Get More From Your Bowl

Happy Fall everyone, Winslow here!

I only say "Happy Fall" at this moment because it feels like most of the changes we will experience in France are happening now. The leaves are really turning now (though the young one says it's nothing like a New England autumn), humans are wearing coats, and holiday season has begun! Additionally, after a two-week break my two roommates are feeling the pressure of really settling in, for it's a long wait until our next vacation.

In a bar in Dijon the day before Halloween

So the first holiday of the season has passed. I have never had the pleasure of partaking in Halloween festivities, having lived in a not-so-young Florida neighborhood for most of my life, and this time in France it didn't quite deliver either. Even though people here seem to be overly invested in western culture, Halloween remains entirely an American holiday. We've seen a sprinkling of spooky things here; tacky plastic things on a front entrance or two, jack-o-lanterns, and a few kids dressed up as your basic witch or vampire. Some villages arrange trick-or-treating, but the young one says that the concept is novel to all her kids at school.

The young one tried to keep the Halloween spirit alive by carving this squash. It'll have to do until next year when maybe I'll finally be able to partake! Costume suggestions welcome.

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You must all be wondering where we decided to go at the end of our break. Only the mustard capital itself, Dijon! What inspired this? Not really sure, it was just somewhere to go. For me it didn't make any difference because either way I was trapped indoors since it was raining and the young one can be quite protective. We even woke up to snow one morning.

Rain or shine, here is the young one's list of things to do in Dijon:

1. Follow the owls

The owl has been a symbol of Dijon forever, all starting when someone carved one on the far side of the Notre-Dame.

The owls lead you around the city to all of its interesting historical points, including the church of Notre-Dame with all of its crazy gargoyles, a moutarderie, and the now-faceless "chouette" itself which people touch for good luck (with their left hand only).

2. Bird-watching at Lac Kir

Lac Kir is a man-made lake to the west of downtown. A mayor of the city thought it would be nice for recreational activities so he created it.

There appears to be a lot of varieties of birds around here including our personal favorite, the Eurasian coot.

Around the lake one can find a variety of outdoor gym equipment (pull-up bars, hurdles, dip rails) which seem to be popping up more and more in France.

3. Take the train to a village along the Grands Crus Trail

The vineyards along this trail are mostly UNESCO World Heritage sites. The ones we saw in Vougeot (clos-de-Vougeot) were abundant with grapes. You can't know how delicious they are until you try them, however seedy they may be (eat at your own risk).

Basically, the Burgundy region is more famous for their wine than their mustard. These are world-class vines.

Give yourself more daylight than we did, download the app that takes you through the region, and you'll have a fine day out in the countryside.

4. Go to a museum

All the museums in Dijon are free!

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We got home to our apartment just in time to turn on the heat for the first time, acknowledge the coming and going of Halloween, and for the young one to get to "Les Grands Feux" (The Big Fires) in the pottery region. After a cumulative 40 miles of biking she came home with this bowl, a product of the "raku" technique (if you want to know more feel free to look it up; it involves fire and carbon).

Here the young one will explain her motivations for biking 40 miles for this bowl:

"La Borne is the pottery capital of France, they've been doing it for centuries. Here in Bourges I have not succeeded in finding a way to continue making ceramics, so I had been looking forward to visiting this area as some kind of way back into that world. It's only 30 minutes north of Bourges by car, and you can't get there by public transportation, so I thought I'd push myself to bike. I was sort of picturing a festival when I got there, crowded streets, music, people doing pottery on the sides of the road or something. But it turns out that the week of Les Grands Feux is a way for the small villages in this area to publicize what they do year round. Families and friends get together, meet new people, invite new friends out to dinner, and watch their colleagues pack and unpack their kilns. The "festivities" are more intimate than what can be experienced in one day there. I hope to go back some day to make connections with people and their way of life."

So I guess the moral is here, get more from your bowl ?

Over and out,

Winslow and the young one

#france #dijon #halloween #travel #tapif #laborne