France, Queen of the Roundabouts

One of the things some visitors to France comment on is just how many trafffic roundabouts there are in France. And they are not wrong. The statistics bear this out and show that France is a world leader in roundabouts. 

 This roundabout, in the industrial boondocks of Amboise, has an abandoned helipad in the centre.

According to the painstakingly calculated figures on the blog 'Beyond the Maps', the most roundabouts per population are to be found in mainly western France (Vendée, Loire-Atlantique, Landes, Mayenne) plus Pyrénées-Orientales in the south. The fewest roundabouts per population are around Paris and in the north east. We in Indre et Loire appear to sit in the middle. 

 A plane on a stick. To be precise, a Dassault Mirage IIIB two seater training jet previously of the French Air Force, now a roundabout decoration in Saint-Amand-Montrond

In terms of actual numbers of roundabouts there is a roughly east-west divide in the country, with the west being generally much more heavily endowed with roundabouts than the east. Toulouse takes the prize as the municipality with the most roundabouts (499 at last count). Virtually everywhere roundabout numbers are going up.

 

 A roundabout in the middle of le Blanc, a town about half an hour to the south of us.

 

France is the European record holder for roundabout density, easily outstripping neighbouring countries. The most famous roundabout in the country is of course the horror known as the Etoile, a six lane roundabout in central Paris, surrounding the Arc de Triomphe.

 

Arc de Triomphe and the Etoile.

This post is dedicated to entomologist Simon Leather, who loved aphids and France, but sadly died while being treated for colon cancer a few years ago. His blog is called 'Don't Forget the Roundabouts'.

Local Walks

It would be wrong of us to assert that every commune in France has a board showing local walks in the area, often with the national walks (Grand Randonné), but that would appear to be the case. Sometimes these boards are near the post office, often they're by the town hall, and sometimes they're in the parking lot by a picnic area.

They aren't all an identical format, and some are very old. The board in Ferrière Larçon is typical.

Preuilly sur Claise once had a similar board by the post office, but that is long gone. The is a board in the Bourg Neuf that shows longer walks in the South Touraine (but not little walks from villages).

This makes it very easy to explore France on foot, no matter your mobility. As long as you can find the board.

The Dead Centre of Preuilly (part 2)

Two and a half years ago I wrote about the Napoleonic Cadastre, and how it seemed to indicate a burial ground even older than the old cemetery that at that time surrounded the Chapelle de Tous les Saints. At the time it was uncertain as to where the marking "Ancien Cimitiere" referred.

Cadastral Map, Preuilly sur Claise

The old cemetery (now the Aboretum) is centre left

My conjecture was that as the area marked with the crosses was at the time the cemetery, the "Ancien Cimitiere" was actually in the field it was written in. What I should have done was check the cadastral map for Boussay. That seems to give even more evidence that the cemetery that the Aboretum now occupies wasn't the first in the area.

The 1810 cadastre of Boussay. The "Ancien Cimitiere" seems to be

deliberately marked away from what was then the current cemetery

Drinking Water in France

The French consumer watchdog organisation UFC Que Choisir has investigated tap water quality throughout France and has established that 96% of communities have good quality, safe tap water, but that in a few, mainly rural, areas, the tap water is contaminated.

The pollutants are mainly nitrates and pesticides, which is why the polluted tap water hotspots are mainly in rural areas. Some of the contamination is due to aged water pipes, leading to high levels of  lead, copper, nickel or vinyl chloride. UFC Que Choisir tested for 50 different contaminants.

The aim of the investigation was to point out that tap water was safe, and far cheaper than bottled water. The vast majority of French households have perfectly safe tap water, but about half of French people drink bottled water rather than tap. Tap water costs an average of 0.004 centimes per litre, whereas bottled water is an average of 0.26 centimes per litre. UFC Que Choisir points out that certain bottled mineral waters are not recommended for daily consumption, because of their high level of fluorine, for example. They also calculate that bottled water contributes 360 times more to the greenhouse effect, travels and average of 300 kilometres and creates 150 000 tonnes of landfill every year.

Where there are problems with the water quality much of it will be the over and inappropriate use of fertilisers, with no respect for the regulations about distances from water courses. Although the study doesn't say so, I suspect an additional problem is that there are new chemicals in the environment that are extremely difficult to remove from water in a way that is compatible with managing a town water system.

Luckily, Preuilly's town water is fine. We had a scare during the June 2016 flood with bacteria, but our water is tested regularly by the council and they issue a report every year. The town controls and manages its own independent water supply and distribution at the moment, but under the new amalgamated Communauté des communes, I believe that the town will have until 2020 to decide which of the big water management companies it wishes to engage.

