No point in even trying to change the travellers’ cheques today.  I shall leave my passport where it is until tomorrow.  Mme was very understanding about the shower.  (In fact, she knew it was damaged and had already bought a replacement, but it was the wrong type).

After breakfast, I went for a quick stroll to get some fresh air, and look at the small market that was taking place outside the château next to the hotel.  It was overcast, and spitting with rain, and didn’t look a bit like a good day for a trip out.  I had made my mind up however, and besides, there was going to be absolutely nothing to do in Roanne on a Sunday, so I packed up the car and set off.

It was good to be on the open road again (and in the air-conditioned car – the horrendous 40+ days have thankfully passed, but the temperature is still in the 30’s, even when it is cloudy).  The miles between Roanne and St-Priest-La-Roche were soon covered. The sun even came out and the sky cleared. I paused only to photograph a magnificent charolais bull in a field next to the road, but when I got up close and he started taking a sullen interest in me, and I realised how muscular he was and how flimsy the barbed wire fence was.  I decided against hanging around, or antagonising him by pointing cameras at him, and beat a slow, cautious retreat instead.

The Château de la Roche and the Gorges de la Loire were lovely and I took a load of photographs there (even bothering to set up a picture of the photographer himself, just to prove I was actually there).  I left the Château just before 12 – it was about to shut of course until 2pm.  I realised that this mania for shutting everything tight over lunch is very telling about the different attitudes to work in France and England.  In England, people either work through their lunch hour and are compensated later (or not, in my case) or else they rush their lunch and use the time saved to get some shopping done.  In France, on the other hand, where everyone has an inalienable right to two hours of peace and calm in the centre of the day, and where a 35 hour week is written into the statute books, it is natural that the whole country must grind to a complete halt during the mid-day period.  (Which can be irritating!)  I wonder who has got it right?

There was a small bar and restaurant nearby and I stopped off to see about getting a coffee before moving on.  I was impressed by the size of the car park for such an out-of-the-way spot and was amused at their thinking they could ever fill it.  When I got to the terrasse of the restaurant however, I realised that they were busily preparing for the feeding of the five thousand.  There were tables crammed in everywhere, all set with cutlery and glasses, and I finally realised that I was witnessing the calm before the invasion.  French people take their Sunday lunches very seriously (and in restaurants).  I beat a hasty retreat and decided that it would be churlish not to experience the tradition, and set about finding a quieter restaurant for myself.  In the end, I finished up in Balbigny, where a hotel-restaurant called “Le Buffet” looked very closed until I saw some people going in.  Once again, it was crowded inside, but they found me a table and I set about lunch.

I discovered immediately why they called the place “Le Buffet”, because that was the first course, whatever menu you chose.  It was their speciality and they did it proud.  At one end of the room were a row of tables laden with astonishing fare. They had just about everything you could imagine, and I will attempt to remember the majority of them:- there were tomatoes, green salad, French beans, pasta, salsifis, braised leeks in vinaigrette, stuffed vine leaves, lentils, semoules, mussels, trout, tuna, roll-mops, black olives, cornichons, silverskin onions, saucisson sec, cured ham, salami, chorizo, beetroot, porc en croûte, pork scratchings (surprised me too!), green olives and peppers, potato salad, macédoine, plus one or two other things I didn’t recognise, and several others that I cannot recall.  The tables were groaning under the weight, and so was my plate as I carried it back to the table.  This was later followed by roast pork, a crème caramel and a coffee for 17 €.

I drove back to Roanne and had a well-earned nap in the heat of the afternoon before going for another stroll into town just before 5pm.  The sky was overcast again and it was spitting slightly, but nothing worrying. It didn’t get worrying until I was near the town hall and too far to run back.  There was a sudden strong wind, a clap of thunder and the sky turned leaden.  I just had time to make it into the bar on the square before the heavens opened and the roads turned into rivers.  I stayed there some time (fortunately I had my book with me – “7 jours pour une étérnité” by Marc Lévy) and ended up drinking several coffees.  Finally, the barmaid took pity on me and lent me her umbrella so that I could get back to the hotel.  

Given the weather, and the fact that I had already eaten too well for a major meal tonight, I decided to go to the pictures again, as they were playing “Charlie’s Angels” at the cinema next to the station.  The sound was very poor, and the dubbers were too busy trying to sound American/Irish/Black to talk clearly, so I just watched the pictures and followed the story as best I could.  Some good action photography, but not much of a plot (unless it is the one where you take a popular film and re-run the formula to squeeze more money out of it).

After the film I strolled for a bit in the cool air (it had stopped raining) and surprisingly found room for a sandwich au saucisson sec and a beer before turning in.

Tomorrow, I WILL cash my travellers’ cheques, return the umbrella, and hopefully tour the region to the North West of Roanne.

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