Provence Blog by ProvenceBeyond

Benedictine Nuns of Avignon not joining Lady Gaga

And they're not from Avignon. Major news sites today are announcing things like "An order of reclusive Benedictine nuns from Avignon has signed a major record deal with the company behind Lady Gaga". 

 The nuns are actually from the Benedictine Abbey of Our Lady of the Annunciation (Abbaye de Notre-Dame de l'Annonciation), between the villages of Le Barroux and Malaucène, in the Vaucluse department.

The deal is for a record of their Gregorian Chants, to be released in November 2010 by Decca Records. Decca (part of Universal Music) does also have Lady Gaga, along with several hundred or thousand other artists. Also, Avignon is 35 km to the southwest, well past the town of Carpentras. But then, who's heard of Le Barroux or even Malaucène, except for our Beyond readers.

The Most Expensive Towns in France

Nice (in the Alpes-Maritimes) was "high" on the list, the 5th most-expensive town in France of the 72 French communes compared. Another Alpes-Maritimes town, Antibes-Juan-les-Pins, was 11th, just beating out Paris.

Coastal towns in the Var did pretty well too: Hyères came in 3rd even more expensive than Nice, and Fréjus was only 17th, cheaper that Paris.

The survey was done 5000 super-stores, the grandes surfaces: large French supermarchés, hypermarchés and discounters. The products compared included groceries, hygene, beauty and other general items. The survey, released in March 2008, was done by LSA, a journal of distribution and "grande consommation".

One argument about southern towns being more expensive than those in the north of France is that the pay is lower in the north, therefore the difference between pay and prices is greater there. Still, the south coast of France tends to have higher rents, property prices and property taxes as well, so we don't see that having corresponding high prices is really a consolation.

Highest Prices
 1    Ajaccio (Corsica)
 3    Hyères
 5    Nice
11    Antibes-Juan-les-Pins
13    Paris [map]
17    Fréjus
22    Aix-en-Provence

... down to the least expensive:
 4    Calais [map, NW]    1c nw
 3    Troyes [map, SW]        2d sw
 2    Nancy [map, W]        2e w
 1    Charleville-Méjières [map, SE]    1d se

The north of France has 7 of the 10 least-expensive towns, and there are more "hard-discount" stores in the north. The Hauts-de-Seine around the west side of Paris [map] is the departement with the least number of discounters, and it has 7 of the 15 most-expensive towns.

Angelina, Brad, Knox and Vivienne in Nice

In a follow-up to our 3 July 08 blog titled "Quadruplets for Angelina & Brad", the twins have really arrived this time. Named Knox Leon and Vivienne Marcheline, the news was scooped by our local rag, the Nice Matin.

The Nice Matin had in-the-room details, directly from the source, so to speak, and the CNN website had an article about the Nice Matin, explaining why a small French local newspaper managed to scoop the high rollers.

Well, apparently the twins have really arrived this time, and only one pair of them.

For further news on this subject, don't watch this space.

Quadruplets for Angelina & Brad in the South of France

Just announced in the press that Angelina & Brad are about to give birth to twins. This same global press announced last month that Angelina & Brad gave birth to twins. We congratulate them on their four new babies, but we think that a pair of kids a month is a bit extreme, especially with all the starvation problems in the world.

"This time it's real!" (So was last time, they said.) The dynamic duo arrived at the Lenval Foundation in Nice on Sunday 29 June, by helicopter, and are checked into a corner room on the fifth floor.

Travelling by helicopter is a problem for the paparazzi, but good for the tiny villages surrounding the Domain Miraval in the Var where they are said (by the ever accurate news media) to be staying on a three-year lease. Miraval Estate is in a very rural, forested area of the Var, about half way between Cannes and Marseille, near the villages of Brignols, Châteauvert and Correns. And the chateau is in the center of the vast private area, so there aren't any reasonable peeking options.

It isn't likely that the new parents will be plodding down the long country lanes to the nearest hamlet with a café, so coming to the area for a look at them would be futile. And a helicopter going to or from the out-of-sight chateau 360 directions to choose from, none likely to be over a nearby village.

Parents Jolie and Pitt apparently have a few other pieds-a-terre in the Var (again the trusty news media), so there's no telling which on they're at at any moment, or even if they are in the Var at a particular time. And even more en-plus, the reports of their rental at part of Miraval hasn't actually been confirmed - that could also be part of the great shell game.

We're looking forward to the news announcement of the August twins.

