Madame Cholet

One of the advantages of the Womble project we undertook a few years ago was that it took  us to some parts of the world we might otherwise never have visited.  Cholet is a case in point.

Cholet is a fairly small town in western France, whose two main claims to fame are as the scene of a battle during the Vendee revolt of 1793 and as former centre for the manufacture of textiles, and handkerchiefs in particular. Whilst handkerchief production is no longer carried out on a commercial basis, the town’s heritage is celebrated in the Textile Museum, which is located in a former canvas bleaching factory (built in 1881). There are rooms dealing with the various stages of textile production: spinning, bleaching, weaving etc. and information about the Cholet handkerchief industry. The museum has revived handkerchief production in Cholet, and I understand that visitors can watch this taking place but the machines were not operating when we visited. The surrounding grounds are now a garden containing plants connected to the textile industry, such as flax, and marigolds which were used for for dyes.

One of the most striking things about Cholet was the quality of the floral displays. The flower beds outside the Hotel de Ville were quite spectacular. There are also attractive gardens, such as the Jardin du Mail, and lots of hanging baskets. We even saw a vending machine for bouquets.

As we were visiting in honour of Mme Cholet, we took a taxi from our hotel in Cholet to the nearby Ribou lake for the ‘festival of regional deliciousness’. The lake is actually a reservoir providing drinking water for the area so there are restrictions on activity in the area. By the lakeside are a hotel, a restaurant, a campsite, sailing club and tennis club.

The ‘festival of regional deliciousness’ was a sort of cross between a village fete and agricultural show. Despite an advertised start of 10.00 a.m. it was slow to get going. There were a few stalls with local produce (ice-cream; ostrich products from rillettes to painted eggs; cured sausage; caramels); some livestock including rabbits, ducks, geese, goats, pigs and a calf (no sheep); a stage with an extremely sophisticated sound system; and a pig roast (no less than 6 pigs on two spits). The pig roast meal cost €6.50 for which you got a plastic tray and helped yourself to green salad, white beans, coleslaw, pork, bread and yoghurt. We took one look and made for the lakeside restaurant where we had a delicious meal for €16.90 per head.

Returning to the event, we found that things had livened up. On stage a singer had given way to Cholet’s equivalent of Bruce Forsyth, who was circulating in the crowd with a low-rent version of ‘Play Your Cards Right’. If you correctly guessed either the colour of the next card or whether it was higher or lower you could win a rather cheap-looking card table mat.

Meanwhile, a patient donkey was being led around by a sadist with a bunch of carrots in his other hand. Affixed to the donkey’s back was a notice saying ‘My name is Katy2. Guess my weight and win’. It wasn’t clear whether you won Katy2 herself or one of the dodgy looking card mats (or even the leftover pig). We decided not to enter as Katy2 would certainly not have fitted in our ‘one item of hand baggage only’ with EasyJet.