Lawrence Durrell, Sommiere and the Camargue

Here's a question. Name me an English town in which the residency of a foreign writer is celebrated. Outside of Stratford and its Shakespeare industry, and Haworth and the Brontes, it's hard to think of instances where we even celebrate our own.

Sommiere (pictured) in France, north-east of Montpellier, lets you know at once that Lawrence Durrell spent the long and final portion of his life there. his house stands on the outskirts of town, and a Lawrence Durrell society runs a museum in his name and honour in the centre, to which signs point all tourists. Hooray for the French and their appreciation of writers. It's remarkable how the streets of the smallest town are often named after writers.

Our Sommiere stopover (in honour of Durrell, whose writngs helped forge our own beings as writers) was en route to the Camargue. The prime goal was more birding, the best sighting being the red-footed falcon, the funniest being the crowds of flamingoes, the most elusive the Cettis warblers singing in the reedbeds. the wite ponies and black hulls are emblematic of the area, though as tourism goes it's all somewhat like catching the melting snows on Kilimanjaro. Should the seas rise minimally, this unique habitat will be destroyed. For now it's like finding cowboy country on the Med.