Day 630 (Thursday) 28^th February 2019

I woke up this morning and was horrified – it was cloudy! We have had 27 consecutive days of blue sky and warm sun and the only day we can go to the Citron Festival in Menton is today! We went last year and it was a bit overcast then too. It was wonderful anyway…I found this website with all the information about this magnificent festival (all the photos are mine)

The most Italianate and the warmest town on the French Riviera has become famous for the colourful Menton Lemon Festival. A major event on the French Riviera, the celebration attracts no less than 230,000 visitors in Menton each February who marvel at the impressive sculptures and parades.

Every February, the little town of Menton runs one of France’s most popular events: the Lemon Festival (Fête du Citron). Organised by the Tourist Office towards the end of February, the event has been taken place since 1928.

 

Today, each festival uses 120 tonnes of citrus fruit to decorate its gigantic structures and floats. The festival has now become the second largest event on the French Riviera, after the Carnival of Nice and before the Formula 1 Grand Prix of Monte Carlo.

It is held around the same time as the carnival of Nice. Each year, the festival is organised on a given theme: Disney, Music of the World, Spain, etc. In 2013, the 80th edition of the Lemon Festival was “Around the world in 80 days: Menton, the secret port of call”. In 2014, the 81st edition of the festival took place from the 15th February to the 5th March and was themed on a novel from Jules Verne: 20,000 leagues under the sea. In 2015, the 82nd edition was dedicated to ‘the tribulation of a lemon in China’. In 2016, the 83rd edition paid tribute to Cinecittà, the Italian cinema of the 50s and 60s. In 2017, the 84th edition was dedicated to Broadway and musical comedies. In 2018, the 85th edition was dedicated to Bollywood. In 2019, the 86th edition takes place from 16 February to 3 March and is themed on “Des mondes fantastiques” (Fantastic Worlds).

The long and narrow Biovès Gardens next to the casino are walled off for the occasion and feature an impressive display of large wire-framed structures and sculptures built from thousands of citrus fruit (lemons, grapefruit and oranges). This dazzling display of sunshine colours require nearly 15 tonnes of fruit and thousands of hours of creation and handling.

At nighttime, the citrus structures at the Biovès Gardens are lit up to create a magical atmosphere with the addition of unusual sounds.
Each Sunday afternoon, colourful citrus fruit floats parade along the pebbly beachfront of Promenade du Soleil, accompanied by dancers, folk bands, fanfares and confetti.

The little town of Menton is located 30 km east of Nice where steep mountain cliffs and terraces slope dramatically to the Mediterranean Sea.

The location of Menton is unique in France: the last coastal town before the Italian border is protected from the cold winds of the Alps by the surrounding mountains and therefore enjoys the warmest winter in the South of France (Corsica excepted) with more than 300 days of sunshine per year. This explains why this is the only place in metropolitan France where lemons are grown.

Until the 1930s, Menton was Europe’s largest lemon producer. The local production went into decline until recently, when about 15 citrus growers preserved the tradition. Today, some 5,000 trees produce more than 150 tonnes of lemons yearly in Menton and the neighbouring communes of Roquebrune, Sainte-Agnès and Castellar.

The lemon varieties which grow in Menton have names such as Santa Theresa, Villafranca and Eureka. According to the Tourist Office, the shape of a Menton lemon is “more elliptical than round with a bright yellow colour.

It is also characterised by generous branches bearing up to fifteen fruits, while there are less than five to a branch on most lemon trees. The research reveals that the lemons grown in the Menton region are rich in acid and essence, with a high essential oil content in the peel”.

Menton is therefore famous for its lemon tart (tarte au citron) and many shops in the old part of town sell lemon-related products: gingerbread, almond paste, boiled sweets, wine, vinegar, jam, soaps, candles and perfume.

Every lemon and orange is attached to the structures with an elastic band, a yellow band for the lemons and an orange one for the oranges.

I think the flowers are almost as impressive as the oranges and lemons

 The enormous dragon was our favourite so we were pleased to see that it had been contributed by Villefranche sur Mer.

Its claws were amazing

We went for a walk along the seafront and saw many stalls selling oranges and lemons and we were amazed to see how expensive they were considering the sheer number of pieces of fruit on display.

We have been to Menton a number of times but we’ve never been to the old town so we did today and it’s really rather lovely.

On the way to the station we saw all these amazing photos of the people who made the amazing citron structures.

We caught the train home and rounded off a lovely day with a French lesson from the lovely Sylvie. We did our homework from last week on the train so we were in the right frame of mind for her and it was a lovely class. Badger attacked her handbag for a while but she was fine because she has a cat of her own. He then fell asleep on her bag and she thinks that he can smell her cat on it. To start the class she had brought a French magazine with her about the British royal family thinking that because we are British it would be a good topic of conversation. She was amazed by how little we knew about them and we were amazed by how much the French love our royal family!