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~ A fairy-tale cottage by the Seine in Normandy

chaumierelesiris

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Normandy Impressionist Festival 2020

06 Sunday Sep 2020

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Culture, France, Normandy, Things to do

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Art, Impressionism, Impressionist, Le Havre, Monet, museum, Normandy, paintings, Paszko, Pizarro, Pont-Audemer, Renoir, Rouen, Seine

Delayed by the Covid19 crisis, the Normandy Impressionist Festival is now bravely rescheduled to  4 July – 15 November 2020, at museums and sites all over Normandy. We managed to see three of the exhibits. 

First, at Le Havre’s striking dockside modern art museum MuMa, Electric Nights brings together impressionist images of cities lit by artificial lights.

You get a sense of the wonder as artists explored the effect of the new lighting and the scenes it opened up.

Next, to the Beaux-arts museum in Rouen, where part of the collection of coal magnate François Depeaux is being shown together. His paintings formed the foundation of the museum’s collection.

The Seine and its changing light is depicted in many of the images by both the most famous and lesser known impressionist painters.

Quirky paintings we loved: the collector’s young daughters by Georges Picard; and Monet’s turkeys.

Last to Pont-Audemer and a retrospective of contemporary impressionist Malgorzata Paszko at the tiny Alfred Canel museum. The theme of the festival is light and colour, and Paszko’s work celebrates and recontextualises the nocturnal blues and shifting horizons of the earlier impressionists.

The large canvases pop and shimmer and you can lose yourself to them – a rare pleasure, in 2020.

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Copper Pots

06 Monday May 2019

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Les Iris, Things to do

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brocante, cooking, shopping

I’ve written before about the thrill of hunting around at the brocante in Pont-Audemer. There’s an upstairs section for mismatched crockery, 70s cheese plates, ancient paperbacks and souvenir cups: everything chipped and dusty. You have to climb some crooked stairs to get there.  It’s not for the faint hearted.  


But here’s what I found recently. Stacked into each other and on the floor, I almost missed them. They were dirty and heavily used. But they were heavy, professional French-made cooper pots.  And just a couple of euros. Would they shine up? 

All it took was salt, white wine vinegar, and a soft sponge. Thank you Huffington Post. Just a few minutes of polishing and the result: 

They’re not  like new, you can tell they’re recycled, and that’s ok. There’s a scruffy beauty in the whirls and scratches that matches the cottage, and the suggestion of a thousand shared meals whose secrets  we’ll never know. 

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Bells, Hedgehogs, Sardines

21 Sunday Apr 2019

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Culture, Food, France, Normandy

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chocolate, Easter, Food

Savour the variety of Easter chocolate on offer in France. From the multiplicity of French labels in the major supermarkets (the global brands compete for a look-in) to the local chocolate makers – every village has at least one – the choices are delightful, and affordable. 

This charming hedgehog – herisson- nestling in his bag of grass from our local boulanger-turned-chocolatier for Easter. 

Normandy is known for its seafood – moules, oysters, coquilles St-Jacques – so why not chocolate versions?

Hens are everywhere: a chocolate French hen is to be expected. 
No Easter Bunny in France. Instead, the bells are said to fly away from the churches and return with chocolate by Easter morning. So there are chocolate bells galore although I have no pictures. But here’s a cheeky Easter bunny from the supermarket. 

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Drone’s Eye View

22 Wednesday Aug 2018

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Les Iris, Travel

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drone, guests, photography, reviews, Travel

We love it when our guests share pictures of their holidays with us. It goes without saying that we’re hopelessly biased – and firmly believe that Vieux-Port is one of the most photogenic villages in France.

This time we have something entirely new – pictures taken by drone! See if you can spot the house.

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St-Ouen, Pont Audemer

06 Sunday May 2018

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Culture, Normandy, Things to do

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architecture, churches, gothic, Pont-Audemer, Romanesque, Rouen

The church of St-Ouen, at the heart of our busy local market town of Pont Audemer, is currently undergoing a 2.5M EUR restoration.

IMG_4874

After several years under scaffolding, the difference is now visible around the front entrance and the tower.

IMG_4853Take a moment to look inside this cool, ancient edifice. The oldest, Romanesque sections around the choir were built between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries.

IMG_4862The gate and north tower were constructed starting in around 1485, and the striking gothic nave with aisles and side chapels were build between 1505 and 1515 by Rouen architect Roulland le Roux, who also worked on Rouen cathedral. The south tower was never completed due to financial difficulties.

