Local explorations

On the recommendation of Tony from Paziol Rentals, we popped out to try the village restaurant last night. And my goodness, it didn't disappoint! We had snails in garlic and parsley butter for starters (just enough garlic and not the overpowering quantity that some restaurants choose to use!) and I had a "brochette de gambas et noix de Saint Jacques" (enormous king prawns and scallop skewer) which was just perfectly done whilst Andy had "joue de porc" (pig's cheek) cooked in their special homemade sauce which appeared to hit the spot. With the meal, we had a scrummy bottle of white Cotes du Roussillon 2009, Cuvée du Cigala from the Lesquerde Catalan vineyards. Very very tasty. We shall be returning there before the end of the week.

Today, it has still been incredibly windy but we ran a lovely little waymarked circuit direct from the house this afternoon. It took us on good tracks up the valley ...where we were surprised to stumble on quite a substantial vineyard!We were heading up to the head of the valley...from where we had a fairly steep climb on narrow paths up on to the ridge above where we were greeted by even more excellent tracks and superb views towards Pic de Canigou in the distance
The track went on for several kilometres and provided some fantastic running
and even more vineyards!
We arrived back, totally out of water, having covered 12.6kms with 532m ascent in 1 hr 42. Hotter, calmer weather is forecast for the rest of the week. An outing on the roadies has to be next on the cards. The roads around here are superb and I have already got a couple of good circuits downloaded. It is so good to be able to explore another wonderful area of France. Why would anybody want to go anywhere else?!