Bellegarde is having a Cuban Festival! Why? To learn about and celebrate Cuban heritage. We have Turks, North Africans, Portuguese, 1 Japanese, 1 Chinese-American (that's me), 1 Italian, and 1 Senegalese...but Cubans? I don't know of any but maybe we have some. Another reason why: my guess is to bring residents (and their Euros) into the shops located in "downtown" Bellegarde, which has a population of 10,000, but is losing shops, shoppers, and Euros to the other big shopping centers a little outside of town.
Today we noticed that the Cuban Festival crew had set up large tents in the town market square - and to get everyone into the mood? Cuban music was being piped on the town's loudspeakers placed all around town. The hit of the fete, a Cuban spectacle with singing, dancing and colorful costumes. Instead of buying tickets, you can pick up invitations at participating shops and other locations like the Mairie and Hotel de Ville. Then you can exchange these invitations at restaurants in town for actual timed tickets. We have 2 tickets for tomorrow after at 17:30 - and 2 extra tickets to give away to my mushroom club friends! I'm looking forward to the music and the show tomorrow night!
After a little shopping, we decided to take advantage of the gorgeous weather and go for a walk to look for châtaignes (edible chestnuts with the super spiky shells) in the forest near our house. R has seen people collecting châtaignes there, so we decided to try our luck. Within minutes on the trail we found a large châtaigne tree with some chestnuts still hanging on. We collected half a dozen or so from the tree and many more that had fallen on the ground. Feeling lucky, we walked further but alas, it was the only tree we found after an hour or so of walking. BUT I did find a super cool looking Helvella Crispa mushroom and a tiny bolet (unfortunately it was not a tasty cep de Bordeaux)!
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