She phoned our landlady, Daniele, and a rapid exchange in French ensued, accompanied with some smiles and chuckles at the plight of the directionally challenged Canadian couple.  We finally set off in the right direction to meet up with Daniele who guided us to our  beautiful 15th century apartment with its high ceilings, huge carved mirrors, and a fireplace in every room.

Although Pierre's description of  the many shops and cafe's, fresh produce, lovely parks and beautiful sights was spot on, what we weren't prepared for was the crowded and noisy streets at all hours of the day, and the cost of eating in one of the many lovely outdoor restaurants.  Fortunately the grocery stores had lots of fresh produce and baked goods, and the wine is inexpensive, so we didn't suffer too much.

Montpellier has a population of around 250,000, and about a third of those are university students.  As 'old town' is right in the centre of it all with a bar or restaurant every few feet, this tends to be where the students hang out.  And they do.  Long after the shops have closed and the shop owners and their customers have gone home, the students are still there.  The narrow streets act like an echo chamber as the high-spirited, and somewhat inebriated youth wander the streets yelling and kicking beer bottles and peeing on the walls and in the doorways.  Although Ken and I were immune in the large, sound proofed back bedroom of our apartment, my poor sister Pat's bedroom was above the street.  I would have been pouring buckets of water onto the heads of the miscreant youths, but she is a much kinder and gentler soul.

Tiring of the people and the noise - you couldn't walk out of the apartment most days without dodging the crowds -  we contacted Daniele to see if we could move to one of her other properties.  She owns a vineyard and several country homes and gites. Daniele was nice enough to let us move to her winter home mid-month as she was moving to her summer home.  More on this later.

Ken, the ultimate people watcher, wasn't too enthusiastic about the move as he loved Montpellier, but he was outvoted and the move was on.

The crowded streets

Would I go back to Montpellier.  It is a lovely city interspersed with beautiful parks where you can sit and enjoy a glass of wine and listen to the many street musicians who dot the square every day.  But I fear that if the powers that be don't take steps to curtail the noise and filthy habits (peeing in the streets - really??) of the younger population, it will lose its tourist appeal and a good part of its economy.  Definitely not the retirement spot for me.

Note - Montpellier is not the place for driving a car.  We had picked up a car in Barcelona as we wanted to see the French countryside.  The first time we ventured out of the city, it took us an hour and a half to find out parking garage, even though we got within a few blocks a dozen times.  The second time, it took two hours, and at one time we were in the pedestrian part of the city weaving behind people sitting at the cafes with inches to spare, about a block and a half away from where we wanted to be.  Montpellier is narrow streets, one way roads, roads that get blocked off at different times of day, and roads that spoke out in all directions so you can't tell what is a right turn versus a bear right, versus a veer to your right.  Combine that with excitable French drivers and we were getting home each night close to tears and not speaking to each other. After several days we finally found a general store and sprung for a European GPS (as opposed to the phone GPS which caused the right turn problems noted) - best $79 ever spent and much cheaper than relationship counseling all around.

Keep watching our blog for adventures from the French countryside.

The Beaches of Phuket

Tiring of the constant noise and commotion of the very large cities of Thailand and Malaysia and not wanting to pack up and move any more, we decided to spend the last couple of weeks of our trip relaxing on the beaches of Thailand.  We checked out Rayong and Khanom and Koh Samui, but thought they'd be too difficult to get to from where we were in Penang, Malaysia.  We were wrong, and these may be destinations for our next trip.  The flight from Penang to Phuket was short and painless, and the view from the plane of the volcanic islands in the south of Thailand is breathtakingly beautiful.

Our daily exercise - 165 steps straight up!

We had finally settled on a studio apartment at the Phuket Island beach of Patong as we heard that was a popular hot spot.  Big mistake!  Although the condo was lovely and the rooftop infinity pool was a delight, the apartment building was a tough 165 steps up a very steep hill. Once we made the trek to the bottom of the hill the road to the beach was almost impossible to navigate on foot.

