Just found this article from the May edition of the Observer Food Monthly, but better late than never right?

Top 50 Things a Real Foodie Should Do

To celebrate Observer Food Monthly’s fiftieth edition, we asked some of our favourite bon viveurs what they considered most essential to do before they died. …

31) Get up early and go to market
Preferably in Provence. The smell is a mix of pine and cigarette smoke with the occasional strong hit of goat cheese. Cogniscenti head for the Var area, particularly the markets of Cotignac (summer only), the bustling town of Salernes (Wednesday and Saturdays) and Aups (famous for truffles).

The village in the late afternoon

Having left the country, we’re finally enjoying the Indian summer that we hoped we would have at home. Here in the south of France the sky is cloudless, the days are still warm and the vines are heaving with fruit.

Whereas a month ago this sleepy village would have been quietly dull apart from the occasional group of tourists canoeing downriver, it’s now a hive of activity. The campers have gone home; the children have returned to school; and the 2004 harvest has finally begun. Every 10 minutes another trailer load of grapes arrives at the coop