There's something fascinating about the concept of a frontier. There's grass both sides. There's tarmac both sides. But one side is France. The other's Italy. What's going on here?
And borders can be very funny things. Sometimes they can be very logical; the Mason-Dixon line for instance. And sometimes they can be anything but.
For instance there's Baarle Hertog, in Belgium. No, in Holland. No, it's in Belgium.
This site explains. It all goes back to the early middle ages, when part of Baarle was claimed by the Duke of Brabant, and the rest by the Lord of Breda. The market place isDutch - the church is Belgian. You can play hopscotch jumping between countries.
And it gives citizens unique opportunities. The entire village is made up of tiny enclaves belonging to the Netherlands or to Belgium. If your house frontage borders both, just moving your front door would enable you to move country! That's a brilliant tax dodge.
I seem to remember a lovely story about a prize fighting contest back in the days when boxing was illegal in England. The fighters chose a place where three county boundaries came together; if the police turned up from one county, they could simply jump into another. Of course the police had no jurisdiction in that county and would just have to sit and watch the fight go on.
Sadly, I can't find chapter and verse. But it's a nice tale.
Tuesday, 30 January 2007
Friday, 26 January 2007
Best jogging tracks
One of the things I like doing if I'm travelling is looking for a good jogging track. If I've got my running shoes, I'm off - before breakfast, perhaps, or late in the evening. It's a different way to see a place, and it helps keep me fit and use a few muscles that sight-seeing doesn't.
My big favourite has to be Bruges. It's flat, and that helps! You can run most of the way round the outer ring canal; that's about 8 kilometres. I haven't done it all yet, but one day, I might.
Paris: the walkway from Bastille? Well maybe, and I've seen a lot of joggers on it, but you get your aerobic exercise with this one: lots of steps up and down. I prefer the Ile Saint Louis; the leafy, aristocratic quais tend to be quiet (by Paris standards) and the views across the Seine are fine.
I like running beside water, too. So another Paris favourite could easily be the tow path by the Canal de l'Ourcq - a very urban experience from Parc de la Villette and a contrast to the gentility of the Ile Saint Louis. But there are too many bicycles going too fast for my jogging pleasure.
Norwich. Well, this is my usual run when I'm at home in the city. All the way round the Wensum, round the cathedral close, and back to the Adam and Eve pub. That's a mile and a half, and you can do it twice. There's the river; there are swans; there are boys from Norwich School playing football or rugby on the fields by the river; there may be sculls on the water; and there's a big fat cat who sits on the bench in Lower Close and waits for me to pass, and stop for minute to fuss over him.
Last time I went, I'd gone about a hundred yards when I looked back, and he'd already found another foolish human being to tickle him behind the ears. What a tart!
Venice. Definitely the Giudecca. One long quay, with the finest views in the city. The way is flat, of course - you get your exercise on the bridges though. I haven't measured this one (half an hour or so? I seem to remember.) And no crowds to push your way through.
I saw a jogger out in Cannaregio, by the Scuola della Misericordia. That's a quiet place, with long quaysides.
Rome. Don't even try. I suppose the Pincian hill, maybe, or the park on the Janicolo. But the Tiber banks are just disgustingly full of traffic. And there's nowhere in the centre. Perhaps, one early morning, about 7 am, I might try jogging Piazza Navona in the cart-tracks of the Roman charioteers who ran races here. But no. Rome is just not jogging city - unless anyone knows otherwise.
My big favourite has to be Bruges. It's flat, and that helps! You can run most of the way round the outer ring canal; that's about 8 kilometres. I haven't done it all yet, but one day, I might.
Paris: the walkway from Bastille? Well maybe, and I've seen a lot of joggers on it, but you get your aerobic exercise with this one: lots of steps up and down. I prefer the Ile Saint Louis; the leafy, aristocratic quais tend to be quiet (by Paris standards) and the views across the Seine are fine.
I like running beside water, too. So another Paris favourite could easily be the tow path by the Canal de l'Ourcq - a very urban experience from Parc de la Villette and a contrast to the gentility of the Ile Saint Louis. But there are too many bicycles going too fast for my jogging pleasure.
