The Vendee

We leave the Vendee on Thursday and we will miss it. We have only lived here for 8 weeks but have had a holiday home in St Michel en l'herm for 5 years. The Vendee for those who don't know is one of France's 96 departments (counties) and is the area of coast between Brittany and La Rochelle, the most southerly part being approximately on the half way point of the country running North to South. The area is mainly farmland, little industry with a number of tourist towns along the coast capitalising on the almost unbroken sandy beaches that run along the Atlantic coast often behind a thin barricade of pine trees. This is the campsite centre of France and for a very good reason. The weather is on average about 4 degrees warmer throughout the year than London. If you haven't ever visited, do so.

In my previous writing on cycling, I talked about the area around St Michel. This is very fertile land, having been reclaimed from the sea 500 or so years ago. The area is very flat as you would expect and is criss crossed with canals, both large and small draining the land. There is an abundance of bird life, especially noticable are the huge buzzards, the hawks that are forever circling the fields waiting to pounce and the herons. There are herons aplenty, both the white and large grey varieties. The dykes are also the home to Ragondin, an otter like pest that has populated this area.

The people are friendly, the life style relaxed and the road are quiet. In the evening in the village often there is almost silence except for the birds, the owls that live by the church and the ringing of the church bell. The bell here chimes twice every hour at five to and on the hour. This was done so that workers in the fields would be alerted by the first set of chimes and could then count the second set

The one dampner on our time here is that the area is recovering from Xnythia a storm that hit the area on the night of 28th Feb this year. You may recall that the UK was due to be hit by a storm of high intensity and weather warnings were issued for a number of days beforehand. As it was it missed the UK but having crossed the Atlantic hit the French coast with 100mph winds and an 8ft sea swell at the twin towns of La Faute sur Mer and L'Aguillon sur mer breaking through the sea wall in a number of places. These are twin towns either side of the River Lay estuary and are only 5 kms from St Michel. The storm hit at night with a much greater severity than was expected. More than 50 people were killed in France, the majority drowned in their beds in La Faute.

The area is recovering, although the road to Aiguillon point is still closed. Houses are being demolished both because they are unsafe and also because Sarkosy demanded that houses built in unsafe areas be demolished.
Declaring it a “national catastrophe”, Mr Sarkozy also ordered an inquiry to establish how sea levees broke as the storms battered western coastal regions.

“We have to find out how families in France in the 21st century can be surprised in their sleep and drowned in their own houses,” he said at a meeting with local authorities

“We have to shed light as urgently as possible on this unacceptable and incomprehensible drama.”

The picture below shows the extent of the flooding. Thousands of acres were underwater and it is not yet apparent if this year's crop will be usable. Hundreds of animals were drowned. Farmers could not use their milk as it tasted of salt where the fields were flooded




We have attended a number of charity events for the victims of Xynthia. For a large number of the people of the Vendee the events of 28th Feb will never leave them. To all of us it is a reminder that nature is much more powerful than we will ever be. And last and not least perhaps we should reflect on how we view world events as the bare breasted SAM from Evesham said in the Sun " oh what a good job the storm didn't hit the UK. I had forgotten to take my knickers off the line and who knows where they would have ended up"