Tourists, to judge by remarks in hotel guest books, are obsessed with minutiae. "The butcher," one had written at Mouthier-HautePierre, "was somewhat sour." "On the contrary," noted another, "he was very nice - and gives tastes."
We found him in agreeable mood. He tried a little English. He even threw in a half loaf of bread with the ham. Strictly speaking, the guest book in question was not intended for every customer at the Hotel de La Cascade. It had been provided by the tour operator which spirited our bags from village to village, while we, burdened only with picnics, bottled water, binoculars, camera and waterproofs - redundant, though you would be mad to go without them - toured the Jura on foot.
This region of low limestone mountains in eastern France, close to the border with Switzerland, is cut by the Loue in an abrupt gash when rain comes suddenly and violently. It is a fascinating river, for it flows out of another, the Doubs, down a hole in the rock and, after a brief spell of independence, flows back into the Loue. That it did so was proved earlier this century when, after a fire at the Pernod plant in Pontarlier, a million litres of absinthe poured into the Doubs and emerged in the Loue.
What followed has echoes in the film Manon des Sources. Factory owners along the Doubs, anxious to improve the river's level when spring torrents were exhausted, began cementing all the fissures they could find in its bed.
This provoked fury among people working on the banks of the Loue, which once provided water power for forges and mills. It took the construction of a dam to bring peace.
We set off along the river's right bank, shielded by beech branches from the hot sunshine. After a couple of kilometres, we came across the first of several distractions, the Source du Pontet, a mysterious place of soft, damp air, ferns and rocks clothed green with moss, where water gushed from a cavern.
We crossed a bridge to the left bank and followed the wall of a gorge, in the gloomy depths of which, legend has it, lives the serpent-like vouivre, a monster thought to be of Celtic imagining. The river hurtled and sparkled through narrows, tipped neatly over regular limestone steps where the valley bottom broadened. We dipped our feet by the Grand Saut, and walked on across the top of the waterfall.
Gustave Courbet, an artist from nearby Ornans, has painted the source of the Loue 14 times. Tourism officials have had the idea of stationing an easel there, with a Courbet reproduction on it so that you can sit and see the river explode from a great maw of rock, much as the artist did.
Ornans, where Courbet's home has become a fine museum and gallery, was the start and finishing point of this eight-night holiday. Unless you are an expert in wild flowers, you would benefit from buying a guide, the more so if you are going in early summer, for then they are in profusion. There are orchids, lilies, meadow sage, yellow gentian. One day, in a secluded meadow of long grass, we found the lyrically named Narcissus poeticus. Rarely have I seen so many wild strawberries.
Kingfishers stayed stubbornly out of sight but, in the forest above Montgesoye, we stood motionless for a good half hour, waiting for a woodpecker to overcome its alarm sufficiently to return to the hollowed tree trunk nest where its young kept up their shrill, nonstop prattle.
The walk is unguided, so you do not have to hike in a group, but a map and directions are supplied. There are two nights at each hotel, allowing you to walk locally on "rest days". The climb from Mouthier to La Roche de Hautepierre - on a clear day you can see Mont Blanc - is not to be missed.
The route takes you through vineyards which produce the distinctive wines of the Jura, among them vin jaune, reminiscent of dry sherry. After the gorges it turns back, and steeply uphill, to Le Moine de la Valle and the ramparts of Les Rochers du Capucin, where there are fine views of village rooftops far below.
There is a lack of village bars in the area. Maybe the locals had all signed the pledge, I suggested at the Hotel de France in Ornans. "Pas du tout," explained the woman at the desk. It was simply market forces. The young up sticks and head for town as soon as they are old enough, and there is not much profit in selling the occasional drink to passing tourists.
The village of Longeville was no exception. We tramped its long, sloping main street, cooling heads and necks in the chill water of regular spaced lavoirs, in search of a beer. Eventually we asked an old man if there was a cafe or bar. Minutes later, as we sat resignedly on a churchyard wall, he appeared with two beers.
We did not record this in any guest books, however. It is as well that some holiday minutiae comes in the form of an agreeable surprise.