Beneath the Pic du Canigou
‘The Pic du Canigou is my Eiffel Tower’, a winemaker in Roussillon told me; it overlooks the whole scene like the beacon of French Catalunia. The slopes and valleys around this famous Pyrenean peak make up one of my favourite areas in France to explore. And that’s saying something.
The best time to pop down to Ceret is in June when the cherries that grow there are so famously delicious that the first tray is sent to the Elysée in Paris for the president to munch on. I wonder if he spits the stones out of the window as he cruises to work in his limo, as I’ve done as I drove around, in wonder, up steep Pyrenean valleys, past beetled little villages, and snapping photos of abbeys, orchards, farmhouses and mountain tops with equal abandon.
Stay in the charming and amusing Le Mas Trilles, beneath Ceret, since the other fancy hotel in town is overpriced and under-cared-for. It’s a great choice—the owners Lazlo and Marie-France kept their guests laughing with cheerful nuggets of easy-living philosophy at breakfast, and dole out great suggestions of restaurants and of where to go and what to see for the entire time you’re there. They’re in the valley of the Tech, which like all the rest of the Pyrénées Orientales makes me want to move to the south to enjoy the glorious clear light off the mountains, just as in Provence, but with very few of the crowds.
The exception being Ceret itself which is firmly on the map, thanks to Matisse, Monet, Picasso et al, who got the fauviste movement under way in the nearby coastal town of Collioure, and who seem to have spent some cheerful summers painting in Ceret—its surroundings, its people and its rooftops. Tough life. The Modern Art Museum in the town is surprisingly stuffed full of paintings by the modern masters; surprising at least given the size of the town, but not given how pretty it is. If it were 1913 and I could throw together a canvas, I’d have moved here too.
Although town has more cafés than it ought, and although in the summer months it crawls a bit too much, just off season, it really is one of France’s prettiest—the ubiquitous French plane trees having been allowed to tower as high as they like (they’re usually substantially trimmed) reaching far above the towns rooftops, and shading the streets and squares beautifully.
It’s not on the ‘usual’ tour de France, but on trips coming in from Spain we’ll often try to persuade travellers to find time in their itinerary to discover this part of the Pyrenees: its wines, art, villages, coast and culture, and extremely garlicky cuisine.
Jack is an Englishman who seems to be turning more French by the minute. Shoot him an email if you want to hear more about the Pic du Canigou
