arrived in aix

we left beaune thinking we’d find a cafe in one of the little wine towns. we headed to volnay, but discovered that it was such a small town, that at our late breakfast hour, there was no cafe open - maybe no cafe at all. i didn’t want to lose the opportunity to buy some wines directly, so on empty stomachs, we went looking. there was a man at the door of a winery and i went and timidly asked if it was too early to do a tasting. he looked at me shocked, and said, “[no, of course not]”. so we tasted his 3 wines and bought 2 of each. we eventually found a town big enough to have several cafes open.

arrived in aix. went directly to see amy and bob, who have keys to their friends’ house, where we will stay. they have a beautiful apt which is part of an older house with a lovely garden protected from the street by a wall. part of their space is a building that used to be an “orangerie” or conservatory. it is long and narrow with one long wall made of a series of arched windows. it was beautifully renovated to be a little modern and like a loft. the owner is always digging up roman artifacts on the property and the outdoor tabletop is an ancient millstone that he found. there is some sort of roman underground water system that he might use to make a lap pool. there are grapes hanging off vines which wind up an outdoor stairway. we had dinner outside, and it was lovely - exactly what i had been looking forward to in the south.

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