The amazing view from our infinity pool.

There were no sidewalks and the little bit of easement on the side of the extremely busy road was used to park cars and by crazy tourists on scooters trying to pass the buses, tuk-tuks, cars, carts, delivery trucks, etc.  Going for lunch became a life-threatening adventure.  We decided once we were down the hill to pick up refreshments and dinner before making our way back.  We really did not want to climb that hill twice in one day.  Patong is definitely for the young and stupid (adventurous?).  We only lasted 2 days before deciding to move on.

Fortunately, we were able to find a one bedroom condo in the quieter beach community of Rawai.  It is owned by a family from Kitchener so communication was easy and the driver he sent, Cha and his wife Oyl, were delightful and full of helpful information.  This apartment 'The Title' has two swimming pools and a beach across the street.  They also offer a shuttle to Nai Harn beach, which is one of the nicest beaches we've ever seen.  We would float in the water for hours, just letting the tide gently move us in and out, and then go for lunch at one of the many restaurants at the top of the beach.

View from our balcony - the pond with waterfall, one of the pools and the beach just beyond.

One of the many food options just outside our door.

Lazy days at the beach.

A typical beach restaurant.  They cook the food in their kitchen across the street, then dodge traffic to bring it to your table.

A rainbow of fish, yellow, blue, green, red, pink.

On one of our daily walks along the beach in Rawai we stumbled on the Gypsy Market, full of strange and colourful fish for sale, fruit, clothing and Thai pearls.  I was standing by one of the stalls waiting for Ken to catch up, (I swear that man meanders along checking out every little thing like a dog deciding where to leave its mark) when I felt something wet on my feet.  I looked down to see if some animal was peeing on me, then noticed that I was standing next to a big bin of clams.

Buckets of huge colourful lobsters - but where are the claws?

Little streams of water were dancing across the surface looking like the fountains at a Vegas hotel.  
The fish stalls were on one side of the lane and a row of restaurants on the other side. You could pick your fish and then take it across to the restaurant of your choice where they would prepare it for you.


We managed to get in a couple of tours while we were in Rawai.  The one to Phi Phi (pronounced peepee, not fifi) is sold everywhere, but I didn't really find it worthwhile.  We were crammed into a speed boat with about 100 others then taken over to a beautiful beach, but it was so crowded you could hardly walk. Ken enjoyed the snorkling, although I'm sure all he saw was other people's feet under the water.

Phi Phi - not my favorite day at the beach.

The best tour was our day long trip to James Bond Island.  It was featured in the movie 'The Man With the Golden Gun'.  Terrible movie - but fast forward to the part where Roger Moore weaves his plane between islands and then lands on a beach, and you're there.  Then just imagine it with a row of souvenir stands.

The cave where the evil dude has his lair.

Ken looking very James Bondish in front of James Bond Island.

For this trip we were on a smaller speedboat with only 20 people and an entertaining guide. The highlight of the day was when we pulled into a cove and were surrounded by Thai guides paddling rubber canoes.  They loaded us in pairs onto a canoe, and then took us for a trip underneath the islands into caves and grottos that seemed to go on forever.  We would have to lie down in the canoe to get under a stalactite, then would explode out into a sun-filled lagoon in the centre of the island, then wend our way through a narrow passage and back into another cave.  I'm glad our guide knew where we were going or we'd still be trying to find our way out.  It was an amazing adventure!

So long from Thailand.  We're back to the cold of Canada to plan for our next adventure.

Off to Malaysia and Kuala Lumpur

It seems that we hadn't had enough of people and crowds in Thailand, so we decided to make our way to Malaysia and the metropolis of Kuala Lumpur (KL), 1.6 million people spread out over a city of 243 kms (94 sq miles for our American friends).  Of course, we decided to stay in the most populated area, Chinatown, which was gearing up for Chinese New Year.  The lovely Five Elements Hotel was right in the center of everything.  

