We had a great time picking out some cheese. After a couple of samples I got a 12 month old Gruyere to try. Wendy had a lovely time sampling olives. She tried 3 or 4 different ones before narrowing it down to 2 kinds to buy but only a small handful of each so she can buy more on Saturday.
There are so many different things to look at and all so fresh. The vegetables are wonderful.
We also got some thin-sliced dried sausage (goes with olives!)
We bought pâté de campagne from this stall. It tasted as good as it looked.
The cheese in France is amazing. My favorite is still Comte but I keep trying others thinking it's not right to buy just one kind when France apparently has more kinds of cheese than days in a year. We always have a Brie on the go too because we love the French pears and you just cannot eat a pear without a chunk of Brie - or vice versa.
The fish stalls are always popular. The gambas at this stall were plate size.
After we had made our purchases we headed off for a café creme for me and an espresso for Wendy at the sidewalk café right near the end of the market. It started to rain a bit but as soon as we finished we headed for our next destination: Jardin des Plantes. We had wanted to go Saturday or Sunday but the park was all locked up on the weekend because there was a big storm expected. I am not sure what the danger was but it was considered huge, "code orange". So we planned to stay home after getting groceries and did some housework. We were very disappointed when we only got a bit of rain. Nothing else. And everything locked up tight.
So we headed over to the Jardin des Plantes, just on the outside of the old town part of Montpellier. It's a very old park, dating back to 1593 and is the oldest botanical garden in France. Almost all the plants were labelled with Latin name and origin. This garden was originally associated with the medical school, and included a collection of medicinal species. Lovely to just walk around. Lots of others there having lunch or just browsing.
A really nice place to spend a little time wandering. We checked out the other old gate of Montpellier called Tour des Pins because there were two pine trees growing out of the top of the tower. At one time this was a walled city, with guard towers along its length. This is one of two original towers that still exist.
We went in search of two different churches and we found both but neither were open to visitors. So they will remain on the list for another day. (St. Pierre and St. Roch)
We are loving the tram system here. So easy, so cheap and so quick. Such fun people-watching too. I especially love watching little ones and getting them to smile. Tomorrow we will go hiking.
A bientôt
Marion et Wendy
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