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Christmas in Pont-Audemer

31 Sunday Dec 2017

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Culture, Normandy

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Christmas, Pont-Audemer, Reveillon

Normandy is magical at Christmas, and Pont-Audemer is no exception. The main streets sparkle with overhead lights, and each shop and half timbered building is laden with traditional decorations. The butchers and bakers and fishmongers work long hours to deliver the Christmas and Réveillon feasts. And it’s not just the streets that light up. Here, Père Noël has had to borrow a boat to get the job done along one of Pont-Audemer’s charming canals.

Screen Shot 2017-12-31 at 13.28.38

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The Longest Day

30 Sunday Jul 2017

Posted by chaumierelesiris in France, Normandy, Things to do, Travel

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Bayeux, Cemeteries, Commonwealth War Graves Commission, Gertrude Jekyll, History, Landing Beaches, Museums, Saving Private Ryan, The Longest Day, Travel, Victoria Cross, Winston Churchill, World War 2

A guest contributor takes us on a tour of Normandy’s World War 2 battlefields

The world-changing liberation of Europe began on 6th June 1944 on the beaches, in the fields, through the streets and in the bocage of western Normandy. The region is replete with museums and memorials which tell the awesome and uplifting story of the Allied Invasion and the individual deeds of countless brave and clever men and women.

The historic D-Day battlefields are well worth a visit, and start about an hour’s drive west of Les Iris. A D-Day visit does need to be planned, as there is more than enough to see and do in one day. But visitors who wish to devote more time to it will be well rewarded.

The closest beaches to Les Iris are Sword (British), Juno (Canadian) and Gold (British). These are flanked on the east by the River Orne and its Canal. Omaha and Utah (both American) are further to the west.

Image result for battles around Caen

A good place to start is the famous Pegasus Bridge at Benouville, over the Caen Canal, the first bit of France to be liberated just after midnight on 6th June, by British glider-borne troops, in a brilliantly planned and executed swoop. This strategic crossing was taken and held by lightly armed airborne troops, including paratroopers of the 6th Airborne Division dropped in the small hours, until relieved by Brigadier the Lord Lovat, whom Churchill described as “the handsomest gentleman ever to slit a throat”. His commandos, fighting hard across-country all the way from Sword beach, four miles away, arrived shortly after midday, just two minutes behind schedule. Nevertheless, the immaculately mannered, Highland aristocrat modestly apologised for being ‘late’.

Image result for pegasus bridge.

From here it is a short drive north to Ouistreham on the coast, then west past Sword and Juno to the western end of Gold beach at Arromanches, with its museums, restaurants and cafes and what remains of the ingenious, artificial Mulberry Harbour, which the British brought with them.

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At Omaha Beach (American) west of Arromanches, where the GIs took heavy casualties, the informative and moving American Cemetery and Memorial overlooking the beach is a must-see. Look out for the photographs of the four Niland brothers, on whom the movie, Saving Private Ryan, is based. Fritz (the real-life Ryan) was shipped back to America so that the Niland family wouldn’t lose all their sons. Mirabile dictu, Edward, who was originally thought dead, escaped Japanese captivity, so that in fact two of the four brothers survived the war.

But the big choker is the sight of 9,000 headstones, mostly marble crosses, interspersed with stars of David, all arranged in perfect symmetry, marking the graves of American soldiers who made the ultimate sacrifice for freedom, right across Normandy, and were laid to rest here in the majestic Omaha Beach Cemetery.

Image result for omaha beach cemetery

If your spirits need a lift after this sobering experience, visit the nearby Pointe du Hoc, to the west of Omaha, where US Rangers scaled 100 foot cliffs on London Fire Brigade ladders to capture the enemy gun emplacements on top, which they did in a dazzlingly well-planned, courageous and successful manoeuvre.

Image result for pointe du hoc

Utah Beach (American) on the Cotentin or Cherbourg Peninsula is the most westerly of the five beaches and the one on which the German resistance was lightest. If you have time, visit the invasion museum at Sainte-Mère-Eglise, which is arguably the best in Normandy.

Those who are old enough to have seen the film The Longest Day will remember that one American’s parachute snagged on the church tower – and he’s still there, it would appear!

