Everyone knows the Loire, its chateaux, the wines, or Burgundy for the Abbeys and the wine, Champagne or Provence, the promised land of long sunny summers. The Lot, not so much.
I spent a summer there not so long ago, following an accordion band out in the hills for a music magazine that vanished almost before summer did. I took the assignment only to have my camera stolen and just when things seemed hopeless, a friend came to the rescue, tossing a little handheld, a laughable thing, into my lap. -So you’re it ? I asked. We looked each other over, my new buddy and I. What can you show me? Off we went.
I traipsed around behind the band for more than a week, taking far too many shots. A real pest. You can see it in some of the images where the band members gave me that look, but on the whole they were hospitable and happy for the attention. I followed them to rehearsals, met local singers and interested parties, hiked in the hills up to the caves, got to know the small town of Marcilhac and its neighbors a little and finally ended up being the pool boy for a lady getting through a cancer who couldn’t do it herself. She gave me a small room in an old stone garage to stay in. Suddenly the summer was no longer about the assignment and my tiny camera but about staying and living there as long as I could. Paris would be there when I got back.