Coffee....Grasse

Grasse is, of course, famous for its perfume industry and the flowers that go with it though things have changed a little since Catherine de Medici persuaded the merchants of Grasse to perfume their leather gloves. Now there are many factories making real and synthetic flavourings for anything from perfume to biscuits to yogurts. Sometimes when the wind's blowing in our direction we smell strawberries; confusing in January especially at 8 in the morning. So when the guide books tell you to smell the jasmine, take it with a pinch of salt.
We stopped off for a coffee in the Place aux Aires one Saturday morning and even though it's November it's still nice enough to sit outside and watch people buying fruit and vegetables for the weekend and then there were the flowers...
I can't resist cut flowers and the bigger and more extravagant the better. Lilies, highly perfumed, white in preference to pink are my absolute favourites, next roses but preferably garden roses. With the petals drifting onto the table they remind me of childhood. I love peonies too but would never cut them.
I chose a variety called Anais, white with a creamy middle, perfumed but not too heady. Gorgeous.
I took the 2nd photo a week later and now 10 days on they're still beautiful.
Thank you, Mr. Thierry Bayard who also sells his flowers in the fountain in Valbonne at the friday market. Do you know, he treated all his flowers like friends.

Thank you for good wishes for my son. He's doing ok.