The first thing we need to be clear about here is that Winter is coming, and soon. I’m often reminded that this is an extreme environment. We live in the mountains, on the slopes of the mountain and there’s going to be snow. The only question is when and how much. Not that there will be panic as might be the case elsewhere for the people in Savoie have always known what winter brings; cold and the necessity for keeping warm and being in the warm. I feel this keenly this year, the end of summer only a few weeks ago it seems, cooling pleasantly into colourful autumn, the hillsides a feast of different shades of yellow, red and orange. A couple of Sundays ago we walked, my friend and I, a short way up from the last driveable point below the Grand Bec which as you know dominates the head of our valley beyond Bozel. The cows were already down from the high pastures and we had passed them loitering in fields beside the road. The ground had already been snowed on once and the grass was damp and flattened, bushes had lost their colours and turned purplish brown seen from a distance, except for the scarlet berries of the mountain ash which grows at altitude, up to 2,200 metres. Two days later more snow fell and that’s probably the last we shall see of those slopes until spring. The snow fell as rain below 1800 metres and so far that’s what the weather has been as October has given way to November. In the village the birds are taking life more seriously. They still sing in the mornings, from 5.30, but I suspect this is to rouse the clan to the business of food hunting. My balcony must be a gift, a ready supply of seeds only two swoops away from the fir tree. I notice the sparrows come in force, ten or so at a time, their beaks drumming on the plastic tray as they stab for the small yellow grains, before belly flopping off the edge. I notice fewer blue-tits and great tits at the moment. My guess is that they are still able to find what they need in amongst the woodland trees fifty metres above the house. They will be back as soon as it snows.
All the tourist cars have fled. No more 92 or 75 from Paris, the 44’s have journeyed home to Nantes, the 13’s to Marseille and the 62’s to the Pas de Calais. 73’s are kings of the road in their own land once more. Not that they drive in any other way, ever. French licence plates will soon no longer have to bear the department of origin but will follow the British system of keeping a number for life. Where’s the sport in that I ask you! Brides-les-Bains is having a brief respite from its twin season status. The flower troughs are empty, the trees have been pollarded. The last of the budget slimmers have left and it is possible at last to park in the streets, although who wants to? Nothing is open save the pharmacy, the bank and the Spar, all on restricted times. Even the bar Parisien only serves in the mornings. However it’s a needed break and the locals you come across, and I count myself among them now, actually have time to talk, take a coffee.
A friend’s research showed that there are only 600 all year round inhabitants of the town and that many shopkeepers are not locals in that sense yet there are 5000 beds available in the town for the ski season in hotels, apartments and chalets. These must all be made ready for the start of December. In the resorts the maintenance crews have been working since the summer to make sure the ski lifts are ready. Building workers are making haste now for no crane may be left standing after the 15th December. The ground will soon be too hard to dig and construction sites will close down until April. My neighbours appear to have moved smoothly through their well practised routine of end of year activities. Weeks ago they picked apples and quinces and the last of the plums. I received plenty too but there’s no way to offer jams and preserves in return, they have too many as it is. Gabi’s apples are pressed in his barn using ancient wooden press, machinery from an earlier age, the juice trickling into a vat and then into an assortment of bottles to be drunk fresh or stored to become strongly alcoholic. A nearby walnut tree fell over this summer, remaining propped at an angle against the bank but not until all the nuts had been picked was the tree cut down. Vin de noix is delicious; a warm tasting wine, almost a liqueur.
There’s a saying here that wood warms you seven times before you burn it; since most of the villagers have some source of wood to collect this must be true. From cutting the tree, to dragging it and transporting it home, cutting it into metre lengths for first storage, then moving it again to cut shorter, 50 cm seems the usual, splitting the logs and stacking them in neat patterns against the wall, it’s a long process. In the end, all the forms of energy probably work out equally expensive. Clearly some use oil, since I see the Murebianco lorry coming up through the village. Some, like me, order wood either cut to size or in cubic metre ‘’stères’’. Some use electricity. But whatever method you choose you have to keep warm. And active. It’s not possible to stay warm even in a heated house if you don’t move about. This I saw clearly with old Claude whose kitchen was always at 24 degrees. We don’t wear moon boots or other fashion garb against the cold; just lots of layers. Similarly most cars are not off road vehicles. The chief requirement, I now realise is a good heater, good brakes and maybe snow tyres, unless you want driving to be a real sport ! We are fast approaching the winter days when ’I get all the news I need from the weather report’. Each time it rains I look out to see how far the snow/rain limit has descended. The peaks are set to be covered for the season now it’s clear.
In 221BC Hannibal passed this way with his 20,000 men, his hundreds of pack animals and his elephants. He chose to cross the Alps quite near here (it’s thought via the Saint Bernard pass) to attack Rome from the north. Even though it was only October he found the peaks covered with snow and spent fifteen days struggling over the mountains, fighting off wild mountain tribes of ‘ceutrons’, inhabitants who had never before seen elephants. There was no forage for the beasts, many fell and he lost a lot of men and supplies. The descent was worse, much steeper on the Italian side, the snow becoming treacherous under the passage of thousands of feet. They must have been so glad to reach the pleasant, still-warm meadows of northern Italy after experiencing this harsh region. I shall think of him this winter as I drive to work with the heater on and my snow chains in the boot.
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copyright Julia Austen 2015