The way to Saint Affrique..

" Enjoy the paths and pleasures of the journey, as much as the final destination"

The destination was a mill near the countryside in a village called Saint Affrique, near the town Millau, in the Aveyron region somewhere in south central part of France. I would be surprised if you can find this place in Google Earth..

One of my friends working in Singapore, David had returned to France to spend his vacations, and for the third year he was organising a party for his friends in here. The concept is pretty simple: eat, drink, dance and loaf around in the rural settings, without the distractions of TV, internet etc..

I managed to cling onto other friends' car (Stephane and Albanne), for the ride to Len, and we passed thru some beautiful and varied landscape -

starting from dry sunny burnt out Provence which endured some recent forest fires,

delta plains of the Grand Rhone river- Camargue with wild horses and bulls as permanent residents,

steep mountains on the way to Millau offering scenic views,

a plateau with blonde grass and green shrubs for miles without a single tree in sight,

rustic agrarian villages by the hillside....

I would not have reached the destination if I wanted to stop to take pictures at every interesting place..

Since we could not join our hosts in time for a trek, we went around the town Millau (pronounced something like Meeyouw). We walked along the narrow streets, and climbing a 12th century tower. I guess people who lived then did not mind climbing spiralling stairs, with the width just enough for one person, and without much ventilation or windows to improve the claustrophobic confines of the tower.

But atop the tower we could clearly see the pride of Millau - a newly built, massively tall bridge carrying the highway. It is positioned between 2 mountains to take the aeriel route avoiding the valley in which Millau rests. To get an idea of the height of the thing, few of the pillars supporting the pont (bridge in French) are said to be taller than the Eiffel tower ! Later we passed under the bridge and marvelled at the engineering effort needed to construct it.

On the way to our final destination, Stephane suddenly exclaimed " Ah !! the wonderful smell of country", and rolled down the car windows.. While I was expecting the fragrance of some orchids typical to that region or some smell from the fields of some crop.. I was hit by the earthy odour of fresh fuming bovine excreta (commonly referred to as bull shit). I need not have come all the way from Mambalam, Chennai with all the slow moving cows-on-the-street to experience this sample of gobar-gas!!

We reached the Moulin(mill) by evening and the fun was yet to begin...