We dropped our luggage and immediately headed across the street to the Fat Brother's food stall where they displayed a variety of meat, vegetables, fish, and dumplings on skewers.  They happily grilled the meat for us while we settled at a table in the street with our own "hot pot" to boil the veggies and dumplings.  After we ate our fill, they simply added up the number of skewers we had consumed.  Dinner for two with a large Tiger beer - around $25 - more expensive than Thailand but still manageable. 

After satisfying our hunger and thirst we decided to explore the streets of Chinatown.  A fascinating place full of people and vendors all crammed in to narrow streets full of noise and commotion.  During the day you could walk among the stalls and keep away from vendors trying to haul you in to buy their wares.  There were various meat vendors, roasting chesnuts, clothing vendors, fruit and veggie vendors, electronics carts (Ken stopped at every one) and various and sundry restaurants of every type imaginable.  

Roasted duck for take out.

The original "meat wagon"

At night the previously manageable streets became almost impassible as they added an extra row of merchant stalls down the middle, forcing people to walk single file.  Ken being bigger than pretty much every other person in KL just strolled along like he was at a garden party, while I had to keep stepping into stalls to avoid the crush of people coming from the opposite direction.  Once you're in, the merchants have you and it's all bets off.  For him the noise, people, sights and smells were heaven - for me, claustrophobic, hating shopping and being touched by strangers - it was like descending to the seventh level of hell.

The manageable daytime streets

Nighttime on the same street - aargh!

Bargaining with the street vendors in KL is a must.  Ken bought a good quality leather belt - although the vendor started at 110 Malaysian Ringits, after some hard bargaining Ken got it for 30, or about $10 Cdn.  In addition, I now own four scarf/blouses that can be worn in multiple ways.  We had seen these in old-town St. Augustine, Florida for around $90.  I'm not really sure how much I like them, but he had so much fun bargaining them down to about $10 each, so they're coming home with me anyway.

On a different note, we decided we wanted some "home cooking" once night and spotted a Kentucky Fried Chicken down the street.  Just so you know, the 11 herbs and spices used for KFC in Malaysia are not 11 kinds of salt.  I could discern chile, cumen, coriander, turmeric, among other things.  Interesting and sightly tongue tingling, but yummy.

The White Temple - Beautiful but Bizarre!

Before leaving Thailand for Malaysia we decided to take a day tour out of Chang Mai to visit the White Temple in Chang Rai and the Golden Triangle.  The Golden Triangle is a section of river abutting the countries of Thailand, Myanmar and Laos.  We were told that the Opium trade is conducted on the small islands as they do not belong to any country and are not subject to any laws.  Supposedly the opium dealers set up on an island and people from all three countries come by boat to trade - the only currency used is gold.  All we saw were some very small grassy islands in a very muddy river so for all we know this may have been a "tourist" tale.

The highlight of the day was definitely the White Temple of Chang Rai. A fairly new edifice, it was probably built to draw tourists to the north part of the country.  There were really no signs of it actually being used as a place of worship and, unlike the other temples we visited there was no dress code.  A huge structure covered in pearlized cement (?), silver and glass tile, it shimmers in the sunlight like a giant wedding cake on steroids and was worth the visit just to gaze in awe at the craftmanship.  Enjoy the pics.   

The main temple

The fanciest outhouse ever!  This is where all the opium dealer's gold went.

No smoking!

This is what they do to smokers.

No drinking!

This is what happens to the drinkers.  Notice the one red fingernail.

A beautiful ceiling made up of individual hangings like the one shown below.

This is our hanging with our Canadian and Thai names - 30 baht to join the masses.

Beauty and the beasts.  We'd be strolling along blinded by the shimmering temple, then stumble across a bizarre creature like this one...

or a shimmering cesspool of hell like this one!

Beautiful, but bizarre!