News from Nowhere

Roger found information about a walking route to explore the illumination of the city, and he was keen to try it out. The sun was low when we set out in search of dinner, but nowhere near set, and I was happy just to enjoy the evening light on the Belfry, and on St Nicholas', and on the view back to the three towers from St Michael's Bridge...

We ate at Balls & Glory, which does what it says on the tin: they serve meatballs. Giant meatballs, admittedly - imagine a Scotch egg in which the egg has been replaced by some kind of sauce - but meatballs, and nothing but. Well, OK, there's a choice of four balls, two pork, one chicken and one veg - and since Thursday is officially vegetarian day in Ghent I should probably have gone with that, but it was aubergine and tomato, and you never know with aubergine... Where was I? Balls & Glory wasn't our first choice, but it was fine, and cheerful: you choose your ball and whether you want it with stoemp (which is mash, and traditional) or salad, or bread and a little salad. There's beer or lemonade to drink, and wine as well if you want. There's one long table down the middle of the room, and little tables for two (or four if they squeeze up), and there's a carafe of water on your table and a bowl of apples for dessert, and we sat back and watched the Deliverooo drivers coming in to collect their orders.

By now it was dark, which was fine, that was the plan. I wasn't keen to do any more walking than we needed, but we did need to walk back to the hotel - and as soon as we set off, we found ourselves on a swing bridge, looking back to St Michael's Bridge:



and what we should have done, obviously, was head for those lights (maybe we will - we still have one night left); instead we followed the original plan, and saw a couple of public buildings lit up, which weren't very exciting. What would have been exciting would have been if those birds in my picture had been illuminated as they were supposed to be, and for a while this made us wonder if we had misunderstood and the circuit was not in fact illuminated at the moment. But we asked at the Tourist Office this morning, and the lady said it's all working, and she would report the problem with the birds.

For a catalogue of 'we didn't really get we'd we'd been wanting from the evening', we had a surprisingly good time anyway. There's probably an uplifting moral in that.

D. is with us: or rather, D. has gone to - Northallerton, I think - for the dinner which justified his coming to see us, and staying here last night and tonight. Not that staying here in order to dine in Northallerton makes enormous sense, but we're all glad of the excuse for a visit and don't enquire too closely.

A visitor is grounds for going out to lunch, and we thought we'd try somewhere new, and went to the farm shop at Knitsley. Success all round, I think. A pleasant drive out, with authentic April showers, and the verges thick with daffodils (were they always there, or is it an exceptionally good year?); a twenty minute wait for a table gave me time to buy goodies for tomorrow's lunch and further into the future; and good things for lunch. durham_rambler and I chose the 'pork tasting plate' (ham, pate, pork pie ans a particularly successful Scotch egg) while D. observed the traditions of the day French-style, by opting for the fish and chips. The dessert menu was less exciting, especially as we had seen the cakes counter on our way in, so we bought cakes to eat at home with coffee.

We drove home via Lanchester, since D. had not seen the information board about the Roman fort: the fort itself is unexcavated, so there isn't much to see, but the walls are visible - or rather, the core that remains when the stone has been robbed for use in more recent buildings:

On our first evening in Tarbert, we ate at the Starfish. It's the obvious choice: well recommended, inviting white exterior with blue shutters, local artwork on the walls, good seafood... Not cheap, but I'd happily have gone back there.

After spending the day in Skipness, we were back in Tarbert quite early. durham_rambler had had enough, but I didn't want to waste a minute of the last day of the holidaym so I went for one last walk round the harbour, one last inspection of the shop windows - there was some sort of promotion going on which included a competition for the shop window which best illustrated the theme 'space': lots of Star Wars models, some very fine planets, but why had the ships' chandler chosen to put three monkeys in their window? I had hoped to find the gallery listed as along this street, but instead took the steps up to the castle, which gave me some fine views over the town, took me through a belt of midges - only the second time of the trip when I was seriously bothered by them, and no more than an incentive to climb that little bit higher:



Steps led down the other side of the hill into woodland, and I was tempted, but it was time to return, and make plans for the evening. We decided to try the Anchorage Restaurant: the reviews were very mixed, but the positives were the sort of thing that appealed to us. The restaurant is next door to the Islay Frigate pub, and not as distinct from it visually as it should be: we had walked past without really noticing it.

