Tour de France 2026 – Part 3

I had two teaching trips in three weeks in the south of France in July, with a week in between. I was going to stay in France with my family, but one by one they all had better things to do and it looked like I would be spending the week on my own. So in the early hours of the morning sometime in early July I grabbed my phone and booked flights home for that week. I am very glad I did go home.

This is the story of the week I spent in the foothills of the Pyrenees, in the very dreamy Atelier Clos Mirabel, near the city of Pau.

Friday 24th July

I am supposed to be on a flight to France this morning, but late on Thursday night I receive news that my daughter needs emergency surgery sometime around midnight and will be back in her ward at about the same time I will be checking in my suitcase. I cannot fly into the clouds without holding my daughter’s hand and seeing her “on the other side” of her ordeal and so I change my flight to the next day. It is surprisingly easy with Ryanair.

Saturday 25th July

I am up and out the door by 4.00am, and whether it’s that or concern for my girl I do not know, but I faint on the plane and am offered a nice dark seat at the back of the plane and all kinds of drinks by the lovely staff. Two sips of Fanta has me feeling myself again. Later I tell my other daughter about this, and she says “new Ryanair hack unlocked” – fair comment, I kept my shillings in my pocket on this flight.

In Biarritz Airport I have half an hour before my Flixbus departs for Pau, so I order a hot chocolate as the coffee machine is hors service. I want to draw the airport but I am uninspired, so I draw my drink and my hat.

I am picked up in Pau by Xavier, who runs Clos Mirabel with his wife Rachel and a horde of lovely staff. Arriving in the beautiful 18th century manor house is a balm for the senses. The house is white with a hipped slate roof and various outbuildings, some of which have been converted (extremely tastefully) to accommodation. Rachel has put me in the Blue Room in the main house and says it’s her favourite. The bedroom is vast, furnished with beautiful French antiques of various vintages, pine floorboards and large Persian-style rugs, and it has windows on two sides. I peek through one of the windows at the soft blue Pyrenees in the distance, close the shutters and collapse onto the bed in the soft gloom. I nap to the sound of a family splashing about in the pool outside.

The dining experience at Clos Mirabel must be seen to be believed. The fruit and vegetables come mostly from the potager in the grounds. The cooking inspiration is in the style of Ottolenghi and consists of wonderful salads, heavenly desserts and creatively-prepared vegetables and meats. There are local cheeses at every meal. Each evening we start with apéritifs on the terrace, followed by dinner cooked by one of the in-house chefs. My ambition is to spend a week at a course there that I am not running, so that I can wallow in all the loveliness AND explore my personal development.

I meet my students and thankfully they are warm and gracious, and very happy to be there. This week I only have five students: I was a bit concerned at first, mostly for the venue itself as I like everyone to do well, but they have non-participant guests staying too so I have nothing to worry about. For my part, I am grateful for the small number of students in the circumstances: it means that I can really get to know them and be “myself” in a way that isn’t so easy when you have 16 or more. With my daughter being ill, it would not have been easy to have felt unable to share her progress. (In the end I feel so relaxed with these five lovely ladies that by the end of the week I am rather less than my usual discreetly professional self, but I am glad as I feel I am with friends, and we have a whole lot of fun.)

Sunday 26th July

We start with a précis of what the week will be about, and do a bit of art-market buying and selling. Time for the first exercise, in which I talk my students through the wonders of combining ultramarine and burnt sienna. They quickly get the hang of it. I have taught other groups in which I have got them to try this combination and it seems to be accessible by all students, regardless of level of experience. I get the students to paint large snail shells from the vegetable garden. (I was dying to add yellow ochre but resisted.) But I did kidnap the empty snail shell and I am going to paint it again in the bottom right hand corner. The thing is, sticking to these two colours forces you to cycle through lots of colour combos and familiarise yourself with different concentrations of colour, and different timings. If you are a teacher, whether oil or watercolour – do it. The students get a lot from it.

Monday 27th July

We try some cloud techniques and use some of the same principles for trees. It takes most of the day. We are not roasted alive – in fact, it’s really pleasant there in the foothills. Unfortunately the mountains are a little shy today…

…but luckily I have a sketch I prepared earlier (last October) so you can see them a bit.

Later, I draw one of my students sketching by the pool: I use the palm trees as an opportunity to show how deepening the values can help in the depiction of light. But you can see from the cloudy sky that it’s not too uncomfortably warm.

Another of my students is feeling frustrated about her depiction of vines and I see if I can offer her advice. I suggest deepening up the values at the boundaries between the vines and the distance.