Norwich. Well, this is my usual run when I'm at home in the city. All the way round the Wensum, round the cathedral close, and back to the Adam and Eve pub. That's a mile and a half, and you can do it twice. There's the river; there are swans; there are boys from Norwich School playing football or rugby on the fields by the river; there may be sculls on the water; and there's a big fat cat who sits on the bench in Lower Close and waits for me to pass, and stop for minute to fuss over him.
Last time I went, I'd gone about a hundred yards when I looked back, and he'd already found another foolish human being to tickle him behind the ears. What a tart!
Venice. Definitely the Giudecca. One long quay, with the finest views in the city. The way is flat, of course - you get your exercise on the bridges though. I haven't measured this one (half an hour or so? I seem to remember.) And no crowds to push your way through.
I saw a jogger out in Cannaregio, by the Scuola della Misericordia. That's a quiet place, with long quaysides.
Rome. Don't even try. I suppose the Pincian hill, maybe, or the park on the Janicolo. But the Tiber banks are just disgustingly full of traffic. And there's nowhere in the centre. Perhaps, one early morning, about 7 am, I might try jogging Piazza Navona in the cart-tracks of the Roman charioteers who ran races here. But no. Rome is just not jogging city - unless anyone knows otherwise.
Tuesday, 23 January 2007
New goodies on www.podtours.co.uk
I've just uploaded some new stuff on the website.
- My personal selection of the ten top cathedrals to visit in France. Some won't be contentious - but there is one big surprise!
- I've added a new set of photos to the 'Labours of the months' series. These come from Abbot Suger's facade of Saint-Denis, near Paris, dated about 1140. They're rather fine and include an unusual scene of two women gossiping by the fire (meant to represent February, but in my experience, you can gossip any time!)
- A photo-essay on the Marais of Bourges. It was an overcast day but the vivid green of the gardens gives these otherwise melancholy photos a feeling of spring.
Saturday, 20 January 2007
Coming up on www.podtours.co.uk
I've just finished writing and editing a number of new Podtours.
You should shortly be able to download mp3 audio tours of the following sites:
Meanwhile there are a few more stacked up and nearly ready to go - two tours of Bruges, and tours of Mont Saint Michel, Saint-Denis basilica in Paris, Reims cathedral, and Lincoln.
I'd be very interested in hearing from people about what destinations they'd really like an audio tour for. And I'm also going to be thinking about doing tours of some of the big museums - but rather than trying to do 'the British Museum in a day', take a special subject, whether that's music through the ages, the Etruscans, or the idea of the Orient. Or say in the Louvre, you could follow different paths depending on whether you're interested in women artists, different interpretations of religious art, or images of landscape and travel.
You should shortly be able to download mp3 audio tours of the following sites:
- Ghent, Belgium
- Ely - city and cathedral
- Peterborough cathedral
- Bourges, France
- Laon cathedral, France
Meanwhile there are a few more stacked up and nearly ready to go - two tours of Bruges, and tours of Mont Saint Michel, Saint-Denis basilica in Paris, Reims cathedral, and Lincoln.
I'd be very interested in hearing from people about what destinations they'd really like an audio tour for. And I'm also going to be thinking about doing tours of some of the big museums - but rather than trying to do 'the British Museum in a day', take a special subject, whether that's music through the ages, the Etruscans, or the idea of the Orient. Or say in the Louvre, you could follow different paths depending on whether you're interested in women artists, different interpretations of religious art, or images of landscape and travel.
Nuits lumieres
Following up the theme of son et lumiere, the 'Nuits lumieres' of Bourges go even further, linking the town's lighting with projections of great paintings.
Previous years have seen a Renaissance wedding going on in the Hotel de Lallemant, Gaulish chief Vercingetorix posturing on the ramparts, and s authentic music being played (Monteverdi, Dowland, Vivaldi). And the council has just put contracts out for 2007-2010, apparently, so it looks like the event is going to continue, every night in June and July.
Previous years have seen a Renaissance wedding going on in the Hotel de Lallemant, Gaulish chief Vercingetorix posturing on the ramparts, and s authentic music being played (Monteverdi, Dowland, Vivaldi). And the council has just put contracts out for 2007-2010, apparently, so it looks like the event is going to continue, every night in June and July.
