LETTERS FROM PARIS #42 - A fitting end.

This is where we all began. The plaque on the stone gate all that is left of the original city wall – reads: “From here Samuel de Champlain went to Canada.”

We are in the final leg of our sojourn in this country: beautiful old port city of Honfleur. Today it has those 14th century bu8ildings, timbered in what we call Tudor style. It also has more restaurants per square foot than I have ever seen.

The city has about it an ineffable kind of welcoming feeling. Everyone seems to be glad to be there. Everyone working there is glad we are glad. I exult in all the tourists, commenting to Henri that everyone seems to be from France. There it is again: that stubborn sense that if it's French it must have value. Forgive me.

The next day, in our hotel, I hear English. Sure enough, because it is just across the channel (the Manche) there must be many visitors from England. They speak no French and express their admiration for what sounds (to them least) like unaccented fluency. Two couples tell me that they are heading to Canada next year, probably to Vancouver and the sight of the mountains. With apologies to everyone in our version of lotus-land, I tell them that if I had my choice, I’d see the East. There is more variety, more history, and the people – well – not at all like the smug Vancouverites who insist that they live where everyone else wants to. I tell them about Nova Scotia’s south shore; I tell then m about the Cabot Trail on Cape Breton, about the Gaspe, and above all, about the people and their special enjoyment of where they live. More history too I tell them – dating back to the earliest colonies in Canada.

Now, from being an almost relentless Francophile, I become a promoter of my own country. It feels good. Like looking at a plaque to Champlain feels good. My romance may be with France but my heart is still at home.

We finally made it to Normandy. Not to the D-Day beaches, but to Etratat where Seurat and Monet painted the famous stony beach with the memorable cliffs and the very special rock formation that arches from the cliff into the sea and invites you to look through the same hole than Monet painted. (But I figure if Monet had been Canadian he would have immortalized Nez Perce in the Gaspesie.)

To turn travel writer/agent for a moment: the best way to see Normandy, is to have a good friend who knows it and loves it and can’t wait to show it to you. Henri and Michele take us on the trip, first to Etretat where we marvel at the rocks and the enormous cliffs. They drive to the top of one where we could perhaps on a very clear day, see England. But Etretat is not enough. Henri loves driving quickly on narrow winding roads. We find ourselves in two more little seaside towns looking at the same stony beaches and the same dominating “Falaises.” Notwithstanding the distraction of the magnificent view, the French are out in force sunning themselves, frolicking in the water, and idling comfortably at the dozens of cafes, brasseries, and taverns that cover the waterfront.

He leads us then to Honfleur, the old city that sprawls forever upward along steeply angled hills. He makes sure we see all the art, because everyone seems to come to Normandy to paint. The high point is the Eugene Boudin museum. There are hundreds of paintings by 19th century painters, many of whom I have never heard of. The museum represents them all from the Barbizon school of Corot to the post impressionism of Dufy. There is even a Braque from his pre-cubist period. And Henri is everywhere, criticizing and complimenting, always the artist and always the critic. Again, it’s the good part of having someone you know lead you around.

We head back toward Paris, but first they have to show us the onetime playgounr of the aristocracy: Deauville. Still beautiful. Still with one of the best beaches because it is huge and unlike Etretat, all soft sand.

So perhaps there is more to France than Paris. Perhaps it is high time that I experienced the towering hills and cliffs of Normandy. If you want really to feel it – you have to do something French. And they do it. They enjoy their country as fully as they can.

But wait - don’t the people of Lunenburg feel the same way? Don’t the people of Vancouver, in spite of that smug self-congratulation, feel deeply about where they live? I meet people who enjoy living in Hamilton. There are those for whom Kingston is the only place to be. And we argue, often about the Montrealer’s devout belief that only that city knows how to make a bagel or smoked meat. I am sorry if I have omitted so many Canadians who could tell how they love being where they are, and what they are.

Me too.