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France
Travel
The French
wrote the book on la vie en rose and gave
the world Champagne and camembert, de Beauvoir and Debussy, the
Tour de France and the Tour Eiffel. So if they have a finely
tuned sense of national pride, who are we to point fingers?
Although the ubiquity of Levis and Le Big Mac flusters the
country's cultural purists, anything from a year in Provence to
a weekend in Paris will explain why half the world grows dreamy
over stalking the streets of Cyrano or picnicking Manet-style
sur l'herbe. France has been synonymous with Romance for longer
than your grandmother cares to remember, so whether you visit
Paris or the Pyrenees, the Côte d'Azur or the auberge de
jeunesse, be sure to keep your fantasies in check, your
expectations in line and your joie in your vivre.
Spring offers the
best weather to visitors, with beach tourism picking up in May.
Temperatures aren't too bad in autumn, although the short days
mean limited sunlight and the cold starts to make itself felt
towards the end of the season, even along the Côte d'Azur.
Winter means playing in the snow in France's Alps and Pyrenees,
though the Christmas school holidays send hordes of tadpoles in
uniform scurrying for the slopes. Mid-July through the end of
August is when most city dwellers take their annual five weeks'
vacation to the coasts and mountains, and the half-desolate
cities tend to shut down a bit accordingly. Likewise during
February and March.
The French
are a festive bunch, with many cities hosting music, dance,
theatre, cinema or art events each year. Rural villages hold
fairs and fêtes which celebrate everything from local
saints to agricultural progress. Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer in
Provence is the venue for a colourful gypsy festival in
late May honouring Sarah, patron saint of the gypsies.
Enthusiastic singing and dancing characterise this extravaganza.
Prominent national days off are May Day (1 May), when
people trade gifts of muguet (lily of the valley) for
good luck; and Bastille Day (14 July), which is
celebrated by throwing firecrackers at friends. Regional events
include the primping and preening prêt à porter fashion
show in Paris (early February); the glittering and often-canned
Cannes Film Festival (mid-May); the International
Music Festival in Strasbourg (first three weeks of June);
the mainstream and fringe theatre of the Festival d'Avignon
(mid-July to mid-August) and the Jazz Festival in Nancy
(9-24 October).
The city of
Paris was, is, and always will be the classic travel
destination--awesomely lovely, sensual and pulsating, the home
of our most ambitious human aspirations in art, architecture,
philosophy, and literature. Though the Parisians can be
short-tempered with awkward tourists, their response is mainly a
mannerism rather than an actual desire to be discourteous. By
developing a "thick skin" to all the imagined slights of Paris,
tourists can enjoy one of the best city stays on earth. As for
myself, whenever I return to Paris, I feel as if an atomizer of
perfume has just exploded, and all the world is filled with
sweetness and little beads of light.
