The Leucate of oysters, dwarf flowers and cuckoos

Staring out of the window and taking walks is such a part of the writing life that we’re taking day trips out to so as to surprise ourselves into vacation mode. Time in nature, fine food and wine, all can nudge writing plans out of my head for a time.

Yesterday we headed for a favourite place, the area around the lighthouse above the French Mediterranean town of Leucate. The plain looks like a Neolithic settlement, though in fact the low crumbling walls are apparently remnants of some ancient agriculture. Miniature flowers stem from the sand, tiny sea narcissi and dwarf yellow iris. The bird of the previous visit was the Thekla lark. This time we found the great spotted cuckoo. It only just reaches into this part of France from further south, and these birds were scoping out the territory after arriving. They favour magpies as surrogate parents for their eggs, kakking away their un-cuckoo-like cries as they establish their territory.

Culinary treat of the week were the Leucate oysters, fresh from the fishmongers in town. Elegant, juicy, highly biteable, they filled us with the taste of sea and set the whole head and body tingling with health.

Tomorrow we head away for a few days … a fine dine-and-stay option at a wondrously good manor farm near Montpellier, Blancardy, then on for some birding in the Camargue.