The community closest to us with contaminated water is Martizay. This small town apparently has an unacceptably high level of selenium in the water. Here's what UFC Que Choisir has to say about selenium: 'it is a component of deep rocks whose presence in water reveals the depletion of groundwater due to overuse, especially agricultural. Although this compound is toxic, its health consequences are poorly evaluated to date given the low levels to which the French population is exposed.' 

Source: Que Choisir water quality report.

The Dead Centre of Preuilly

Looking at the 1813 cadastral map the other day (as you do) I was drawn to the area around the Chapelle de Tous les Saints.

The chapel is in the top left corner of the the old cemetery, the area outlined in yellow.

The area outlined in red is part of the new cemetery

We know that the area to the east and south of the chapel was the burial ground, which was moved to its current location at the start of the 20th century. The exact date seems to be lost in the mists of time, although there must be a record somewhere.

What interests us is that on the 1813 cadastre an old cemetery is shown: the cemetery which predates our current "old cemetery". It's marked on the map as the Ancien Cimetiere (bottom left corner of the above map), in a location now occupied by houses and farm buildings.

What is the Name of This Street?

We have blogged about this little dead end before.

However, I was looking at the cadastral map for Preuilly, and noticed there was punctuation shown on the maps on the new cadastre37 website run by the conseil générale of Indre et Loire.

When I came to writing this blog post I went to the French national government cadastral maps in error - and noticed that the punctuation is different.

 So - what IS the lane called?

Simon

Renaming Avenue du Cher

It appears that Avenue du Cher in La Croix en Touraine has recently been renamed. However, just in case your maps or GPS are out of date, they have not removed the old sign, just run a strip of black tape across it. Pragmatic or what!?

How to Research the History of your French House - an overview

In France, researching the history of your house is referred to as généalogie immobilière (real estate genealogy). Lots of people are interested in finding out about the history of their house, and sometimes circumstances mean you are obliged (or at least, well advised) to do so. As a consequence, the Conseil général and the Chambre départementale des notaires d'Indre-et-Loire have produced a booklet outlining how you go about it. The notaire supplied a copy along with our copy of the Acte de Vente.

It tells you how to locate sources of information, what the principal steps involved in the research are, what type of information the various actes contain and how to decode the references.

What will the archives reveal?

By retracing the history of your house through the archives you can find out when it was built, the succession of owners and details of changes such as extensions throughout the centuries. There are several ways you can approach the research.

The first, and the easiest, is to carefully read your deed (acte de propriété or acte de vente) which would have been put together by the notaire at the time of your purchase. It contains the first useful clues and references, indicating whereabouts of previous actes from changes of ownership. For instance, the acte for our house tells me the names, places of birth and occupations of the previous owners to 1945, and whether they acquired the property through purchase, inheritance or gift, as well as other more random seeming pieces of information. Each change of proprietor is listed with a reference to the name of the officiating notaire and which volume and document number the information was lodged under in the files of the Conservateur des Hypothèques in Loches. In time copies or originals of all documents relating to the transfer of property ownership find their way to the main archives in Tour. By visiting the archives reading room and consulting the actes, one will lead you to another, going back in time. As yet, we haven't made the time to do this, but one day...

If I owned this house, I'd want to know
about the people who constructed these
simple, graceful steps.

There is another way. When the actes notariés are missing, or they don't give any information about previous owners, or they leave you with a dead end, you can switch to other sources to find an owner's name. The Cadastral documents, the registers of the Enregistrement or those of the Contrôle des actes can all help you to pick up the trail. Your Acte de Vente documents should include an extrait du plan cadastral which gives you a map reference number for your property.

The quantity of information in the archives and the network of references should nearly always allow you to discover the history of your house. Sometimes it's not very direct and you have to wade through a maze of records and tiny clues, but you will have fun reconstructing the puzzle and revealing past lives, communities, families, owners and learn quite a bit about how people in the Touraine thought and acted in the past.

We would have loved a house with a proper tower...

This is just an overview of how you go about finding out the history of your house. I'm hoping to write in more detail about using each of the archive strands separately at a later date. Throughout your quest, I am assured by a friend who has researched several buildings in town, you will find the staff at the archives unfailingly helpful, and often indispensable to the success of your research.