Image result for sainte-mère-église

On the return journey, take the time to visit Bayeux, if you can. This ancient town was one of the first the British, coming south from Gold beach, took from the retreating Germans. Being spared serious fighting, Bayeux retains its medieval charm, not to mention the Bayeux Tapestry, which tells the (somewhat spun) story of the last successful Invasion of England in 1066 by William the Conqueror.

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Bayeux also has a good ’44 museum and across the road, you will find the main British cemetery in Normandy, wonderfully well-maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. It contains the remains of over 4,000 Commonwealth sailors, soldiers and airmen, over 300 of them unidentified, as well as over 500 war graves of other nationalities, the majority German.

http://www.cwgc.org/dbImage.ashx?id=4180

Like all such cemeteries, it is laid out in an under-stated, dignified and uniform style, first adopted in WWI. One of the original designers, Gertrude Jekyll, wished to create the ambience of an English garden and suggested that small rose bushes should be planted among the graves so that “The shadow of an English rose shall fall at some point each day on every headstone.”

In the cemetery register, look up the citation to Sidney Bates, the 23-year old son of a Rag-‘n-Bone man from Camberwell in south London. The Corporal’s quick thinking in thwarting a determined enemy attack and courage in fighting despite multiple wounds until his battalion’s position was no longer threatened, earned him a posthumous Victoria Cross, Britain’s highest award. The Victoria Cross insignia is carved on his headstone with the words, ‘For Valour’.

Visiting all these sites would require at least two days – and this only covers the first phase of the Normandy campaign: the ‘break-in’ to establish and consolidate a beach-head. The ‘break-out’ took two more months of heavy fighting and even heavier casualties. The British & Canadians, driving south, were time and again checked by the Germans in desperately hard battles around and beyond Caen, before General Montgomery eventually took it and broke out south towards Falaise.

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Meanwhile, the Americans took St. Lo in the west and General Patton unleashed his tanks in a fast-moving right hook, or series of hooks, heading first south then east (and north) to Argentan, to trap German Army Group B, in a giant pincer movement, between the two allied armies, in what is known as the Falaise gap or pocket. Image result for patton falaise gap

Although some fugitives managed to flee eastwards, the bulk of the German forces here were killed or captured. Enemy resistance in France, not just in Normandy, effectively collapsed and the way lay open to Paris, which was liberated on 25th August 1944. Amidst scenes of delirious joy, the Parisians warmly welcomed their liberators. Allied Commander-in-Chief General Eisenhower held back his American forces to allow the Free French 2nd Armoured Division (DDB) the honour of re-taking their Capital.

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The enemy was now caught between two fronts – American & British in the West and Russian in the East – resulting, after many more months of heavy fighting on the roads to Berlin, in complete victory over the Nazis.

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Everyone, young and old, returning or a first-time visitor, will find something of interest in the inspiring stories of D-Day. I visited alongside parties of schoolchildren from all over Europe –  Britain, Germany, and many other countries. There was no jingoism or militarism, just people of all ages and from all over the world, learning the story of those who put themselves in harm’s way to secure the freedom, peace and prosperity which many enjoy today and which we perhaps too often take for granted.

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…and after…

26 Sunday Mar 2017

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Uncategorized

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Thatching the cottage this spring

18 Saturday Mar 2017

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Les Iris, Travel

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thatched cottage

chaume

 

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Giverny, On and Off Canvas

21 Sunday Feb 2016

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Culture, Les Iris, Normandy, Things to do

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Art, Gardens, Monet

If you’re heading to Normandy and interested in gardening, a visit to Monet’s garden at Giverny will be on your bucket list. It’s an easy hour’s drive from Les Iris and a wonderful day trip.

For those in London before April 20th 2016, a great warm-up is Painting the Modern Garden: Monet to Matisse at the Royal Academy. Bringing together an immense number of works by Monet and his contemporaries, the exhibition examines the role gardens played in the evolution of art from the early 1860s to the 1920s.

It’s a blockbuster exhibit that brings many works together for the first time in living memory. Book ahead and expect crowds. The exhibition is free for under 16s, and the free Art Detectives guide kept our children engaged.

And if you can’t make it to London, the Royal Academy have produced an informative series of videos introducing artists’ gardens in northern France –  Monet at Giverny, Pierre Bonnard’s garden at Vernonnet in Normandy, and Henri Le Sidaner’s garden in the medieval village of Gerberoy, Picardy.

Monet in garden    Monet 2.PNG

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