Across the Luberon, thick silvery olive trees rustle, sway and chatter. For it is the olive harvest; when a seemingly innocuous ladder leaning against an olive tree means only one thing; that hidden inside, two or three olive pickers are braced against ancient branches, dropping olives to the nets below, and keeping warm with a flask of something or other.
Picking olives is rather like combing the knots out of a head of unruly hair. A small plastic rake and a head for heights is all that’s needed. Local mills do the pressing and will let you watch as these unlikely black berries give up their oil; litres and litres of the delicious, fruity, peppery stuff. But the Luberon olive groves aren’t competing in the global oil market. Like much of Luberon production, this is thankfully another crop that the locals like to keep local.
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