As good fortune would have it, 2017 has turned out to be our year for casual cruising: first, up the Columbia River from Astoria, OR, to Stevenson, WA, on the American Steamboat Line's American Express, and most recently in France from Paris North to the D-Day Beaches of Normandy on the Vantage Cruise Line's River Venture.
Our European journey started in the lovely town of Conflans at the confluence of the Oise and Seine Rivers. With our river boat docked on the right bank of the Seine alongside a host of barges (some of which had picturesquely been converted to homes, while another became a museum and yet another developed into the Je Sers boat church and soup kitchen), we spent our afternoon strolling the streets and enjoyed visiting a variety of flower, cheese, meat and bread shops. We were especially captivated by one of them, La Fromagerie D'Honorine, where the owner graciously pointed out her truffle cheeses and Charcuterie plate items, including Maison Ader duck and mushroom pâtés.
You're probably not surprised to learn that we exited the shop some time later with an armload of intriguing items, including a country style pork pâté with Boletus edulis and Armagnac which morphed into a much-appreciated midnight snack on slices of French bread (what else?) while sipping glasses of Normandy's Calvados apple brandy.
We were seduced by La Fromagerie D'Honorine's window
display of velvety mushrooms, sausages and pâtés!
This open air market entrepreneur counterpointed boxes of
Golden Chanterelles with boxes of Yellow Foot Mushrooms!
Here baskets of Golden Chanterelles were tucked among
exquisite displays of tomatoes, carrots, and greens.
Black chanterelles appeared to be the pride of this stall.
These elaborately fashioned fabric mushrooms
silently guarded tempting displays of seasonal sweets!
While it is true that we were too early to participate in the International Wild Mushroom Festival, which is held annually at the end of September in Belleme, France, perhaps our simple wanderings added another and more personal dimension to mushrooming in Normandy: the unexpected, the chance meeting of man and mushrooms, a réunion décontractée, a tête-à-tête, that surely enriched us in a very private and primitive way.