A quick note from Provence... 🇫🇷

Cheese, wine, sun and a dead rodent in a hanging basket 🧀

Bonjour, mes amis!

I write this from the dining table at the house we’ve rented for a week in sunny Aix-en-Provence, where we have spent five glorious days eating, drinking and shouting at each other during impassioned games of cards as the sun sets in a sky the colour of peaches and cream.

It is incredibly beautiful here - when we’re not languishing in the sun, snacking on bread and cheese or cooling off in the pool at the house, we’re wandering the streets of Aix-en-Provence, a place that I have come to feel very fond of. If I ever pluck up the courage to solo travel, it will be a strong contender.

A full travel diary will be coming your way very soon with all of my recommendations and must-see places, but I couldn’t not say a quick hello before I go back to my sun lounger and my book (I started reading Writers & Lovers yesterday but sadly, just couldn’t get into it - so I’ve started How to Kill Your Family instead, which is excellent so far).

I’m sure you’re wondering if I’m going to address the ‘dead rodent’ part of the subtitle in this post, to which I say of course, how could I leave you hanging on such a riveting cliffhanger?! It all began when we all started noticing a ‘fishy’ smell emanating from the doorway to the garden a couple of days ago.

Before I go on, let me preface this story by saying that there is always some kind of saga on a Rayment holiday: last year in Italy, our hire car kept breaking down every time we drove anywhere, including on the morning when we were attempting to make it to the airport on time for our flight. Before I met my partner James, I’m told there were holidays involving mysterious blood on staircases, relentless mosquito bites, dusty and noisy roadworks right outside the villa, phones dropped in pools, and Jo Malone gift sets mistakenly bought and then immediately binned by airport security staff.

ANYWAY, the fishy smell didn’t seem to be going away, but it also wasn’t really bothering anyone, so we just chalked it up to bad drainage and cracked on with our holiday. Little did we know, the smell was actually coming from a dead rodent that had got trapped in one of the hanging baskets by the door and was slowly decomposing in the summer heat, and none of us had noticed it until today.

The little guy is still in there as we speak, because none of us know how to get him out…so that’s nice.

But hey, as sagas go, this one is pretty tame in comparison to the many others I have heard about over the years. I guess that’s the beauty of an annual family trip: the hilarious anecdotes that get retold over and over on every holiday thereafter, a kind of storytelling only you can intimately understand, because you were there.

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I hope you are having a marvellous week, wherever you are and whatever you’re doing! I have so much to catch you all up on - not least, the Eras Tour, which was every bit as spectacular as I knew it would be. It’s been an eventful week! I can’t wait to be back in your inbox very soon.

Au revoir! x