Vaga-Blog - Volume II - Provence (June 10-15)

BOARS AND BEES AND GYPSIES, OH MY!

This week is our off week, so we spend our days scouting new locations for future trips. Essentially our time is spent eating well, drinking well and waking up without an alarm clock. It’s not really a bad way to live.

The maison where we’re staying in the Luberon Valley sleeps 22. It’s a beautiful old home that was renovated a few years ago by our Swiss hosts, Carmen and Werner, and it’s now divided up into different apartments that are rented throughout the summer to small and large groups of travelers. They live on the property too and ask that we please lock the front gate and close the shutters when we leave. When pressed for a reason, they say that it’s gypsy season. Now, my sister always told me that my real parents were gypsies, but past the age of seven I don’t think I believed they really existed. As it turns out, they sure do. They live in caravans, travel throughout Europe, and are often celebrated as they pass through small towns. Laura reminds me that in Tuscany we’d had our passports checked when we arrived at the villa – it turns out, gypsies occasionally steal passports from tourists, so they want to make sure we are who we claim to be. Not sure why anyone would want to be me, but I played alone.

This week we see a variety of large (Aix-en-Provence, Avignon, Apt) and small (Venasque, Menerbes, Lacoste) towns throughout Provence. Monday is my birthday so I give myself the day off (a day off from relaxing – that’s novel) in favor of lounging by the pool. Laura and Steve went out for sleuthing and returned with champagne, dinner and a fabulous lemon, mint and basil cake. Our three palettes worked together to distinguish the mint flavor, and I hope Laura can figure out how to re-create this masterpiece. The celebration, while small, is the perfect way to begin my 31st year. (What? I’m 31.)

One day, we head off for our own activities. In preparation for my parents’ arrival, I head to the market and the grocery store. Steve and Laura, those lucky bastards, stumble upon a gypsy parade in Meniers. About a dozen gypsies, on white horses, bull run through the town and are chased by dozens of young boys. Laura wishes I’d been there, because a few of them were easy on the eyes. (“Mom, Dad? Guess what. I met a man. He’s handsome, he rides horses … and he’s a gypsy! We’re going to live in a caravan and make a living begging for change and selling stolen passports. Hello?”)