The Asian film festival in rural France few have heard of: cinema greats visit not just the cosy event, but also the charming countryside
- The sleepy town of Vesoul hosts an annual international film festival that sees the great and good of Asian cinema rub shoulders with cinephiles and locals
- The town is the perfect base from which to discover the Haute-Saône region and its spa towns, vineyards and a beautiful national park
It’s easy to get off France’s jammed autoroutes and head down winding lanes to discover what is still very much a bucolic, rural nation.
While tourists may be drawn to the glamour resorts and golden beaches of the Cote d’Azur, the French themselves will more likely be heading for a family trip into what everyone calls La France profonde.
Few destinations symbolise such rustic escapes better than sleepy Vesoul, in the rolling hills of the agricultural Haute-Saône region. A three-hour drive from Paris, the Haute-Saône nestles in between better-known Burgundy, Alsace and the Jura.
Grand chateaux and famous museums are few and far between here, so Haute-Saône holidaymakers indulge in more simple pleasures: boating on a tranquil lake; wild swimming in the fast-flowing waters of a secluded river; stopping off at farms to taste the local cheeses, Gruyère and Comté; and feasting on hearty dishes such as creamy chicken fricassee with juicy morel mushrooms, accompanied by a vin jaune from the vineyards of the Jura.
Vesoul is the capital, the perfect base from which to discover the Haute-Saône, and this solid little town of 15,000 inhabitants is famous throughout France, but only as the title of singer Jacques Brel’s most famous song, released in 1968. Ask people where Vesoul actually is and most will give a Gallic shrug and say they have no idea.
I have been spending my summer holidays here for years, visiting the extended farming family of my French wife and discovering some wonderful hidden secrets.
