Thursday 8 November 2018

Don Quixote is not dead!


...." the real Don Quixote, he who remained on earth and lives among us with his spirit - this Don Quixote was not converted, this Don Quixote continues to incite us, to make ourselves ridiculous, this Don Quixote must never die " Miguel de Unamuno


Looking through my binoculatos what can I see! The most delicious boobitatos!

To remind us of the beautiful summer we had, we look back at a fun show in Montelimar with Montelovelo and the kids in the playground of the housing estate. Yes!


A little cycle up the valley of the Drome, to ploof and splash in the river and visit our friends in Die....


Back down in the valley of the Rhone we have a funtastic, clowntastic Velorution with Alternatiba Valence!


Team Tour Alternatiba go! So good to see old friends and make new ones at Valence Atelier Libre, what a place!


Sniff, sniff.... of into the future go les Alernatibistas! A la prochaine!


Some picnic areas are just really sad, particularly the ones that are sponsored by hydro electric power stations.... our spirits were lifted by the sculpture...


Mooooh, high up in the mountains of Chambery, we pilgrimage to a giant cross to have a lovely pic-e-nic....


... the cows are friendly and so are the people in the Velobricolade, Chamberies beautiful D.I.Y bike workshop!


We like this part of the world! Meeting Julien again, another blast of a show in a bike workshop, one euro chocolate, grapes a plenty.... maybe we'll be back in March for the bianual forum du voyage a velo Velosons....





Comforting imagery on a nuclear power station, a child innocently playing on the beach..... a swan floating on a lake in the Dombs....


Velovagabondes keep your eyes peeled for the beautiful casa ciclista, gente estupendos, Velorutionaires universelles, people of joy and simplicity at Les voies d'la Fourche at Champvert just outside Decizes.


Where else could you have a summer fair with anarchist potatoes on the run trying to find their way back to to the mountain of Amidon...


.... on the planet Terre de Pommes..... the repieced map with only one square missing....




The campsite in Bourbon Lancy is a bit like being in the velo monkey zoo.... No! I'm not turning left down that there ditch!


Yes! Lets drive to the traffic jam festival in Lapalisse! Lets make a traffic jam... No! Lets follow the rainbow!


Lets follow the rainbow to the carpeted cycle path with sculptures and heavy rock music to make you groove....


Tile art Nr.17


The way to another wonderful show! Some people play Wembley Stadium, we play an abandoned tennis court chez Cathy and Gilles in the wonderful Domain de l'Ocrerie, chambres d'Hotes et maison des arts fantastique!
                                  

 

And one more show, the last one for this year in Toucy at La Californie newly formed recycling paradise cum cultural space!
Thank you Gilles for the balada triste flyer.....
                            
Alors, winter is upon us. No more pic-e-nic baskets until the spring and the release of Johnny Gigant and the Puta Benshi!
Thank you to all you weird, wonderful and absolutely lovely people that made this past year an impossible dream made possible!

And remember folks: “For neither good nor evil can last for ever; and so it follows that as evil has lasted a long time, good must now be close at hand.”― Cervantes, Don Quixote

Saturday 25 August 2018

Three Pedals to heaven..

Wohoo! After three years we met up with our friends from Le Tour Alternatiba and met some more wonderful people in Clermont Ferrand. It is getting hot and the hotter it gets the more important it is to meet people who are actively changing their ways of living and are inspiring others to do so.



https://tour.alternatiba.eu/




“There’s a time to sit down and work at your desk and there’s a time to get up and leave the area where you are comfortable.
That time is now.” Johan Rockström, executive director of the Stockholm Resilience Centre





That pirate up there on the big gurt lush wheely wheely thing is part of the local bike workshop Un Guidon dans la Tete in Clermont Ferrand http://www.unguidondanslatete.fr/ who organised a funky Velorution for the arrival of Le Tour with a colourful collection of recycled D.I.Y. crazy bikes.




They must all be children at Un Guidon dans la Tete, imagining different kinds of cities, towns with bicycles, space for people and trees to cool the cities down!




Maybe the people of the village of Miremont are children too! Who else would make such a funny village museum?
A little bit scary, especially as it was coming up to full moon


            

A fun labirynth of coloured he-stones, she-stones and stone-imals! We don't think children are dangerous!



One of our delicious pic nics, yum yum yum.


On the island of the Lac de Vassiviers we visit the Centre International d'Art et du Paysage de Vassivier and spend a beautiful afternoon in the forest.
Quiz: Spot the Goldsworthy. Which one is made by a child? And which is not land art at all?



The Millevache again, more ticks, more cows and not many people. So we are very happy to finally get to the Perigord and meet some like minded souls who invite us to play at the night market.
Mardignac in Ladignac   https://www.facebook.com/lelieudit87/ making Ladignac le Long a fun place to be  https://lelieudit.qsdf.org/
Here we also met a crazy man, a cyclist, maybe a child with very silly dreams and mad plans to cycle to Africa with his home made electric tricycle contraption powered by human beeings. Nous sommes tous les Champions!   http://www.champions.tk/

In Tulle we are hosted by another wonderfull bike workshop: A Bicyclette https://abicyclette-tulle.org/atelier

We get to dance at the Nuits de Nacre, festival de Accordeon, and play our show amongst a wheeze of accordions, fanfares and choirs. We have never performed so fast and loud and sweaty before!
http://www.accordeon.org/                    https://www.facebook.com/NuitsdeNacre/


The Massif Central is a never ending puzzle of hills and seams. Hills and forests and rivers. We are happy to stop for a couple of days in a little place called Nomadways http://nomadways.eu/en/ An interesting, new art project developing fast. Nestled in a little village on the river Dordogne there are opportunities here to make some art, run workshops and be part of a lively house.


