Durfort 2008 - Day 7

Before we knew it, Sunday had rolled around again in Durfort and it was time for another vide grenier. Several people were leaving today, some going home, some travelling on to their next destination but first, we were going to the flea market! I can't tell you the name of the village, as for some reason, my travel journal is a bit sparse about this day, but I do have photos. Wherever it was, there was this very interesting turreted building. There was also this collection of owls, which for some reason, is a very popular item at flea markets in France but we never did find anyone who could explain exactly why this was true.

After the flea market, I drove to Toulouse with Kate in my car and Carin followed in her car with Sydney, Wendy and Adrianne. We dropped Kate, Wendy and Adrianne at the train station where they were going to catch a train to Barcelona. The rest of us were going to stop somewhere for lunch but we got separated in the traffic leaving the train station, so I headed back to Durfort on my own.

On the way, I stopped several times to take photos of more sunflower fields, but at one point as I was driving, I could see a bell tower in the distance so I turned down the road and ended up in a very quaint little village whose name I swore I wouldn't forget but didn't write down and now can't remember! However, I do have several lovely photos of the church with the bell tower! There was another building there with very unusual architectural features - metal crosses on old stone walls and triangle shaped bits at ground level which might have been installed to keep the walls from falling down or for some sort of defensive purpose, I really couldn't say. The whole village seemed completely abandoned except for myself and two motorcyclists who were having a bite to eat in the shade of an ancient tree.

When I got back to La Cascade, all was quiet. It seemed strange with most of our group gone. That night, Carin, Jennifer, Shevawn and I had dinner at a restaurant in Soreze called Gigi's. Kate had eaten there in the week before we arrived and raved about the cassoulet, so we had to try it. It was delicious! Here's a picture of Carin and I with the two desserts that the 4 of us shared, which were also quite yummy. It was a lovely evening and quite different to be just 4 of us after a week of being a dozen or more all the time.

The most amazing thing was that on the (very short) drive back to Durfort, something hopped across the road in front of our car and it turned out to be a very small owl!! Carin very smartly suggested that we shouldn't stay too long with our headlights pointed at it, in case some other animal decided it would make a tasty snack so off we went. I looked up the habits of owls on the Internet once I got back home and learned that baby owls often hop before they learn to fly, so it must have been quite young. But it was a very special way to end our last night in Durfort, to have such a sighting!