Tuesday, 16 January 2007
Pizza style Française
We had a fantastic pizza the other day. 'Pizza campagnarde' mixes bacon, 'crottin' (local goat's cheese), cream, and onions. I've not seen this one in Italy but it seems quite typically French.
Even more French - and like all the best cooking, decisively regional - is 'pizza berrichonne'. Crème fraîche, pommes de terres, fromage, lardons, oignons - in other words, cream, bacon, onions, cheese, and potatoes. Potatoes!!!! But it's darn tasty.
It's intriguing what happens to food when it moves countries. Indian cooking in England is nothing like Indian cooking in India (though it goes back to the 18th century - my father once found a recipe for curry in a recipe book from about 1780). The Italians probably took Chinese noodles as the basis for a rather different form of pasta.
Only German food doesn't seem to travel...
Even more French - and like all the best cooking, decisively regional - is 'pizza berrichonne'. Crème fraîche, pommes de terres, fromage, lardons, oignons - in other words, cream, bacon, onions, cheese, and potatoes. Potatoes!!!! But it's darn tasty.
It's intriguing what happens to food when it moves countries. Indian cooking in England is nothing like Indian cooking in India (though it goes back to the 18th century - my father once found a recipe for curry in a recipe book from about 1780). The Italians probably took Chinese noodles as the basis for a rather different form of pasta.
Only German food doesn't seem to travel...
Monday, 15 January 2007
Bourges - coeur de France
Bourges. No one outside France seems to know where it is. "Where is it near?" they say. It's not really near anywhere. At least, it's not near anywhere you've heard of.
It's the capital of the old region of Berry. That's as in 'Les très riches heures du duc de Berry'. Which is significant, because the duke who commissioned that manuscript was a great patron of the arts here in Bourges. After he died, the rich merchant Jacques Coeur picked up the running, and his palace - rich with carvings, pinnacles and turrets - is one of the finest buildings in Bourges.
We stayed in a lovely little chambres d'hote (bed and breakfast) in the old town, Les Bonnets Rouges, with a view of the cathedral from our windows. The old town mixes fine half timbered houses with beautiful soft stone, cobbled streets with narrow flights of steps. And there's an incredible number of book shops for a town this size.
The great treasure of the town, though, is the gothic cathedral. Apart from one tower, the facade, and a few later side chapels, it's all precisely planned and exactly as it was the day it was finished; a work of impressive unity. A single style, a single mass - no transepts or crossing tower, just one long roofline from west front to apse. (So you can bet that I will be writing and recording a podtour of Bourges cathedral.)
The interior is breathtaking. The nave arcade is exceptionally high, and the inner aisle has its own triforium and clerestory - so that light enters from windows at three different levels. It seems almost as if the church has duplicated itself in this cascade of different heights.
The east end even has its original glass. Now I live close to Chartres so I'm used to a high standard of medieval glass, but this really is amazing. First of all, the glaziers were very clever with their subjects - they put a single huge figure in each of the high windows, but in the ambulatory, where you are close to the window, they created a whole variety of different designs and filled them with narrative episodes of great detail. And as we got to know the windows - we went back three separate times, at different times of day - we began to see how each one has its own distinctive colour scheme. There's one in hot reds, one with more yellow, one that is a deep rich blue, one that seems more a blend of blue and green. Some are hot, some cool. The sensibility that created this scheme has something in common with Rothko, an ability to make colour meaningful. And very cleverly, white glass is used in all the windows to pick out the main lines of the pattern.
Even the iconography is very different from elsewhere. There are some of the same stories - Saint Denis carrying his head, Saint Nicholas saving the three youngsters from the wicked innkeeper who chops them up - but the windows of the Apocalypse, the New Alliance, the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son are quite different from anything I've seen before. The format is interesting - the main story runs up (and in just one case down) the middle, but there are little comments on it in the glass to each side. It's like one of those printed Talmuds where the original Mishnah text is surrounded by Maimonides' comments; except that here, the comments are in the form of other episodes from the Bible which relate to the main story in various ways.