The Departmental Archives for Indre-et-Loire are open from Monday to Friday, 9am - 5pm and some Saturdays from 9-11.45. Access to the reading room is free, allowing you to consult the files and inventories. Anyone can consult documents if they hold a Reader's Card (carte de lecteur). Reader's Cards are free and obtained by supplying proof of identity. The Archives can be contacted by email on archives@cg37.fr and their website is www.cg37.fr. Historic records are kept at 6 rue des Ursulines 37000 Tours, telephone 02 47 60 88 88 and contemporary records at 41 rue Michaël-Faraday 37170 Chambray-lès-Tours, telephone 02 47 80 89 00. You use the Archives historiques to consult the Contrôle des Actes, the Enregistrement and the Actes notairés that are more than 100 years old. The Archives contemporaines are used to consult the Cadastral records. You may also need to contact the Chambre des notaires d'Indre-et-Loire, 32 rue Richelieu, BP 15953 37059 Tours Cédex, telephone 02 47 05 60 20, email chambre.37@notaires.fr, website www.chambre-indreetloire.notaires.fr.

Susan

Butterfly Surveying in France

This year I have joined the Suivi Temporel des Rhopalocères de France (STERF or, in plain English, the French Butterfly Atlas project). Some of you (my family in particular) will be familiar with 'bird atlasing'. Surveying for butterflies is based on the same principles.

The aim of the project is to find out what species occur where and whether populations are increasing, decreasing or stable. Volunteers and professionals all over the country gather data from (April) May to August (September) and send it in to the French National Natural History Museum biodiversity recording unit. They do the number crunching and produce graphs showing the population trends and distribution maps. The data also feeds in to the annual European report on the state of grassland butterflies and the International Red Lists of Threatened Species. Butterflies make good indicator species because they are particularly sensitive to habitat change. They are also easy to survey because they are generally easy to identify without capturing.

One of the squares I have been given to survey.

Each surveyor is allocated one or more random 2km² patches within a 10km radius of their home. They then decide on 5 transects within that square. A transect is a strip 5m wide and of varying length, depending on how rich the habitat is. For the French butterfly survey, you must be able to walk it in around 10 minutes, counting and identifying all the butterflies within the 5m strip as you go. You must only survey in good weather, as it is pointless going out in conditions when your target will be keeping out of sight.

Polyommatus bellargus Adonis Blue (le Bel-Argus)
one of the target grassland species.

Of particular concern at the moment are butterflies that inhabit grasslands. It is clear that their numbers are plummeting in almost every case (a total population decrease in Europe of 70% in the last 10 years, and it is believed that the population was already greatly reduced when surveying first started). The causes are the increased intensification of farming (eg. broadacre farming, improved pasture) and conversely, the abandonment of small, steep sites which were once grazed, but are now considered uneconomic. On these latter sites, butterflies thrive for a couple of years, but with no grazing stock the grassland gets rank and is slowly replaced by scrub, and the butterflies disappear. Intensive farming on the other hand, uses almost every inch of soil for monocultured crops, with no space for the mosaic of wild flowers and wild grasses that the butterflies need. Improved pastures replace native flower rich grasslands with a much less complex mix of much lower habitat value for butterflies. Even haymeadows don't provide as high a quality of habitat as they used to, as in the modern farming calendar hay is cut earlier (and silage even earlier).

This is the middle of my other survey square.

As a result, STERF surveyors are told that 3 of their 5 transects must be through agricultural land. The aim is not to concentrate on high quality nature reserves, but to get a broad and realistic picture of the situation throughout France. The clearer the problem becomes, the more chance the project has of influencing policy. Environmentalists believe that the Common Agricultural Policy must be reformed, to encourage and allow farmers to become ecological stewards rather than ruthless exploiters of the landscape.

If you are interested in monitoring butterflies and can commit to about an hour a month between May and September, please contact STERF. Last year there were only about 120 surveyors, checking 660 transects. Some departements don't have a single surveyor yet. You don't have to live in France (or even speak fluent French) but if you have a holiday house here and visit once a month during the summer you could participate. If you have any questions don't hesitate to get in touch with me or with STERF. And if you see me wandering about the Chaumussay area or the Parc de Boussay with a clipboard, you will know what I'm up to.

Susan

A New Walk

We haven't written about any of our countryside walks lately, the main reason being that we haven't been on any. Work on the house has taken over our lives (and I have a million other excuses as well, if you have time...)

As I suggested on Tuesday's blog, we were expecting a couple of nice days weather. As this could be our last chance of a dry walk in the country, we went out after lunch to explore some of the rural roads that aren't really marked on any map. (The walk is marked here, in green)

We started at the bibliothèque (where we saw the baby orchids) and followed the back road to le Petit Pressigny until we reached the Carroir au Loup (crossroads of the wolf!), then turned on to the rural roads that lead back to the escarpment above Preuilly.

