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Everything you always wanted to know about France - from France |
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France - Make your dream come true.
From "Homes" section of Sunday Mirror, 20 May 2007 A CHEER IN PROVENCE Peter Mayle’s books made Provence hugely popular. As a new film adaptation is released, we find out if the region is still affordable IT’S known as the Peter Mayle effect. Ever since A Year In Provence became a best-seller in 1989, we’ve been flocking to the region in our thousands. Even now, the author’s witty account of life in his adopted home, from the finer points of wine tasting to the thrills of goat racing, continues to draw us Brits to Provence. Advertisement It’s not hard to see what attracted Mayle to this corner of the south of France – the picture-postcard villages, expansive vineyards and chateaux are captivating. But with the price of land and property rising as a result of the region’s popularity, some have argued that Mayle’s books – he followed up A Year In Provence with Provence Toujours and A Good Year – have helped spoil the rural idyll they describe. Look closer, though, and there are still plenty of affordable dream homes to be found among Provence’s hills and villages and further afield in the sunny south. One family who found their own piece of paradise are Tony and Carole Tidswell, originally from Bracknell in Berkshire. After restoring a ruined medieval farmhouse in the region, they now live in a 19th Century home with their children in Montblanc, a village about an hour from where Mayle lives. “Prices have definitely gone up but you can still find a little cottage with a garden in Peter Mayle country for £170,000,” says Tony, 62. “I don’t always agree with Mayle’s observations of the French but we both agree we are in the best little corner of France!” Someone else who is well aware of the Mayle effect is the author himself. He now has to keep his address a closely-guarded secret, after his last home became a popular stop-off for tour buses. “We had people in the pool, in the garden, in the house and banging on the front door,” Mayle says. “We had to move – it got too much. “People ask me if I’ve ruined Provence, which now has more than its fair share of museums and ‘frou-frou’ gift shops. People say, ‘look how much it’s changed in the last few decades’. But everywhere has changed. The thing is that as long as there isn’t a war or pestilence people are going to go on travelling to nice parts of the world and Provence is a nice part of the world.” Mayle’s latest book on Provence, A Good Year, has been made into a film starring Russell Crowe as an unhappy City banker who inherits a chateau in Provence and falls in love with the region. The film brings back memories of Mayle’s first trip to the region, which he describes as “love at first sight”. “I was having a holiday on the Cote d’Azur with my wife and the weather was lousy so we decided to look at ‘the back bit’ away from the coast, which was how I thought of Provence at that point,” he recalls. “After seeing a gorgeous pink sunset, I thought, ‘gosh, you could live here and see that every night’.” Twenty years on and Peter Mayle still sees a Provençal sunset every night. “What strikes me about the people in Provence is they are always prepared to take the time to enjoy something – whether it’s a coffee, the sunset, a long meal or a good argument. “They live for the moment, and that’s very attractive.” We’ve never looked backTONY and Carole Tidswell left their home in Bracknell, Berkshire, 18 years ago to start up a new life in Provence with their children. 
Tony, 62, says: “I worked in computers and we lived in a typical executive new home. But we were despairing of life in the UK. “It was the early 1990s, not a good time, and we were worried in particular about the education system in England.” For the first three years in France, the Tidswells rented while they made sure it what they really wanted. They bought a ruin in the farming village of Nizas for £27,000 and began the painstaking process of restoration. “We were still working on it when we sold in 2004 and paid £370,000 for our 19th Century home in Montblanc, near Pezenas,” Tony says. Tony and Carole, 45, say it is great for their three children – Alexandra, 21, Miranda, 18 and Jack, 12 – to have grown up bilingual. “It isn’t always easy to earn a living in France and the bureaucracy can be frustrating. But we’ve been very happy with the health and education out here and we’ve never looked back. “And then of course there’s the wine… and the 300 days of sunshine a year!” There are over 2,000 features and articles on this site about French life and living in France. Do browse through our website and please use the advertising links, they help pay for the site. I do try to reply to all mail - Contact Me - most is about property or living in France. I publish comments in this newsletter which I believe are of interest and may help find answers for people wanting to come to France. I hope readers will go to the adverts which help support our overheads. |
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