When I first moved from New York to Paris, France people told me all the time how lucky I was. I understand why everyone thought that. I worked as a lawyer for a prestigious firm and lived in a beautiful apartment a stone’s throw from the Louvre. I traveled all over Europe for business: I would be in five-star hotels in Milan one night and Frankfurt the next.
“What do I wear in bed?” mused Marilyn Monroe. “Why, Chanel No. 5, of course!” Perched in the hills above the Côte d’Azur in France, Grasse has been the world’s perfume capital since the 17th century. The countryside around this Provencal town is where the jasmine and roses that go into the country’s famed luxury fragrances are grown and harvested.
Six years ago, I received a birthday present worth over $70,000. No, I’m not friends with Oprah. We had recently fallen in love with—and bought—a crumbling, pigeon-infested, 150-year old maison bourgeoise in northern Burgundy, France, only two hours away from our apartment in Paris.
Day-glow sunrises and sunsets over the River Seine, fresh breakfast croissants on your private balcony overlooking Notre Dame Cathedral, public transportation practically at your doorstep… Try retirement in Paris, France; it’s as romantic and magical as you imagine, and it’s easier than you think.
Getaway breaks to the French Alps town of Annecy are the stuff of dreams—majestic mountains, fresh air, flowery lanes, a crystal-blue lake, and a canal-filled medieval old town rivaling romantic Venice. Jim and I have retired to Paris, France, so places like this are on our doorstep.
Sally Stone was searching for superb scenery and a relaxed pace of life when she bought a small stone cottage in Brittany, on the Atlantic coast of France. At the time, Sally was working as a director in a marketing company; the Breton cottage just a part-time retreat. But a year later, in 2002, she lost her job to cost cutting and needed to find something else.
If you have to ask: What’s so special about walnuts?, then you’ve never visited the Dordogne. Noix (walnuts) grow in abundance in this tranquil area of south-west France. It has a special walnut route, and the nuts are brand-protected by an AOC appellation just like French wines. Near the chateau-topped village of Castelnaud, there’s even a museum devoted to walnut culture.
Wednesday is market day in Piégut-Pluviers, a town in the north of Aquitaine’s Dordogne département. A French country market is a gastronomic Garden of Eden, so leaving these stalls of foie gras, saucissons and cheeses feels like being cast into the wilderness.
Paris is the destination of choice for most visitors to France looking for culture, good food and that special joie de vie (“joy of life”). But while there are good reasons it’s the most- visited city in the world, don’t be blinded by the City of Light.
La Bruyere is one of those dreamy, remote French farmhouses that make you ache for your own place in the sun. You get exposed stone, terra cotta roof tiles, and an idyllic rural location with the restaurants and shopping of Bergerac just a stone’s throw away. This sort of house makes you want to ask the owners, “How on earth did you find this place?”
One thing to keep in mind when searching for properties, which we find true primarily in such a competitive market as Paris: properties advertised on websites, in magazines and even agency windows have either been sold and have not been yet removed from the advertising or have been on the market a long time…for good reason.
Paris rentals come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. An apartment rented unfurnished is a very different animal from one that is rented for vacation use completely equipped for as little as a few days or by the week.
“As we descended into the valley the netherworld fog that enveloped Quito melted away revealing gorgeous green foliage and multi-colored flowers of every shade and hue. Brilliant flat-leafed bromeliads, silver-hued orchids and bright, tiny orange geraniums lined the road,” writes Suzan Haskins in the May issue of International Living magazine.
Tired of the over-the-top folly of Monaco, the star-spotting excesses of Cannes, and the fashionable frenzy of Saint-Tropez? The south of France has long been synonymous with glitz and glamour, but it’s only a tiny sliver of a wonderful region.
See the video, where Dan Prescher reports from Ecuador with your weekly wrap-up of International Living postcards for the week ending February 19.
The healthiest country in the world is France. That might surprise you about a country that places such an emphasis on delicious food, savory meat dishes, creamy sauces, delicate cakes, sweets and pastries, fine wines and barrel-aged brandy.
Was that a howl? I look out the window and shiver. Corsica is steeped in superstition. And tonight’s moon is almost full, a hunting moon…
The luminous hour before sunset is special. Every bay is a brilliant turquoise. Villages take on a honeyed glow; vineyards are dusted with gold; mountain crags flare orange. Out to the west, rocky islets change from dusky pink to a deep blood-red.
Teetering above the north-west coast, the villages of the Balagne region in Corsica, France, have a grandstand view of white yachts, silver sands and luminous blue sea. I spent one day of my October trip driving between these settlements.
Fresh air, fish stew, red wine. I’ll sleep. Tonight’s lullaby is the murmur of waves and the tinkle of masts in Macinaggio’s harbor. Earlier I’d walked the village’s Sentier Douane, a seashore footpath once used by customs officers hunting for smugglers. Views are spectacular: the turquoise Mediterranean, a crumbling Genoese watchtower, the tiny trio of Finocchiarola islets.
See the video, where Dan Prescher reports from Merida, Mexico, with your weekly wrap-up of International Living postcards for the week ending January 8.
The hardest thing about owning a home in France is leaving it. From the moment I looked through a viewfinder at the age of eight and saw slides of rolling French landscapes, I’ve been hooked. But it wasn’t until 2004 that my lifelong dream of owning a place in France became reality.
The adventure and great benefits of life overseas can be yours right now—and you don’t have to sell everything and make a “forever” move to get them. Rather than plunge…take a part-time paddle to test the waters someplace new.
Fresh air, fish stew, red wine. I’ll sleep. Tonight’s lullaby is the murmur of waves and the tinkle of masts in Macinaggio’s harbor. Earlier, I’d walked the village’s Sentier Douane, a seashore footpath once used by customs officers hunting for smugglers.
International Living’s Annual Retirement Index for 2010 identifies at least 14 places around the world where retirement funds go farther, health care is cheaper, and the lifestyle is healthier than in the U.S.
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