France gets 39 million visitors a year,  38 million of them were in Annecy yesterday  They were there to see this stunning little city beside a lake at the base of the French Alps. And we were part of that 38 million.  Sometimes when travelling I am made acutely aware of my own hypocrisy – yesterday was one such day.  I wished that Annecy had  fewer tourists, that it was less crowded, and yet I was part of that crowd…

Annecy is two hours north-east of Lyon by train and the journey itself is worth the cost of the fare. This part of France is made up of such a variety of micro-climates – it means that the city’s markets have easy access to the widest range of fruits and vegetables – dry land rice, wheat and livestock, temperate citrus and vine products, alpine berries, stone fruits, and dairy products. When this is combined with a French obsession with fresh food, generally, you get the type of food we are experiencing on this leg of our journey.  However, as locals also tend to shop at outdoor markets for fresh ingredients, and then you add tourists like me, the end result is a crowded small city .

I don’t believe I have seen better markets than those in this part of the world.  The cheese stalls in Annecy were obviously always going to appeal to someone like me.  The area is dotted by caves and tunnels, some of which are used to store and age their products – both cheese and wine. Quite a few of the stalls were being run by the family that made the cheese on offer.  Some vendors only sold one or two varieties of their own hand-made fromage (far more addictive than tobacco or heroin for your scribe) – no prize for guessing what we had for dinner last night. (Mind you, the Spar Supermarket in Rosewood also only sells two varieties of cheese – Kraft cheddar and Spar’s own-brand Grated Italian.  A similar passion for excellence, I guess?)

Lunch was at a restaurant beside one of the many streams that run through the city – again, it featured local produce – lamb, freshwater fish, and the best of salad vegetables. More wandering, more wondering, and more hypocricy made up the rest of our day before the journey home.  If the train trip to Annecy was worth the fare, we got even more value for money on the way home – we managed to miss a connecting train at one of the small stations on the way back to Lyon. It added an extra hour to our return journey…c’est la vie.

I read today there is a movement starting called ‘Slow Travel’ – akin to the Slow Food movement that began in Italy.  It is described a a form of travel where people stay put for a time and travel ‘deeply, rather than widely’, As our barista said today, it means staying long enough to take a photo you would put on your wall at home rather than simply taking a single selfie in front of the major landmarks in a town, posting it on Instagram or TikTok, then moving on. I agree with the philosophy entirely – my fear, however, is that 38 million tourists might want to stay put in Avignon – possibly our next day trip. Selfish bastards….

Farley

PS – I am beginning to wonder if Mr Putin might be thinking of sneaking into Avignon with those 38 million tourists for a bit of quiet time….