We are really pleased we went out for a walk when we had the opportunity, as yesterday was so-so at best, and today we are forecast rain and/or snow.

The colours are really good, which surprises us. After last week's rain and wind we though that all the leaves would have been blown off the trees, but as you can see from the photos, that isn't the case.

I am not sure it will be quite so pretty tomorrow...

Simon

Via La Pouët

Here are some pictures from another of our favourite walks around Preuilly.

Going out of town up Route C1.

The wheat crop at La Pouët.

La Pouët.

Cattle near La Grotte

A very spic and span maison de vigne, in the ZA

(Zone Artisinal or Light Industrial Area).

Route C204 loops off the main road into town and allows
for a quieter, safer walk.

A link to the map showing the full route of this walk is here (in red).

Susan & Simon

Driving to Tours

I am amazed!

Susan and I have driven to Tours many times. It takes about an hour 20 minutes, which, using the Australian rule of thumb must mean it is a distance of about 100km when you take into consideration all the villages you drive through.

I was playing around with Google Maps the other day, and just out of curiousity used the "directions" function to see how it would get us from home to Tours. For some reason it suggests an odd dog-leg through St Maure de Touraine for a trip of 1hour12 minutes. I then entered the route we take to Tours, only to find out it is only 70km. 43 miles (click here for our route) in 1hour 15 minutes!

I can't believe how slowly I obviously drive. I know I am the slowest car on the road (excluding tractors and self propelled sewing machines) because I obey the speed limits, but still...


Talking of Noddy cars, don't you like the way this Ligier has been customised with the application of 'leccy tape pinstripes? Classy! Note also the Hi-Vis jacket slung over the back of the seat. Carrying one of these inside the car is now compulsory - I assume people have them this way so that they aren't stopped to be asked if they are carrying.

Simon

Why I am not Always in France

How come I wasn't able to join in the fun and festivities of events such as the Tour de France whizzing through Preuilly-sur-Claise?

Well, on 9 July, I had to attend a meeting at the Land Registry office in Lincoln's Inn Fields in London. Just quietly, the people at this meeting are the ones who really rule the world. These people are Geographic Information (GI) professionals. Some of them are good old fashioned cartographers (otherwise known as professional map nerds), some of them are probably Spatial Analysts (and everyone who reads the British newspaper, the Telegraph, should now know what they are). What these people do pervades every aspect of modern life, and without the software they design and the information they provide, our experiences of shopping, travelling, communication and understanding of natural phenomena would all be considerably less sophisticated.

(Photograph by Ian Stone, Senior Graphic Designer, Land Registry)

Despite the fact that several of the people around this table are serious cycling enthusiasts, we still managed to schedule this meeting for 9 July, in London. I suppose it could have been worse – Lincoln's Inn Fields is one of London's most attractive and interesting squares, with the Inns of Court just next door to the Land Registry office, many imposing neo-classical buildings housing various important British institutions, and best of all, across the other side of the square, the wonderful Sir John Soanes Museum, where I took my colleagues for a post-meeting outing. My friend Tim Knox is the Director, so we were treated to a personal, if whirlwind, tour, including getting up close and personal with Hogarth's A Rake's Progress. (This is just an excuse for me to make a shameless plug for the museum, which I can heartily recommend you visit if you are in London.)

And this man is my boss. I should point out that neither he nor I are GI professionals. He is in fact an accountant, but he is edging towards an understanding of geographic issues in the modern world.

If you are interested in learning more about the world of GI, there are some interesting blogs out there.

I suggest starting with Muki Haklay's Po ve Sham, which means 'this and that' in his native Hebrew. Muki is a Professor at University College London (UCL), and writes on how GI is being put to practical use in the real world.

Then you could move on to Tim Warr's blog. He works for Multimap, who you may notice credited at the bottom of some online maps. Multimap is owned by Microsoft these days.

Steven Feldman's giscussions is also worth a look, as he is a real enthusiast and all round nice bloke.

For old fashioned map type maps, albeit with a twist always, you cannot beat Strange Maps for sheer quirky fun and often outright bizarreness.

If you feel up to it, you could go to Ed Parson's blog. He works for Google as their Geospatial Technologist, and operates on a higher plane than the rest of us (he's a very amusing public speaker though). Do temper any reading of his blog by also reading the Fake Ed Parsons. All good fun in small doses, and you will certainly increase your vocubulary.