Bourges, medieval town par excellence, has another secret too - les Marais (the marshes). Just outside the historic centre, the river has been dammed and sluiced and canalised, to create an area of small gardens. Originally these were market gardens; now, they're mainly allotments.
It was an overcast day and that seemed to suit the flat, marshy land. Some allotment holders had come by car; others poled their way to their gardens in battered black punts. Even in midwinter, artichoke plants bristled, and bright green salads marched in their regulated lines on the fertile red soil. And behind this all, the silhouette of the cathedral, raised on its hill, brooded against the darkening sky.
FACT BOX
Trains from Paris to Bourges take about 1 hour 45 minutes from Austerlitz station. Otherwise, the A71 from Paris/Orleans will get you to Bourges.
Les Bonnets Rouges: in rue Thaumassière: 00 33 248 657 992
It's the capital of the old region of Berry. That's as in 'Les très riches heures du duc de Berry'. Which is significant, because the duke who commissioned that manuscript was a great patron of the arts here in Bourges. After he died, the rich merchant Jacques Coeur picked up the running, and his palace - rich with carvings, pinnacles and turrets - is one of the finest buildings in Bourges.
We stayed in a lovely little chambres d'hote (bed and breakfast) in the old town, Les Bonnets Rouges, with a view of the cathedral from our windows. The old town mixes fine half timbered houses with beautiful soft stone, cobbled streets with narrow flights of steps. And there's an incredible number of book shops for a town this size.
The great treasure of the town, though, is the gothic cathedral. Apart from one tower, the facade, and a few later side chapels, it's all precisely planned and exactly as it was the day it was finished; a work of impressive unity. A single style, a single mass - no transepts or crossing tower, just one long roofline from west front to apse. (So you can bet that I will be writing and recording a podtour of Bourges cathedral.)
The interior is breathtaking. The nave arcade is exceptionally high, and the inner aisle has its own triforium and clerestory - so that light enters from windows at three different levels. It seems almost as if the church has duplicated itself in this cascade of different heights.
The east end even has its original glass. Now I live close to Chartres so I'm used to a high standard of medieval glass, but this really is amazing. First of all, the glaziers were very clever with their subjects - they put a single huge figure in each of the high windows, but in the ambulatory, where you are close to the window, they created a whole variety of different designs and filled them with narrative episodes of great detail. And as we got to know the windows - we went back three separate times, at different times of day - we began to see how each one has its own distinctive colour scheme. There's one in hot reds, one with more yellow, one that is a deep rich blue, one that seems more a blend of blue and green. Some are hot, some cool. The sensibility that created this scheme has something in common with Rothko, an ability to make colour meaningful. And very cleverly, white glass is used in all the windows to pick out the main lines of the pattern.
Even the iconography is very different from elsewhere. There are some of the same stories - Saint Denis carrying his head, Saint Nicholas saving the three youngsters from the wicked innkeeper who chops them up - but the windows of the Apocalypse, the New Alliance, the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son are quite different from anything I've seen before. The format is interesting - the main story runs up (and in just one case down) the middle, but there are little comments on it in the glass to each side. It's like one of those printed Talmuds where the original Mishnah text is surrounded by Maimonides' comments; except that here, the comments are in the form of other episodes from the Bible which relate to the main story in various ways.
Bourges, medieval town par excellence, has another secret too - les Marais (the marshes). Just outside the historic centre, the river has been dammed and sluiced and canalised, to create an area of small gardens. Originally these were market gardens; now, they're mainly allotments.
It was an overcast day and that seemed to suit the flat, marshy land. Some allotment holders had come by car; others poled their way to their gardens in battered black punts. Even in midwinter, artichoke plants bristled, and bright green salads marched in their regulated lines on the fertile red soil. And behind this all, the silhouette of the cathedral, raised on its hill, brooded against the darkening sky.
FACT BOX
Trains from Paris to Bourges take about 1 hour 45 minutes from Austerlitz station. Otherwise, the A71 from Paris/Orleans will get you to Bourges.
Les Bonnets Rouges: in rue Thaumassière: 00 33 248 657 992
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