Monday 20th July

We went to the Sigoules wine festival on Saturday.  We had been in two minds about it, having partied on Tuesday, Thursday and Friday evenings, but thank goodness we did.  It may well now go down in the calendar as a ‘Must-Not-Miss’ fixture.  We had been to the Friday night Night Markets in Sigoules for the last two years, and I had noticed that these were not starting until next Friday, quite a bit later than most Night Markets, and now we know the reason why.

The Wine Festival is a massive undertaking, there were over forty stalls selling their wine alone, many grades of wine, some expensive and some for just 5 euro a bottle.  There were bars all around selling pression bier and limonade on tap.  And there was food, my goodness there was a lot of food.  The night market is held in a large rectangular area which is probably some sort of sports court in normal times, and tonight  there was a huge stage at one end and tables and chairs set out with food stalls and bars all the way round.  But the wine festival was much larger, it wound right round a couple of streets and to a park where again there were hundreds of tables and chairs set out.  This area was sheltered somewhat by rows of pollarded trees so we settled down here.  I went off to buy the food.

I had to first of all queue up to select my choices and pay for them, receiving a few slips or tickets.  This took about ten minutes, then I had to queue up again for the food.  It was quite hilarious really.  I wanted two melon baskets and the lady in charge of this was also serving salad crudités.  Both of these items were pre-prepared and in a fridge on different shelves behind her.  Simple, no?  Oh no.  I watched in amazement her confusion and when it came to my turn I gave her my two tickets with ‘Melon’ written on each.  I said “Deux melons, plais Madame.”  She looked at me, looked at the tickets, back at me, back at the tickets. “Melon?” she said.  “Oui” I replied “Deux”.  “Deux?” she asked me. And in English I couldn’t help saying, half under my breath.  “Yes, that is what I have paid for, that is what it says on the tickets”.  She looked flustered, grabbed a pen and ferociously scribbled out the words ‘Melon’ and screwed up my tickets and looked to the next person in the queue.  “Mes Melon Madame?” I interrupted.  She looked really annoyed, harrumphed and turned to her fridge and looking at both the melons and the salads turned to me again and said “Melon?” “Oui Madame, deux si vous plait”.  She grabbed hold of two salads and then put them back and eventually (almost five minutes into the transaction) I got my melons.  She was just as speedy with everyone.  Luckily when I went for paella the guy serving this had a brain and served me straight-away, recognizing the word ‘paella’ on my ticket straight away.  Anyway the food was delicious as was the wine.

Late we watched the show.  A disco extravaganza.  Very loud backing tracks as eight dancers, four boys and four girls danced and sang mostly in English.  Great fun, and they really worked hard, and kept slipping off for at least five costume changes.  It was almost 11.00 p.m. at half time and we left, even though the dancers were returning soon for another burst of Disco Inferno.  A great night, another great night here in France.  Admit it, if this took place in England there would be a £5 parking fee, a £20 entry fee, the wine would be £5 a glass rather than a bottle, and a meal at least £25, where all our food for two was only 18 euros, no parking and no entry fee and the wine 5 euro a bottle….no contest.