Meanwhile at Fons, the giraffe is looking for her glasses she lost. Fons is a beautiful little village just outside Figeac. We play for the local cyclists and their neighbours outside the gite municipal.   https://fons-lot.fr/ressources-locales/hebergementhebergement/

And then in Figeac we are hosted by a beautiful cafe associatif L'Arrosoir   https://www.larrosoir.org/
A little treasure in a equally beautiful, medieval town.

Heading towards Millau we find a weigh bridge. Heyho! So we heyho and weigh our steeds!
Quiz: Who has the heavier bike? Who carries the tent now? And how heavy are we in total - bicycle, load and fully dressed riders? Answers on a postcard  please.


A-ha! We made it! Finally, after three years of erring and erranting we followed up Huberts invitation to be part of this truly wonderful festival du voyage lent Le Festival du Roc Castel!



We listened to flowers with angels, visited paradise... heaven, I'm in heaven...listen to the flower here..

... went to tank up the horse at the motorway service station...

.... cycled around the world on a velo d'appartement http://letourdumonde.org/en/welcome/
and fell in love with everybody at the beautiful festival of Roc Castel!
http://festival-roc-castel.eu/

Saturday 16 June 2018

Le petit tour etendu Alternatiba transiberica

We made it! Tomorrow we will join Le Tour Alternatiba. Not in Paris like planned, but in Clermont-Ferrand. 

On our little tour etendu we performed our show 11 times since arriving in France and visited many a magnificent place.... Ecolieus, farms, cyclists, bike workshops, bakers, artists, cafe associatifs ....

Le Ecolieu Galinette in Taller, dans les Landes.... https://ecolieu-galinette.puzl.com/ 
Cedric says: "...try replacing the word consume with the word waste every time you say it....." 


Next doors, in a village down the road the Ecolieu Jeanot https://jeanot.fr/ a wonderful non hierarchical place also the home of a local radio station https://hapchotwebradio.fr/


Still in Les Landes, in Belin Beliet a beautiful barn full of old books and paper treasure http://www.librairie-et-caetera.fr/
The recyclerie de Val Eyre in Belin Beliet that had just opened last time we visited in 2014 has grown and has now moved next to the dechetterie. More rubbish to recycle! Youpie! http://repeyre.fr/ 


In Bergerac we visited yet another D.I.Y. bike workshop, Roue Libre 24 https://www.rouelibrebergerac.fr/
A fun motivated bunch of cycling activists! Yes!


After Bergerac we stayed the night at a young family who are just starting their market garden in La Grand Chaux, Coutras. The neighbour has been making sheep cheese for many years...

Our next stop was Le Tuquet, another little hamlet where we stayed with a retired couple of foresters who have been creating a wild forest garden in amongst a sea of wheat fields....rewilding their garden, planting hedgerows, turning swimming pools into ponds...

We returned to Reparsac to visit Norbert and Marie Claude again at their Ferme d'Olivet, the home of the association Pain d'Ami https://paindami.wordpress.com/ wednesday is baking day! We played in their beautiful little venue barn, Salle dans la Paille.
Le Tour Alternatiba will be hosted here at the end of the month.


A fun filled weekend at La Maison Broche in Lusseray http://labolusseray.wixsite.com/chantier/le-projet a collective of artists restoring an old Maison de Marionettes...

Then another farm, more bread and circuses. At the Ferme du Bois du Treuil they grow the grain, mill it and bake it. Top! Mmmmh! http://www.farinepainbio.com/
Down the road La Motte Aubert, a big farm with camping a la ferme, gites... a salle de spectacle, artist residencies, tree planting project, free range chickens and soon a montesori school... www.motteaubert.com/fr/

In Thaire, just south of La Rochelle we visited the Bla Bla Caf', cafe bar associatif tres utile,  bringing  life back into the village https://www.facebook.com/groups/220918565068465/

Followed by La Court Echelle in Fontenay le Comte https://www.facebook.com/la.courte.echelle.fontenay.le.comte/
We played our show in this little cafe, bar, shop associatif in collaboration with the local bicycle collecive Roue Libre https://www.facebook.com/larouelibre85/


In Poitiers La Fete du Velo with Le Atelier Petit Plateau https://www.petitplateau.org/
another fun filled weekend with a Velorution, bicycle films, our show in a thunderstorm....

And another farm! This time with cows! La ferme ecologique de Gorce https://www.facebook.com/fermedegorce/
A great insight into ecological meat farming with passion.


Vive la Association! In Saint Leonard de Noblat we find a Brocante Associatif! https://www.mathusalem.org/



Then across the regional natural park Millevaches, full of forests and meadows, passing by the Magasin General, epicerie, bar, cafe, place to be with friendly folk in Tarnac https://www.facebook.com/mgtarnac/ 
to finally arrive in Clermont Ferrand to meet Alternatiba 63 https://www.facebook.com/alternatiba63/
and tomorrow Le Tour Alternatiba! https://tour.alternatiba.eu/