Amid the gently sloping vineyards of the Saint Emilion wine region, as you pass the graceful chateaux and medieval villages, it is difficult to imagine the violence of the road crash that snuffed out the lives of 43 French people on Friday.
Small copses, like the one where the crash occurred at a hook in the road, dot the countryside, between the parcelled vineyards. Autumn is the most idyllic season, when the poplars turn yellow, the grape leaves burn red and orange and sunset paints the sky in pastel colours. The just completed harvest was especially good, and the scent of fine wine fermenting fills the streets of this village of 800.
Many of Puisseguin's residents were woken by sirens and helicopters, as the rescue mission got under way at 7.30am. By noon, there were 200 gendarmes in the village. Prime minister Manuel Valls, interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve and transport minister Alain Vidalies came to express "our sorrow, our support, our compassion", said Valls.
Hundreds of journalists arrived to film grieving families as they straggled into the memorial chapel where white tableclothes were spread over wine barrels.
The coach carried 49 members of the “Petits Palaisiens” pensioners’ club, all of them from villages in the area. “I taught in Lussac, Petit-Palais and Puisseguin,” said Bernard Vargas (57).
"The three villages form a triangle and it feels like we're all the same family. When a tragedy happens anywhere in France, we are sorry, but here, where everyone knows each other, we are annihilated."
“When it happens 500m from your front door, you, think, ‘What if it had been a coach full of children?’ I have two school-age children,” said Vincent Brassous (44) a house painter from Puisseguin. His uncle’s first cousin, from Petit-Palais, died when the pensioners’ coach crashed into the wood lorry and burst into flames.
Jean-Marie Courret (63) a municipal administrator, stood in a knot of villagers outside the church in Petit-Palais. “People are especially upset about Lucienne,” he said, his voice cracking. “Everyone bought tobacco and groceries from her, until she retired 10 years ago. That was her shop, right there, where the mailbox is.”
“I knew them all. I was born and raised here,” said Gilles Clion (57) the owner of Le Prince Sarment restaurant.
"They would meet on Tuesdays in the salle des fêtes and eat little cakes. They organised a lottery on Sundays, to earn money for their outings."
