Near the Blanot Poterie

It has been pleasant to just hang out in Blanot and visit friends. It's rare for a day to pass without seeing Elisabeth.

I drop over to see Anne quite often in the late afternoon or early evening for tea and conversa-tion. Here are the yellow roses that bloom by her front steps, and the mass of hydran-geas that bloom nearby...



When I walk down the steps of my gite I see the pottery showroom, the double doors on the right, and the smaller pottery gite straight ahead. The colors are changing, but these leaves haven't fallen yet.

To see the pottery people pull the bell cord that you can see hanging by the double doors. Then they can sit in the chairs by the round table for the few minutes it takes for either Mireille or Noel to come from their house and workshop further up the hill.

This is part of the view from where I park my car. It's just a little way from my gite...

...and here are my front steps. The bush is also changing colors. The roses just keep blooming!

This sign for the pottery with its samples above is almost hidden in greenery. That's the roof of my gite in the background and I'm on my way to where the car gets parked. Later on after more warm days in November, I noticed this same greenery in bloom!

Below is another plant still in full bloom in front of the pottery showroom...

Days later I noticed these flowers by the door to the goat cheese shop...

One afternoon I went to eat dinner with Marie-Annick, Francis and Lauryne. It was so warm they set the table for outdoors...

On my way home from Sologny I took the pictures below. The day had been warm enough for just a T shirt, but fall has come to the vineyards. Still, the roses bloom!

As the season has progressed, all the leaves fell off the fig tree in Elisabeth's garden. This has made it easier to find the ripe figs before frost arrives to end the harvest. Along with saucisson and fresh goat cheese, I've had an ongoing feast of fresh figs!

The bush by my gite's steps also began losing its leaves, and then this single group of seed pods appeared.



Most of the leaves have also fallen from the rose bush by my gite, but the blooms are still spectacu-lar...



There is bound to be a killing frost before the end of November, but as of the 25th it hasn't yet happened.

Stepping indoors for a moment, there is another luxury I thoroughly enjoy and it depends on a towel rack unlike any I've seen in the US...

This white rack is directly across from my shower. It actually heats the bathroom while at the same time keeping my towel toasty warm!

After a shower it's an absolute delight to wrap up and dry off with a warm towel.

And while I'm on the subject of practical things, let me explain a little about shopping. All the shopping carts are locked together, but everyone has a plastic "coin" about the size of a nickel.

The carts in the picture are all locked. Slide the plastic coin into the slot and it pushes out the blue lock. After using the cart, to retrieve your coin simply push the lock back in which then pushes out your coin. I haven't seen a single shopping cart left in store parking lots; they all get returned and relocked.

On my way home from food shopping I suddenly noticed paragliders in the sky...

As I continued homeward, they kept appearing along the way.

I paused for a few pictures, but I was heading home to make beef stew for  Elisabeth, Anne and Francoise.




The next day I was ready to serve dinner, or dejeuner, at 1 o'clock. That's when the big meal is normally eaten.

We were having fruit cocktail as the mise en bouche, and I said that correctly, which got a big smile from  Elisabeth. She keeps pushing French words into my head. 
We played Rummikub afterwards which surprised Mireille when she stopped by before tending to customers at the pottery showroom.

One day Anne commented that people were stopping across the way to admire Daniel and Michelle's flowering jasmine vine studded with lingering white roses...