After the rain

Last week we had two full days of rain – the first real rainfall since the spring!!  I was thinking of all the parched plants everywhere, and how this rain might just save some of them.

With rain, it’s either feast or famine here in our area – very rarely do we get a steady drizzle which lasts for days, and which would be so good for nature.  No, here it was heavy rainfall, torrential at times.  Slowly but steadily the ditches filled up with water, and the dried up gulleys turned into raging torrents.  The river in Saint-Chinian rose some, although not as much as I have seen it rise in the past.

The rain stopped Friday morning, and I had arranged to meet friends for lunch in La Caunette that day.  On the drive to La Caunette the sun started to peek through the clouds.  Before passing through Agel, there’s a spot where the river Cesse runs very close to the road.  For most of the year, the river here is dry, and in the winter there is sometimes a little water flowing, as in the picture below.

After the rain, the river looked very different!

With the sun coming out, the countryside looked sparkling, as though it had just been scrubbed clean – well, it really had had a good clean with all that rain!

Lunch at Restaurant La Cave in La Caunette was lovely; the food was good home-cooking, and as tasty as always, and the company was great!

Everybody chose the same starter from the daily menu, a tart with bacon, comte cheese and grapes.  The pastry was crisp and flaky, the tart hot from the oven, and the salad leaves were perfectly dressed.

Everyone agreed on the same main course too: Parmentier of ox tail.  Succulent pieces of ox tail meat were hiding under a layer of mashed potatoes and carrots – a bit like a shepherd’s pie, really, and very tasty!

When it came to dessert, opinions differed, and we finally had some variety on our table! 🙂

Pear poached in red wine:

Chestnut mousse:

Speculoos flan with caramel sauce (speculoos are spiced cookies from Belgium):

All three were excellent.  We drank a very nice red wine with the meal, which came from Domaine Le Cazal, just outside La Caunette.

After lunch, a stroll around La Caunette was de rigeur.  Here’s a view of the village from the iron bridge, with the river below.  For most of the year there is no water in the river!  The founders of the village knew why they built the houses a way up the hill from the river!!

In the village, there was water flowing seemingly everywhere – from under houses, above a garage, down gulleys…

Usually, la fontaine is a steady jet of water, rather sedate – the extra water pressure made for a very different jet!

All too soon, the water will stop running and everything will go back to what it was like before all the rain!  I leave you with two pictures, both showing beautiful autumn colours.  One is of fruits on a vigne vierge, a Virginia creeper, the other is of pomegranates.  I hope you’ve enjoyed our little outing as much as I did!!