Inside, it's a tiny space, with a bar at the back and the kitchen behind that. The décor is best described as 'quirky' and has too many fishing nets for my taste, but the general effect reminded me of a French family-run restaurant - except that it wasn't busy: in all the time we were there we saw three tables occupied, ourselves included. Yet it was reasonably priced - cheaper than the Starfish - and the food was terrific. My seabass with fennel risotto and smoked mussels had slices of fennel in a creamy golden sauce with telltale strands of saffron. The homemade soda bread was packed with flavour: I tasted cumin, caraway, seasame - the chef told us there were ten different seeds in it. The cheese plate (actually a cheese slate, set carefully on the slate table mat before me) held five Scottish cheeses: Highland Chief (cheddat-type with whisky), smoked cheddar, Dunsyre blue, a ripe and flavourful Brie and an organic goat's milk log, plus an assortment of oatcakes, chutney and a heap of walnuts. I complimented the chef on the walnuts: "Just lightly toasted." This attention to details made his cooking really special.

I had the opportunity to talk to the chef because as well as cooking he was waiting at table: he explained to us that the waitress had called in to let him know she couldn't make that evening, but he hadn't picked up the call until too late. Over breakfast the following morning we explained this to our host at the Knap Guest House: "Oh, he always says that. He hasn't got a waitress..."

I've been posting about last summer's holiday in France all out of order, as it suited me. Time to pick up the threads, and progress a little. Where were we?

We spent two very happy days in Bordeaux, Sunday and Monday. On Tuesday we set off to our rendezvous with Helen, and ran into the transhumance in Saint Justin en route. Wednesday was the day we spent as guests of the Producteurs de Plaimont, learning about the wines of southwest France.

Thursday morning was fresh, bright and clear, and we could see the Pyrenees in the distance as we set off from the Relais du Bastidou. We weren't going that way, yet. Our schedule had brought us further south faster than we would otherwise have travelled; now we wanted to double back, to visit the wines of the Côtes de Brulhois, and maybe of Cahors, too. But first, we wanted to shop for some of the wines we had tasted the previous day. The Cave de Plaisance didn't stock Moonseng, but they did have, newly arrived, partly fermented grape juice from the current harvest ('bourrel?', say my notes, but I can't verify that name), pale and slightly cloudy, sweet but not cloying.

We drove along a ridge road between two green valleys, seeing no vines - but as we rose higher, so did the distant mountains. A signpost pointed to Bassoues reminded us that we had passed this way several times the previous day, so we detoured up to the hilltop village and admired its timber market hall, its quince trees, its 'donjon':



At the time it was a delightful morning's break, one last pleasure offered by a region we were about to leave. In retrospect, it was only the first of a series of beautiful old villages, any one of which would have been an extraordinary survival.

After the previous day's excesses, I wasn't expecting to want much for lunch, but the Routard guide recommended a restaurant, Le Florida in Verduzan, which was pretty much on our way. That recommendation alone was worth the price of the guide book.

( Lunch break )

And onwards, through the sunflower aftermath, the single plants self-seeded after the harvest, multiple flowers branching exuberant from the stalk, unconstrained by whatever limits the main crop to a single flat disk per tall stem. A brief stop at the Cave de Donzac, and on to La Borde Grande for the night.

We spent a wonderful day last week in the company of of our friend, wine-writer Helen Savage, as guests of the Producteurs de Plaimont wine co-operative.

( Cut for length, wine neepery and the odd picture. )

The Guardian travel supplement last Saturday offers a guide to Sardinia, ostensibly about the beaches, but with alluring descriptions of the nearby villages, because you've got to eat, haven't you? Naturally I want to go there - it's an island; I want to go to all the islands - but not this year.

Because this year I want to go to France. We are almost - but somehow, mysteriously, not quite - at the point of booking the ferry. It's too long since we have been to France. If you don't count a brief foray into the Pyrenees, during our Spanish holiday (and I don't see why I should count it, we spoke to no-one, we didn't even have a cup of coffee while we were there), then it's five years since we were in France, on our way home from the Villa Saraceno. We paused for a couple of days on the way home to do some walking in the vineyards of the Rhône valley - but in Switzerland - which I don't seem to have written anything about. Perhaps I will, one day, or perhaps not, but in any case, not now.