Susan

La Forêt de Preuilly

The communal forest of Preuilly covers a total area of 954ha just north-east of Preuilly sur Claise. This is made up of 575ha broadleaf forest (primarily oak), 327ha pine and 18ha of mixed forest. The mathematically adept amongst you will have noticed that this only adds up to 932ha. The remaining 22ha are étangs - well, we are in the land of a thousand lakes, after all. The altitude of the forest ranges between 119 and 144m above sea level and it is situated on the border of the Parc Naturel de la Brenne.

A relatively young section of forest on a cold mid-winter dayIn the 1st century BC, the Gauls exploited the forest for iron ore mining and smelting. In the Middle Ages the forest was part of the Baronnie de Preuilly. From the Renaissance to the mid-19th century, the forest was used to fuel the fourneaux de la Claise ie in the extraction of iron, the production of charcoal and as a dumping ground for the slag resulting from the processing of minerals. In the 19th century a tile factory operated from an area called la Fontaine Bourbon.

The map on the information board, with the forest itself beautifully reflected in the plexiglassAt the time of the Revolution the forest was sold to the Château Azay-le-Ferron (the home of the Barons of Preuilly after they left Preuilly itself) and it remained part of the château lands until 1951-2 when the Hersent-Luzarche family gifted the forest to the town of Tours. That is why the name is officially la forêt de Tours-Preuilly, even though Tours is at the opposite end of the départment.

Etang de la Ribolache, in the middle of the forest
(A Anne et Jean Pierre - Je n'ai pas pratiqué mon français par appel téléphonique du Mairie. Toute cette information est traduite de l'excellent plaque des informations à l'aire de la Ribaloche.)

Susan

The Claise

La Claise rises just south-west of Chateauroux and flows through the Brenne. It joins the Creuse near Descartes.

Along its way it passes through Mezieres, Martizay, Bossay-sur-Claise, Preuilly-sur-Claise, Chaumussay, le Grande Pressigny and Abilly, for a total distance of 86km (53 miles), and drains an area of 1123km².


It isn't one of the grand rivers of France, being fed mainly by rainwater in an area with a lower than average rainfall when compared to the rest of France - and indeed to the rest of the Loire Basin. On the other hand, it has been known to flood, most recently in 1982, which is when its greatest ever flow was recorded.


For most of the time the river moves very gently. There are a lot of mills and weirs built along it, and it is these that actually turn it into what looks like a proper river for most of the year. If it wasn't for the pools created by these obstacles, I imagine the river would look more like a stream during summer*. There is a weir just below the Plan d'Eau which is responsible for the width of the river as it flows through Preuilly itself.

Simon

*The exception to this would have been the summer of 2007. Just ask my parents!

So - where IS your house?

This is a question we get asked often - and a question that has taken a while to find a useful answer to.

We could, of course, say "Preuilly sur Claise" and leave it at that, but it would only lead to further questions. Or we could answer "the South Touraine" but like most of the answers available that presupposes a knowledge of French geography (the French is "Touraine Côté Sud", but that additionally requires careful use of a French accent). "Touraine" is also accurate, but of a pre-revolution nature. Even more pre revolution would be the answer "in the Duchy of Guienne (Aquitaine)", but at some time it was also in the County of Anjou.


A more modern answer - Indre et Loire - is also correct, being the département that Preuilly sur Claise is in - but what does it tell anyone who doesn't know France well? If were were in Normandy, people would instantly form an idea - somewhere up north, on the D-day beaches with cider and calvados. Or even Dordogne - in the middle with rivers and caves with rock paintings and stuff. Indre et Loire has no resonance like that. Centre - the region we are in - means even less.


So: What we tell people is that we are at the edge of the Loire Valley. Geologically, politically, historically and ecologically this is correct. It also gives people an idea of where we are - somewhere in the middle, sort of on the left hand side.

It's just that we aren't actually in the valley of the Loire river itself...

Simon

Maps from Nationmaster

Chateaux

Time for another map mashup.

This time it is the chateaux around Preuilly-sur-Claise. It isnt complete by any means, but it will be added to as we take more photos - and discover more chateaux. We are always dicovering more - just drive down any road, and sooner or later there will be a discovery.
Anyway - the mashup is here

Simon

Preuilly-sur-Claise; a mashup

Google Maps is getting to be real fun - and easily usable. I have created a mashup which shows some of the notable buildings and a couple of the views in Preuilly.

Just click on this link and it will open Google Maps in a new window, complete with clickable place markers.

Have fun!

Simon