Taxi Kidnappers

History of Ransoms.
France has an unfortunate history of special-interest groups holding the country to ransom by blockading roads, ports, airports and other key points. The sequence is the same each time:
(1) a proposed change in the laws is announced to improve the economy of the country, improve the lot of the people or some other well-intentioned improvement.
(2) a special-interest group blockades key infrastructure points. This has worked well in the past for groups with the easy means to blockades, such as truck drivers and ... taxi drivers.
(3) the proposed changes are withdrawn - and France remains in the past.

The Commission.
In August 2007 a commission was set up, lead by M. Jacques Attali, to propose a set of changes to make France more economically efficient and competitive in the world market. At that time, the President of the Republic said about the Attali commission: "What you propose, we will do...".

The Proposal.
The Attali Report came out in January 2008. One of the 300 changes proposed was to liberalize taxi businesses. Instead of a town having a very restricted number of licensed taxis for a very limited and controlled selection of drivers, the business would be open to competition. This idea of course inflamed the taxi drivers –– competition might be ok for the consumer, but not for the entrenched drivers. There are some valid problems that would need to be solved, such as the very expensive permit (medallian) that the current taxi drivers have invested in, but the bottom line is competition and the people most affected are the consumers.

The Ransom.
Last week taxis in several towns blockaded roads and airports, including the Nice airport. Sure, people struggled to and from terminals by walking and dragging their luggage, with great anxiety. Sure, people missed their flights. But competition was at stake.
This week the Nice taxis blockaded the autoroutes around the town. Not a complete blocade but a "slow down". Roads that are overly congested at the best of times became unbearable for the rest of the drivers (including anyone trying to get to the airport to catch a flight).

The Solution.
The French government today has apparently given in -- once again. "What you propose, we will do...", but not for the taxis, and not for that other special-interest group, and not for this special-interest group. For the rest of us? Well, maybe the next presidental election will give us a new set of promised changes to hope for.

Big Brother in Grasse

Our neighboring enclave of Monaco has been renowned for decades for the video surveillance watching our every move, long before London gained its reputation for being the world leader in spy cameras.

Now our own town of Grasse is joining the 21st-century club of electronic crime-stopping towns. From the beginning of December, a video surveillance systme has been put in place. It's on a trail basis for the moment, but it seems to be working quite well and is no doubt here to stay.

There are 13 cameras in this initial system: 6 in Grasse centre-ville, 2 in the lower-town area called Le Plan, and 5 in the low-cost housing area near the Quatre-Chemins called Blaquière (being renamed Fleurs de Grasse as part of an image-inhancement plan).

The controlable cameras are monitored 24/7, and the video images are stored on hard disc for 15 days, then the old images are erased. Tight controls are in place limiting who has access to the images, and for very controlled times.

We're sleeping better now.

Ratapignata Grotto Historical Site

The ancient pyramid and grotto of Ratapignata, near Falicon and north of Nice, has just been declared a France National Monument (monument historique). This is just over two centuries after its 1803 discovery by the area visitor Domenico Rossetti.

Better European Rail Travel Coming

European rail companies, including France's SNCF and companies from Austria, Belgium, Britain, Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland have formed the Railteam group, that intends to imitate airline alliances by providing seamless international travel on one ticket.

Passengers taking high-speed train journeys between those countries will be able to switch railroad companies without changing tickets, benefit from lounges and other services offered at major hubs, and if a train is missed, take a later train with the same ticket.

(Source Reuters via International Herald Tribune)

Tour de France starting in Monaco

The Tour de France 2007 cycling event begins next week, 7 July, with its start in London. Next year, the 2008 Tour de France will begin in Brest [map]. Rumour (very unofficial) has it that the 2009 Tour de France will begin in Monaco [map].

The Tour director was quoted recently saying, "in general, for a period of five years we have the Tour start outside of France 3 times and within France 2 times.

Starting the Tour in Monaco will be a first, but it has finished there twice in the past: once in 1955 and again in 1964.

The Tour de France doesn't often start or end at the sunny Cote d'Azur. The problem is because of traffic problems and hotel rooms this time of the year. The Tour takes place every July, during the busiest time for vacationing along coast. And with the limits imposed by the sea on one side and the mountains on the other the network of roads is already saturated.

Bordeaux World Heritage Site

Bordeaux [map] has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Rather than a specific object, such as a cathedral, a palace or an abbey, the complete "urban ensemble" has been declared a World Heritage Site. Key features are the 18th-century centre-ville buildings, the port and the docks.

Located in the Aquitaine region of Southwest France, Bordeaux is linked to the Mediterranean via the Garonne river at the Canal du Midi, itself a UNESCO World Heritage Site.