It's around 9 PM the first of June and Maury is beautiful. The town is quiet. Sunday lunch is over and the kids and grandkids have gone home, school is not yet out.
A man walks in the vineyards with his dog, another tends his garden and invites us to come back in August when the tomatoes are ready. Le vrai gout de tomate, not like the commercial stuff.
On the road to Lesquerde the only sound comes from birds. The wind is calm, the wildflowers are everywhere, the air is soft and the fading sun highlights the leaves of the Muscat vines and etches the shape of Queribus from the mountains.
This is a special place and it's a fine time to be here. We often see it as a sanctuary, an escape from real life but then more and more you hear of people who came here for holidays and loved it so much they said why not all the time.
Certainly it's changing and that will continue. Right now I'm drinking a rosé from a Bordeaux winemaker who saw the commercial possibilities and opened a new winery here. And that will continue; we already have a Michelin blessed restaurant and there will be more. Some locals will profit from selling property at inflated prices, others will lose their livelihood to commercial development. It may be the next Provence or Tuscany, take your pick, but for now it's just a small town, with people of all ages who respond with a smile when a bonjour madame or monsieur is offered. The young people haven't left: the Ecole Publique has enough students and Michel and Angelique are building a new house just up the street.
Walking back into town I see three men sitting on the bench in front of the trompe l'oeil café. They are here so often, there's a painting of them sitting there decorating the Maison de Terroir. There's a crowd in the patio of the Café de la Placette, Auberge de Quèribus is empty, Jean has 3 or 4 couverts.
The rosé is very nice, as is the inexpensive Cotes de Catalane, the higher end wines to be over- blown and over-oaked. I like to think there's a populist spirit at work here.
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