We left Switzerland at Le Locle, which proclaims itself "Cité de la Précision" That is, it's a clock town, industrial and slightly grubby, but with some quirky, interesting buildings, altogether more appealing than the smugness of ski towns like La Chaux de Fonds, which we had just passed through. The road took us through a cleft in the rock, and then forked, following the valley edge, with a statue of a cockerel in the V of the fork. Then left through a rock arch held together by metal bolts, wire mesh and something I can't now decipher -

- and we were in France, land of the elaborate horticultural sculpture on roundabouts:



This was in Villers le Lac (Doubs), where we lunched at Le Caméleon. My tarte à l'oignon was a thin, crispy pastry base, covered with cream and scattered with bacon and onions, served very hot - a kind of Alsatian pizza. For dessert I had the 'tourbillon des sapins', a whirlwind of pine trees - expressed by pine bud flavoured ice cream ('bourgeons de sapin') with a shot of sapin liqueur: it was ice cream rather than sorbet, freshly minty and faintly medicinal. I wouldn't have missed it for the world.

Edited (for once) to remove: a final paragraph which belongs in the next instalment.

We lunched yesterday at the Café Kisimul in Castlebay:



It may not look anything special, and the eclecticism of the menu is disconcerting (" A family run licensed restaurant specialising in Indian and Italian cuisine and local seafood") but the food is terrific: we should have tried to get in the previous evening, instead of eating at the big hotel where we were staying - we might even have had a bottle of Château Musar with the local lamb. For lunch we had scallop pakoras (sweet local scallops in the finest crust of spicy batter), a spinach and chickpea curry to share, thick and warming, and a delicate lemon tart ('mellow yellow' on the menu). If they'd just do away with the accompanying jazz it would be perfect.

At 3.30 (slightly late) we sailed out of Castlebay on the MV Clansman:



(Photo taken through a water-spotted window - please make allowances). It's a long trip back to Oban, especially as we called at Tiree and Coll; we had time for both sunshine and showers, and a double rainbow, and twilight and sunset:



before we came into Oban at 10.30. And today we drove home. There was more rain, and memories of our first visit to Oban, one bright frosty November, and there was the long road alongside Loch Lomond, with the water high in the loch to our left and woods full of bluebells sloping up to out tight. There was a lunch break at Cairn Lodge, the motorway service station by the gates of Castle Douglas, and there was a visit to Waitrose in Hexham to pick up supplies.

And there will be more holiday posts in due course, but right now, we're home.

Last weekend was Open Studios time in Newcastle's Ouseburn, and S. invited us to join her for Sunday brunch and to visit some studios thereafter. So we didn't spend as much time for hitting the studios or walking around the Ouseburn as we have done in some previous years, but on the plus side we had a delicious brunch with S., with the full cooked breakfast and ricotta pancakes and blueberries, and bread - well, OK, the bread was of my baking, and I think I have finally cracked Emily Dickinson's rye/cornmeal loaf - and conversation. And durham_rambler and I managed to visit the Mushroom Works before breakfast, where I bought some Christmas presents. I was interested to chat with Jane Frazer: her website shows some of the pieces I liked, her woven mesh and photo pieces, but not the long, loosely knitted strips holding a sequence of tiny pebbles. You could do something similar with my collection of fragments of blue-and-white pottery, I said, and yes, she said, she could...



After breakfast we went back to the other end of the Ouseburn - the river runs in a culvert under the monument in the photograph - and wandered through the various studios, and it was all agreeable enough but nothing particularly exciting. The things I liked were by people whose work I already knew I liked, there were no new discoveries.

On Tuesday we went into Newcastle again, for the North East Labour History Society's 'First Tuesday' talk, because it was about William Morris's visit to the North East during the Northumberland Miners' Strike. The speaker said that Morris had only visited Newcastle upon two occasions, and I could nit-pick and say that he travelled through Newcastle on his way to Iceland. But I won't, because it was a good talk, setting one small event in context, in Morris's life and thought, and in the history of the North East, and opening up to lively discussion afterwards.

It took place at the Newcastle Irish Centre, which is on the border of Chinatown, so afterwards we went down Stowell Street in search of Chinese food. We chose the Royal Emperor very nearly at random, and were well pleased. The charming young waiters looked after us, and took pains to serve us quickly so that we could reclaim our car from the car park before it closed. We had both chosen the a stir fry of scallops and broccoli for the main course, and briefly I regretted this - but once I tasted it, I knew I wouldn't have wanted to share it: the broccoli green and crunchy, the scallops milky sweet, the fresh heat of the slivers of ginger.

