The Renaudière vineyard outside Saint-Aignan-sur-Cher in the Centre-Val de Loire region in France — it's our back yard.
New leaves are growing on the grapevines after killing frosts in the first half of April.
Sunrise highlights the dark red leaves of a plum tree on our property.
Yellow coucou flowers ("cowslips" in English) are some of the first wildflowers that come up in springtime.They are a variety of primrose.
I've tilled the vegetable garden plot up twice now, and will till it at least one more time in Maybefore we plant tomatoes, beans, squash, and greens out there.
This walnut tree out on the vineyard road is just starting to come back to life.Welcome to the joli mois de mai — it's about the wettest month of the year here in the Loire Valley. And it's not always as warm as you might expect... We are told to expect low temperatures in the 30s in ºF over the next four or five days. We often have fires in the woodstove in May, and the danger of frost doesn't end until May 15.
"It's like living in San Francisco again. Back there, the heat came on nearly every morning, even in summer."
ReplyDeleteMark Twain said something like: The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco."
And I'm sure Twain was right. To think he lived for part of his life in Connecticut.
DeleteHe did live for some time In Hartford, and his house there is now a museum. https://marktwainhouse.org
DeleteSo he must have felt that SF in August was colder than Hartford in wimtertime!
DeleteI think there's some discussion as to the veracity of that quote. I've seen it attributed to others, and to other places. SF always seems damp and chilly to me, all that fog. The cold in Hartford is drier.
DeleteWell, if he didn't say it he should have. I remember that when Walt and I moved to SF in October 1986, we lived in a rooftop apartment in the southern part of the city, with a view out toward San Bruno Mtn. to the south and a nice wooden deck on the north side of the building. We had a wet winter but in the spring the weather improved. I bought some big clay pots and planted tomatoes on the deck. And we waited. By July, a strong cold wind had beaten the tomato plants to death. And the cold fog had caused them to start to rot in the pots. We didn't stay in that apartment long. We moved into a different place near Japantown and not far from Union Square in Sept. 1987. And we never planted tomatoes outdoors in SF again.
DeleteWell, gracious, that is chilly for May!
ReplyDeleteOur cold snap (nights around 29°F for about 3 nights), did not kill off our azalea blossoms, so I am very relieved.
That sounds like the weather we had in the middle of April. In our area, the big deal is the damage freezing springtime tenperatures can do to the grapes, which are the main source of income (in the form of wine) for so many people.
DeleteLove the picture with the sun coming up through your plum tree and the vines. Found a nice video of San Francisco in the summertime: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgiiMseGiyc
ReplyDeleteSummer of '67 ;-)
The first time I went to LA and SF was in 1963. I was 14 years old and didn't wear any flowers in my hair.
DeleteI do love that song.
DeleteI do hope you get some warm weather soon.
ReplyDeleteWe are about 330 miles farther north than Toronto, measuring from the equator.
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