Tuesday 28th July

It’s a hot day but we’re assured the temperature will drop by 10ºC in the hills. We head up into the mountains: creamy white cattle and their calves, and the odd reddish brown mama and baby, roam around pastures and we are pleasantly deafened by the sound of cowbells. The cattle are really unfazed by the presence of a few random people on stools staring at them with pens and sketchbooks. I draw a few but they have moved away before I capture in my sketchbook as many as I would like.

It’s sunny but not unbearable and there is lots of shade provided by the trees.

After a few hours we are taken for lunch, and our smaller numbers and therefore smaller minibus allows us to go slightly higher than usual: we end up in a delightful mountain village which I think is called Bielle-something. After a simple but satisfying lunch the propriètere is happy for us to draw directly from his terrace, which is great because we are in the shade.

I use the scene to explain my “accurate drawing” technique which has been a eureka moment for many.

Wednesday 29th July

This is normally a day off for everyone, but we’ve rearranged the schedule to accommodate an earlier flight home for me so that I can be with my daughter, who is still in hospital. I am extremely grateful. The students very kindly tell me afterwards that it’s worked out better this way anyway, as this is by far the hottest day of the week, and we spend it in the air-conditioned market of Pau. The task for the students is to capture the life of the market: vendors, customers, produce, while standing up.

We head back after lunch to the bliss of the air-conditioned studio, but I sneak out into the 37ºC sunlight – my phone says so – and try to capture the shimmering haze of the afternoon. It’s nearly time for our apéros, and I look up to see Xavier beside me, offering me a drink. I tell him I would love a drink but would like him to surprise me. He is back a minute later with a long sparkling water flavoured with basil syrup. I am very pleasantly surprised. Refreshed, I change into my swimsuit and dive into the pool.

Thursday 30th July

Xavier takes us into Pau to sketch, but he thinks we’ll like the “gritty” backstreets better than the more touristy Pau Castle. It’s a good shout: the view is perfect for the combination of ultramarine and burnt sienna, and for practicing the accurate drawing technique. The students are wild about it and we’ll definitely be back there this time next year, when I will be back for another week of teaching and possibly running my mouth.

I start with a “thumbnail” that doesn’t really stay that way…

Back at Clos Mirabel the gentle, balmy weather has decided it’s a good time, now that our guard is down, to start getting weirdly heavy and close. We slip into the potager and draw the produce…one of my students is struggling with loosening up her hand and I think a swooshy broad ink line and some vine leaves might do the trick, but she figures out the issue on her own and I think she’ll see good progress soon.

Just before the end of the day I make a quick sketch of Clos Mirabel itself. I have NOT done its beauty justice, but in my defence it’s getting hotter AND closer to apéro time…

…and sure enough I awoken shortly before 1.00am by an almighty thunderstorm. I normally don’t get out of bed for anything at all during the night but something compels me to open the shutters and peek out into the dark. I immediately realise that there is such thing as light that will absolutely banjax your retinas in an instant and I close my eyes against the lightning, flashing all around like strobes, brighter than anything I have ever seen, bright like how you imagine a nuclear bomb, so bright that you can’t even see the landscape when it’s lit up. I close the shutters and get back into bed, and the gentle hiss of rain lulls me to sleep.

Friday 31st July

My sketchers and I have our last foray sketching the public in the nearby outdoor market at Jurançon, but I have informed everyone at our last dinner together the night before that I am off the clock! Instead I run around buying cheese and sausage and those flat peaches, and figs, for my lunch, and to take home. In Lourdes Airport I am just about to drop my luggage onto the belt but shove the cheese and sausage into my suitcase at the last minute. I later find out that some of my students have their cheeses confiscated at Security as they’re not allowed to take it in their hand luggage. When I am finally back in Galway I sketch the cheeses in gratitude.

A few days later I find the time to look at some of the lovely things in the goody bags generously given to us by the sponsors of the USk Symposium. I have one last page in my France Été 2026 sketchbook and I think the beautiful little paintbox provided by Roman Szmal for the occasion of the Symposium makes a perfect subject.

Roman provides me with all my paints and not only are they among the very the best I have used, he is thre most lovely man to work with. Here are the very cool colours in the set: find out what I did with them in another article!

Why not invite the joy of sketching into your life and join me in my Sketch Club this September? Put it in your diary – for just €12.50 you will have access to one long-ish class per month, live, recorded and always fun and informative. Other perks too but once again i am getting tired and I am a bit cold, I am not in the south of France anymore!

If you’d like to join us in the dream-like Atelier Clos Mirabel next year from 24th to 31st July, don’t delay as it’s filling up fast. Contact Xavier or Rachel and bag your favourite room while you can!