And since it is now December, we had Christmas music throughout.

So far, so good: we are in Tain.

The forecast for the last couple of days has been that the hot weather would give way imminently to thunderous storms. Our weather had already cooled to tolerable, but the thunderstorms were reportedly travelling up the country. Meanwhile the staff of Orkney Island Ferries are in dispute with the employer, and are working to rule.

Never mind. It's a long drive up from Durham - we set off at eleven this morning, and were here just before seven. We took the A68 up through Northumberland, between verges frothing with cow parsley and meadowsweet, and crossed the border at Carter Bar, under darkening skies. A break for lunch at Earlsdon, a petrol stop at Edinburgh, and as we drove on through the highlands the showers stopped and the mists closed in, veiling the firths and hanging low above the forested hills. Very atmospheric, especially accompanied by Stewart Hardy's fiddle playing on the car CD (still a novelty, a CD player in the car).

We ate at the St Duthus Hotel, described by our host as "good pub food". The alternatives were the more upmarket Royal Hotel, and the Indian restaurant, also recommended, but it's been a long day, and good pub food sounded about right.

We shared a starter of haggis-stuffed mushrooms, battered and deep-fried (of course) and served with a really peppery pepper sauce - crisp on the outside, moist and tasty inside, if you're going to do this, here's how you do it right. The smoked haddock fishcakes were OK but didn't live up to the starter (I'm always optimistic about fishcakes, and almost always disappointed). The chocolate fudge cake was evil, but then it always is. There was a choice of three wines, pinot grigio, chardonnay or cabernet merlot (I think). I asked for a dry white, so that's chardonnay in that glass; it's surprisingly disconcerting drinking white wine from a red glass.

It's a two hour drive to the north coast, and we're booked on a lunchtime ferry, so it should be an easier drive. The storms seem to be fading; well, so long as we don't meet them in the Pentland Firth...

At last the snow has all gone, and today was bright and sunny and very cold. I'm thinking back to last spring in California: time to resume the much delayed travelogue. After our day in Santa Cruz, we left Sunnyvale to explore a little further afield - and our first stop was Santa Cruz. I wanted to visit the Bonny Doon winery - indeed, this had been a major incentive to visit California. Plan A had been to visit as my birthday treat, and maybe even eat at their Cigare Volant, but we were too early in the season, it didn't work out (and now it seems it never will, as the restaurant has closed).

Once upon a time, I suppose, you could taste Bonny Doon at the winery itself, but now they are located on a commercial estate, tucked in behind the ethical supermarket near the lighthouse. We arrived in Santa Cruz early, before the tasting rooms were open, and had time to walk down to the ocean, to discover that the lighthouse was a surfing museum, and to explore the supermarket thoroughly, before getting down to serious business.

We stepped inside a vast hangar, the space broken up by screens, small tables and a long bar, with the iconic 'cigare volant' suspended above us: "That," said durham_rambler, "is what I call steampunk."

There was a choice of tasting menus, and we opted for the "reserve flight", the more expensive wines, on the basis that this was how we got to taste wines which were otherwise out of our reach. They were delicious, and I don't know why I don't have tasting notes - except that we were enjoying the wine, and talking about it to our nice server. I love Bonny Doon's presentation, their beautiful labels and their bad puns - reassuring to be reminded that they make delicious wines as well.

We lunched at Bonny Doon on a selection of 'small plates': smoked fingerling potatoes smoked with aïoli; shredded pork with artichoke relish and steamed rolls (the rolls were good crusty white rolls, which wasn't as exciting as it had sounded, but the relish was delicious, the flesh of the artichoke lightly pickled - high risk, I thought, letting vinegar so near their wine, but it worked just fine - and the petals crisply fried). Our nice server said: "I'd like your opinion of this, if you wouldn't mind," and poured me a taste of the wine formerly known as Clos de Gilroy, which was both flattering and generous. We'd had Clos de Gilroy in the past, when the grapes really were sourced from Gilroy - which is no longer the caser, hence its name. It's a fruity grenache wine, and the truth is that it was rather overshadowed by the Rhône-style wines we'd been tasting.

Our mission accomplished, we set off south down Highway 1 (to which nothing compares except of course Iceland's Route 1).