More Songs From the Auverne

The auberge at the summit of the Col de Legal, 1231 metres says the signboard, has the largest fireplace that I have ever seen, surpassing even those of our stately tudor palaces. It must have been twelve feet from one side to the other and would have swallowed whole tree trunks; indeed a minor forest fire would be required I would have thought to have enabled the chimney to pull without smoking. But there wasn't a fire yesterday as we sat eating a sandwich of 'jambon du pays' finished greedily with a 'crepe au sucre'.

We had planned to take the route over the Col de Peyrol but long before we got there a helpful indicator board told us it was closed. Probably still by the heavy snow on the volanic peak of Puy Mary and which now lies white and crisp on the high sunlit slopes; though for all I know the cause of the closure could simply have been roadworks. Even on the much lower Col de Legal - the height of Ben Nevis or thereabouts - the last remnants of white winter lay mudded and melting in the gutters of the road.

Cantal's national Volcano Park, as it proudly announces itself, is quite magnificent. The scale of these extinct behemoths towering into the sky from the fertile green valleys below is breathtaking. It's as if the Brecon Beacons of home were a children's model while this was the real thing. From the ridge road you look out as from the window of an aeroplane at the tiny farms so far below. It is both a humbling and an enriching experience.

Yet overwhelmingly it is the emptiness that is eery - the lack of people, the lack of life even. Certainly there is agriculture, but there is little else except tourism and there are not many tourists in March. You could be on the steppes of Asia rather than in the middle of overcrowded, bustling Europe.

We stopped for a morning beer in the town of Salers extolled by the guidebooks as one whose beauty is unsurpassed. The population, said the book, was 410 - small you might have felt for a town with architecture enough to hold ten times that number.

The reason is clear. Every other house has become a restaurant; the whole place is nothing but a tourist honeytrap. The trouble was, as there were no tourists, none of the restaurants were open, nor for that matter was anything else. The place was deserted as if some invading army were imminently expected. For once the old air raid siren on the roof of the Town Hall seemed strictly purposeful.

So we sat in the windy sunshine before a statue of the extravagantly named Tissanier D'Escous, who had restored the town's fortunes 150 years ago. His bronze eyes gaze out over the town's high ramparts to the fertile volcanic plain below. And though every house, every street, every roof, every window is an achingly beautiful architectural gem, I felt most uncomfortable and was glad to scuttle away, the car labouring, onwards and upwards, in the direction of the snow covered peaks.

We returned via Aurillac where we stopped to buy provisions. Today is Sunday; Fennie is on cooking duty. What to cook when all the choice of a French hypermarket is to hand?

I picked out some lovely globe artichokes for starters that we shall eat with melted butter. And then on the fish counter I saw fillets of fresh Nile Perch - something I had never eaten before and so resolved instantly to try it.

But as an insurance (if it's so good why are the Tanzanians selling it to us?) I also bought trout fillets. I shall cook then side by side, maybe with a little white wine in a thin parsley sauce and serve them with a beautifully fresh cauliflower. (I had the idea of preparing this 'au gratin' but suspect this may be overambitious). All will be accompanied by some sautéed potatoes, washed down with some splendid Luberon Rosé and finished with fruit braised in a little mountain honey.

It will be a thank-you to J and B for yesterday's mammoth tour and for my own labours - three hours of clearing the 'Sleeping Beauty' garden at the Mill the day before. Thirty years of brambles and buddleias had taken hold, even an oak sapling, maybe twenty feet tall and as thick as a fencing post shot skywards from the herbaceous border.

Yet the tenacity of nature is amazing, still inside the thickets were iris and daffodils, little lilac primulas and overgrown roses. The garden is but a quarter cleared and already my arms are cut to pieces. But the tonic of sunshine and real fresh air exercise makes everything worthwhile.

Very sadly there is another point to this exercise. The Mill is now for sale. A long story. This may be our last visit.