Mag

Here you will find inspiring articles on nature, food and drink, and culture – the simple pleasures that make living in France such a joy. You can also enjoy bilingual crosswords, quizzes, book and film reviews – plus lifestyle and travel ideas. We have organised articles by subject – read the latest below or browse sections via the blue tabs. The Cx symbol denotes subscriber-only articles.

French Life

'We crossed the Alps in 40kg of armour'

Historian retraces the route of 16th-century French king's troops

Make sense of...The French and holidays

The classic holiday choice for the French involves lying on a beach in August – and this year Corsica is favourite destination

Make sense of…quirky French festivals

There is no shortage of festivals in France, from music to celebrations of history, sport or food, but some are a little more unusual than others...

Handcrafted bicycles enjoy renaissance as works of art

Some of the bicycles in this month’s Tour de France are likely to have been hand-built by a frame-builder, a cadreur in French.

Language

What does it mean to ‘tell salads’ in French?

There are some interesting ways in French to speak about lying. The English equivalents of ‘telling a porkie or a fib’. Here are five expressions which are well used in French to say the same.

Five French ways to say you are angry

It’s Monday but hopefully you don’t have mustard in your nose (avoir la moutarde qui monte au nez)… a French expression which means to see red, to be on the verge of losing your temper. Here we look at this and four other ways to say you are annoyed or angry in French. Please share others you may know…

7 French expressions you may hear when it's hot

As the heatwave has arrived, here are seven French expressions you may find useful…

Words that change meaning from feminine to masculine

Gender matters in French – get it wrong and it can lead to serious misunderstandings.

Food and Drink

Tomatoes in French shops fail taste test

Consumer watchdog's blind taste test found just 33% of consumers were satisfied with the quality of the fruit they were eating

New farm is thriving in the darkness

Mushroom producer makes use of disused underground carpark in Paris

France food basket: what to eat in July

Every month the French government publishes details of what fruit and vegetables are in season as well as what cheeses and fish are good to eat now

Food basket: what to eat in June

Every month the French government publishes details of what fruit and vegetables are in season as well as what cheeses and fish are good to eat now.

Culture

See Nice from the air – 409 years ago

Those who love Riviera capital Nice – and history buffs generally – may be interested to see a spectacular video by the city’s archaeology service which shows how it looked 400 years ago as if flying over it by helicopter.

French cultural life - August 2019

Actors, art and the Académie , a round up of the arts and culture stories creating a buzz in France this month

French cultural life - July 2019

Culture that hits the right notes - A round up of the arts and culture stories creating a buzz in France

New lease of life for 100-year-old French film studios

Nice once hoped to be a ‘French Hollywood’ - and you will have heard of many of the films that were made at its Victorine Studios. The best of those days seemed over but now the studios are set for a ‘renaissance’

Nature

France's birds hit by summer drought and heat

Ligue pour la protection des oiseaux says lack of rain has seen a drop in food sources this year

Snakes on the plains

Eric Bryan’s guide to the varied serpents living in hiking country in the south of France – and what you should do if you get bitten by one...

Open Gardens: June in full bloom

The Anglo-French association Open Gardens is in full swing this month. The Connexion previews the season’s picks

Green news in France - June 2019

A monthly update on environmental events and occurrences in France: mussel mortality, school pollution and eco-friendly farmer payouts

French Facts

G’day Sheila could have been b’jour Bruce

It is one of the most tantalising wonders of French history: the possibility that, if events had taken a different turn, Australia could have become a French colony. Michael Delahaye plays a historical game of 'What If..?'

Pair retrace wartime Pyrenees escape trek

Tracks of a wartime freedom march across the Pyrenees have been retraced by a pair of Tasmanian friends of the man who made the amazing walk 75 years ago.

Village fighters captured 1,000 Nazi soldiers

A monument outside Anduze in the Languedoc commemorates an incredible story of wartime bravery. Readers Liz Cowley and Donough O’Brien tell the story of how a group of 40 French Resistance fighters and Spanish guerrillas forced a 1,000-strong column of German soldiers to surrender

Explore France

Burgundy rules in French architecture’s game of stones

The beauty of a building often stems from the material used to build it and Pierre de Bourgogne limestone is a classic example.

Baroque jewel hidden behind simple street façade

The architecture of Nice is the result of several very different periods of art.

Chateaux-filled valley marks French Renaissance links

Half-a-millennium after the death of Leonardo da Vinci in Amboise, The Connexion reveals how the Loire Valley is celebrating French links to a stunning period in European history

Big Picture

Hugo home is anything but Misérable

Hauteville House, Victor Hugo’s home on Guernsey, has been reopened to the public after an extensive one-year restoration designed to return the house to the way it looked when the author wrote Les Misérables there.

The great jazz explosion... in Limoges

The Connexion talks to the author of a new book on jazz in France and the ‘Hot Clubs’ that hosted top US acts

Do battle and play your part in French history

Battle reenactment association seeks new players for the summer’s historic extravaganza

Quiz

Test your knowledge of France with our Connexion quiz

What is the name of the transatlantic single-handed yacht race from Saint Malo to Guadeloupe?
Which French comic book series was turned into a film starring Oscar winning Jean Dujardin?
How do you spell “choir” and “heart” in French?
Who is the French singer known as “Cloclo”?
Which salad, with multiple variations mostly include boiled eggs, tuna, and green beans is named after a town on the Riviera?
Which nightly soap opera set in Marseille has aired over 3000 episodes since 2004?
How many French films had over 1 million admissions in cinemas in 2017?
With over 300 fashion shows in Paris every year and 1,000,000 jobs in the industry, what percentage of French GDP is generated by the fashion industry?
The Le Pliage handbag is lightweight, practical, and synonymous with French style with over 32 million bags sold to date; which brand created this line of bags?
Who designed the Stravinsky fountain outside the Centre George Pompidou in Paris and was known for her voluptuous and colourful sculptures?

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Books

Download the pdf crossword here...