Helen and Geoff's Amazing Adventures

Have fun and do neat stuff

France road trip 2016

by | Apr 6, 2016 | France, Road trips

Once again we are spending a few weeks in France: first, a couple of weeks in Paris and then seven weeks in towns across the south. Slightly bigger ‘towns’ this time. We decided that although we prefer smallish town/villages, they need to be big enough to support a bakery. We are also a few weeks later in the season this time, so it will be a bit warmer. The rest is much the same – just us and our little leased Citroen car moving on every Saturday.

The seven towns are: Lyon, Isle-sur-la-Sorgue (in Provence/Luberon, the only repeat), Albi (just north of Toulouse), Arreau (Pyrenees), St Jean Pied de Port (Basque Pyrenees), Ambois (Loire), Dinnan (Britanny). So a big loop across the south and up the west. We pick up the car in Lyon after a fast train from Paris.

What do we plan to do? With a bit of luck, mainly eating and drinking. We have been and seen before. In Paris, we will visit a few old favourites, but not much else is planned. I’ve got the French Michelin guide recommendations app on my phone.

All the bookings for this trip were made in June last year. We have stayed with the HomeAway group as their site is by far the easiest to use, navigate and make payments.
France and Paris might be a little different. Because of the various attacks and bombings, France is still in a State of Emergency. We can expect much more military and police presence in public places and tourist attractions. What else will have changed? Are the Parisians still as happy and friendly as we have found them in the past? We will see.

Leaving this small village of ‘The Grange RSL LifeStyle Village’ even for a few months is not as easy as you might think. So much is going on in this very active village that we are seeing grow up around us. It is almost exactly a year ago that we came down here and put the first deposit on this house. We have now been here for 7 months. Loving it.

This will be the first time for many years that we have not been able to find house carers to look after our cats. Finding someone for Cherrybrook was always easy. Find someone for Wagga, not at all easy. No one replied. Neeka will spend the 10 weeks in a cattery.

Shield Shrimp

When it rains across Australia’s vast inland region, temporary pools crop up all over the arid ground, giving life to a strange desert crustacean known as the shield shrimp (Triops australiensis).

Named after the formidable carapace that shields its head and upper body, T. australiensis can grow up to 7.6 cm long, and it uses its long, segmented tail and mass of 60 or so legs to propel itself through shallow water.

It also breathes through these legs – its sub-class Branchiopoda means ‘gill-legged’ – and in the females these legs bear ovisacs for carrying their tiny eggs.

Several pix in the Photo Gallery and a movie.

Acacia peuce

A rare and endangered plant. The tree grows up to 15 to 18 metres (49 to 59 ft) high, with short horizontal branches and pendulous branchlets covered in needle-like phyllodes adapted for the arid dry climate. It has a distinctive habit more similar to a sheoak or a conifer.

Although speculated to have been widespread across central Australia during wetter climates 400,000 years ago, the population is now mostly restricted to three sites, separated by the encroaching Simpson Desert. In the Northern Territory, the species is restricted to the Mac Clark (Acacia peuce) Conservation Reserve which is surrounded by a pastoral lease, Andado Station. The other two sites are near Boulia and Birdsville in Queensland. The tree is found in open arid plains that usually receive less than 150 millimetres (5.9 in) of rain per annum. They grow on shallow sand aprons overlaying gibber or clay slopes and plains and between longitudinal dunes or on alluvial flats between ephemeral watercourses.

 

Owen Springs Reserve on Hugh River

Owen Springs was a station on the Hugh River. The Hugh River flows into the Finke (when it actually flows). Both cut through the Western MacDonnell Ranges. The image above shows Owen Springs Reserve as a dot at lower right. The river it is next to is the Hugh. Hermannsburg, our next town, is near middle left edge. Hermannsburg is almost on the Finke River. You can see both Hugh and Finke Rivers cutting through sections of MacDonnell Ranges.

Palm Valley

Palm Valley is within the Finke Gorge National Park southwest of Alice Springs. Palm Valley has a smallish population of Red Cabbage Palms (Livistona mariae). The nearest related species is 850 kilometres away in Katherine NT. The average rainfall for Palm Valley is just 200 mm per year. Small pockets of semi-permanent spring-fed pools allow the unique flora and fauna (desert fish, shield shrimps tadpoles and frogs) to survive.

It had been assumed that the cabbage palms were remnants of a prehistoric time when the climate supported tropical rainforest in what is now the arid inland of Australia. Genetic analysis published in 2012 determined that Livistona mariae at Palm Valley is actually the same species as Livistona rigida from samples collected near Katherine and Mount Isa, both around 1,000 kilometres (620 mi) away. It is now thought that aboriginal people brought the palms to here from Mataranka.

Mound Springs

Mound Springs occur around the Western edge of the Great Artesian Basin and represent a natural discharge of Artesian water that was captured many hundreds of kilometers away from rain falling along the Great Dividing Range and New Guinea. This article provides details. Dalhousie is an excellent example of a mound spring.

Great Artesian Basin map Great Artesian Basin diagram