UR TV CAST

Wooden shutters and linen upholstery were dyed in woad, a subtle, antique-looking blue wash, manufactured nearby by a Belgian-American couple.These modern-day druids bought a studio – once a leper hospital frequented by pilgrims on the road to Santiago de Compostela – in the local hilltop market town of Lectour. They set about trying to source the blue which had been used to stain their shutters and discovered the local version of woad, called bleu de pastel, grew plants from seed and researched the process by which dye is made. They now have a successful business, exporting ceramics and fabrics from their factory/showroom in Lectour, all washed in the same distinctive soft blues.The incoming Brits and Americans in Gascony are keen to cultivate the passing tourist trade. One Anglo-Australian couple hosts painting courses from their home in the nearby hilltop market town of Mézin. Tim Clinch, an enthusiastic cook, not only leaves the fork in his potato patch for guests to dig their own, but also plans to take visitors on gastronomic tours of the area.

He is a great fan of Victorian kitchen gardens, and cultivates a gorgeous plot of vegetables which guests renting the barn are welcome to pick: zucchini flowers, red and yellow tomatoes, beans and pumpkins soaking up the sun between rows of marigolds.This is rich farming land, with vineyards, sunflower fields, maize and melons gleaming under irrigation pumps everywhere you look. Specialities of the region include floc and Armagnac, prunes from nearby Agen, and duck liver pâté. This duck liver is not for the faint-hearted: it’s seriously rich, and made in the same violent manner as goose foie gras. Picture postcards in every town show grim-jawed farmer’s wives forcing corn into the bills of captive birds. Our English hosts have gone native to the degree that Tim refuses to accept that this practice might cause unusual suffering, and Lucinda helps out at the neighbour’s farm with the annual slaughter and plucking of fowl.The Sunday after we arrived, the local château opened its doors. Produce from the château was on sale along with sausages, duck pâté, chips, and a good deal of local Buzet wine.

You could buy the produce and get it fried up on a brazier, then park yourself (with bottle of wine) at one of the tables under the lime trees for an extremely civilised picnic.There are markets on most days of the week within striking distance, each with its own particular flavour. Lectour is extremely pretty; it also has a bar on the edge of an escarpment which is a delightful place to pause after you have bought your duck pâté, ham, melon and sweet wine to wash it down. Mézin’s market sits in a tiny square at the foot of the church walls, where friendly people sell you fruit and veg that looks too good to eat, and there’s one of those mobile cheese stalls that in England would be selling burgers. A bar on the corner of the square means you can have a beer while you watch the old chaps in berets chatting away, and then rush home to cook your lunch.Tim and Lucinda Clinch are planning to convert more of their outbuildings to accommodate guests for photographic and cookery courses, anticipating a growing tourist trade that ranges across south-western France and into Spain. (Apparently people do go as far as Spain on day trips, but there’s plenty to keep you amused if you like pottering around markets and eating.)Another British couple bought a château in Cahors, then traded down (too ambitious? surely not) for a maison de maître in Fources, a fortified medieval English bastide, which they have restored and furnished as a chambre d’hÿte, or grand bed and breakfast. Fources is absurdly picturesque, its ancient stone and timber houses set in a circle around the green, where more beret-wearing old chaps play boules of a summer evening.But it’s not only the British who are struggling to restore ancient stonework in this part of France. On a hilltop above Poudenas stands an Italianate château whose owners, descendants of the original inhabitants, are losing their battle against encroaching nature and dilapidation.

Their charming children took us on a guided tour of the south “wing”, showing us the commanding position and lovely interior courtyards, while we pretended not to notice the peeling plasterwork and desiccated parquet flooring. As we gazed over the cracked stone swimming pool at the oak canopies and terracotta roofs of the village below, we were tempted to make them an offer.. The phone didn’t work, the grout was dingy and the light fittings were bare bulbs. But we looked at the windows in our little studio, and our hearts did tangos up our chests. There were two of them, with oak frames and concrete balconies.