Le Chêne Vert

This little painting hung on the wall of our house in Calvi. It looked like the campanile of one of the churches we visited yesterday, perhaps in Calenzana or maybe Montemaggiore.

The Genoese… besides tending their gardens, they built churches, so many over the centuries… that the region was called ‘holy Balagne’; today their bell towers charmingly punctuate the landscape like a series of mild exclamation marks.

Corsica: Dana Facaros & Michael Pauls

But when I took it down I found Église d’Avapessa handwritten on the back. Continue reading “Le Chêne Vert”

Frames of reference

The Century Ilex Trail

This was another walk last summer, one of many suggested by the Tourist Office in Montefollonico where we were staying, but we chose this particular walk because of its promise of an ancient tree. Even though it was confusing. When I read, Discover the 100 years oak, I assumed it was a typo and they’d omitted a 0. Why celebrate a centennial tree? It must be a millennial. It was titled, The century Ilex trail, but then I read, You will get to the Palazzone farmhouse where, on your left, lies the big field hosting the ancient oak. Surely an ‘ancient’ tree must be more than a hundred years old. Well, that was the impetus for this walk, to guess the age of the tree, but I’m no dendrologist. Continue reading “The Century Ilex Trail”

Frames of reference