Day Ten – Lunch and Sadness - May 29, 2011

We didn’t have too much planned for today, for a change. While we didn’t sleep in, we didn’t rush too much getting ready for the day, and took a bit of extra time chatting at breakfast with Nick and Mary before packing up and heading out for the day.

The plans for the day included three main points – lunch in Nanteuil en Vallee, photos in Oradour Sur Glane, and wine on the terrace. Due to careful planning and execution, we managed to achieve all this and more (and a side note – the biggest beetle I’ve EVER seen has just flown onto our terrace – it’s bigger than my thumb – a search on google shows that it’s a Stag Beetle – a protected species in France).

We set out aiming for the nearby town of Verteuil (nearby to Nanteuil en Vallee anyway). We found it without much issue, thanks to Gazza, who rarely leads us astray. It turned out to be a charming little town, with its few shops open on a Sunday, which is unusual for this area of rural France. We picked up a couple bottles of Charentais wine for the evening before doing some further exploring. In addition to a local products shop, there is also a little working water mill on the Charente river – they are using the power for the little attached bakery it seems as well as attaching a power generator to it for the lights for the painting gallery upstairs. This whole thing is just under the big Chateau overlooking the village, so we spent a good 45 minutes taking photos of the place before packing back into Nancy (the car) and trying to find the scenic viewpoint in Les Touches as advertised on the signs.

While we found Les Touches, the viewpoint was nowhere to be seen. Disappointed, we instead aimed for a nearby Intermarche, thinking that the two bottles thus secured may not be enough for an entire afternoon and evening’s worth of sitting. Unfortunately Intermarches across the region apparently shut on Sundays and we were out of luck.

We decided instead to head to Nantueil early to explore the town a bit. It turned out this was a very good idea, as we spent about 30 minutes looking for a place to park. While it may be one of the most beautiful villages in France, it’s not one of the easiest to leave a car in. The medieval layout of the old village does feature some parking areas, but it’s quite popular and they were all full.

After far too long driving up and down very narrow streets, we gave up and parked next to the river outside of town. We walked back in and spent some time taking photos and looking in the old church in the middle of town. Fortunately the village shop wasn’t quite closed for the lunch hour and we managed to secure two more bottle of wine for our afternoon and evening enjoyment.

(Another incidental side note, as I’ve had quite a bit of the wine purchased today – both Jamie and I have decided to be cremated, in an effort to avoid accidentally becoming zombies. I’ve eaten brains already on this trip and didn’t enjoy them. I wouldn’t want to spend my afterlife being obsessed with the eating of same).

Wine secured, town explored, and photos taken, we sat down for the most extravagant and extended lunches of the trip thus far. As its Mother’s Day here in France, it was set menu only, with the only choices being meat or fish for a main course, and a full cheese platter or baked goats cheese after. The other three courses weren’t up for discussion.

Our two and a half hour lunch of glory included a first course of foie gras in chantilly crème with onion confiture and little gingerbread cakes, followed by a second course of scallops on salad. Third course was maigre for me (a meaty white fish, not sure what the English translation is) and veal in forestiere sauce for Jamie (forestiere sauce is a creamy mushroom sauce basically). Next was the cheese course, finished finally by strawberry millefeuille. All this, with a bottle of rose wine and a bottle of sparkling water, a kir for Jamie to start, and coffee for me to finish for €100. Definitely worth the money, and highly recommended.

Extraordinarily full, even for us, and extremely hot (it was in the high 20’s or even the low 30’s at this point) we made a carefully slow yet steady beeline to the blissful air conditioning of the car. Next on the list was Oradour-sur-Glane, a stop we actually considered skipping due to the heat and the lateness of the day. I’m glad we didn’t.

One day, June 10th to be exact, in 1944, a company of Nazi SS entered the town of Oradour Sur Glanes. Theories abound as to why they were there, or what their intentions were upon entering. What is known definitively is that of a town of 648 people, only 6 survived. They rounded everyone one up, separated the men from the women and children, and massacred them. The men were shot in several groups and then burned. The women and children were locked into the church. There was gunfire, and then the church was burned with all those left alive inside. Those that survived the massacre did so by running for the forest early – mostly children – and one woman who managed to jump out of the window behind the altar in the church.

The town was left more or less as it was that day in 1944. There are shells of buildings which have stood unoccupied for 70 years, fireplaces halfway up walls, twisted frames of beds and radiators and singer sewing machines strewn throughout the ruins. Rusting cars sit on the road and in garages, power lines sag down the road and the pavement is slowly disintegrating.

It’s been left as it was as a memorial to those that lost their lives, and as a reminder of the brutal inhumanity that mankind can inflict on others. Not a pleasant afternoon, but deeply moving. Perhaps more so than the horrors of the work camp we visited a few years ago in Sachsenhausen – this was a living town that stopped one sunny day in June 1944. Voices silenced forever – men, women, children, families. As the signs in the village say – never forget.

This was a bit of a sombre way to end the day, and we drove back to Confolens feeling a bit down. We opened a bottle of wine on the terrace and spent some time reflecting on the day. We’ve pretty much been here ever since. A takeaway pizza from up the road for dinner, a few bottle of local wine, leftover donuts from the market yesterday, and the most amazing view across the river and into Confolens to see us through the evening and night. There are worse ways to spend a Sunday.