Château de Ripaille
The past is closer than we realize. Our lives make a thin covering over the layers of many other lives. Sharing the same space at different times, these lives seem like layers of rock, one lifetime pressing its weight against the next.
I’ve felt sadness at the loss of untold stories from people no longer alive to tell them, but perhaps there is nothing to lament. Perhaps if we listen well enough, the untold stories are etched all around us.
About a year ago, I found out that my great-grandmother’s ancestors came from Ripaille somewhere in France near Switzerland and that place name became their last name and changed over time to my great-grandmother’s maiden name Repass. Ripaille became Rippas in Switzerland and Repass in the United States. I wondered if the town might still exist, so I looked it up and discovered there was no longer a town, but a castle remained: Château de Ripaille right on the border between France and Switzerland!
It’s not known exactly how long ago Ripaille came into being, but the town was on the shores of Lac Léman, then called Lac Genève, when the area was part of the Kingdom of Burgundia from around 400 – 1000 AD. When Humbert I arrived in the Alps from Magdeburg in Saxony, he brought the House of Savoy (also spelled Savoie) into existence around 1003 AD. Over time, the region became the Duchy of Savoie and Chablais was the name of the province of Savoie that included Ripaille. Thonon-les-Bains, the town next to Ripaille, was the capital of Chablais, and further south, Chambéry was the capital of all of Savoie. Château de Ripaille was built first by the Green Count and his wife in the 14th century and the castle was expanded by their grandson in the 15th century. The Chablais region of the Duchy of Savoie didn’t become part of France until 1860, and I think my great grandmother would have been glad. For years, to her dismay, newspapers proclaimed her French heritage and it turns out she wasn’t technically French after all.
The photographs of Château de Ripaille and the surrounding area were so enchanting that I knew I would go there one day, and that day has come.
I wake one mile from Château de Ripaille in the Ibis Hotel closest to the train station in Thonon-les-Bains and walk the line of linden trees on Avenue d’Evian as it emerges into a flower garden in the middle of a roundabout or rond-point. To the right, I see a sign: L’Instant. Sucré (sweet). Salé (salty). It’s a Salon du Thé with little tables and chairs set up outside under cover of the overhang at the front of the store. Full of hope for my favorite meal of the day, I open the glass door next to the floor to ceiling glass windows. Inside, it is small and warm with books and games lining the walls and the people who enter seek conversation and ideas. I meet Marie-Anne who speaks French with me and we converse about things beyond my language abilities. Marie-Anne believes in supernatural forces and life after death. Do I? she asks. I attempt to share very complex thoughts that would be difficult to convey even in English. I start to say something very profound in French, realize it, and lose the thread of the whole thing. Marie-Anne smiles warmly at my effort. Viewing me as a fellow life trekker, she brings out a map and points to the places she’s travelled. I wonder if she would hire me to work in her café. I could live in Thonon-les-Bains.
After a croissant and a coffee in the warm place of bonheur, I return to the street. Once I reach the garden rond-point, I see the lake. Beautiful! There’s a park with a round fountain and a walkway with views of Lac Léman (known in English as Lake Geneva) stretching for miles far below. I stroll it slowly. I see a boat marina and neat rows of russet tiles stack in rows on the rooftops of the houses. And I can see the Swiss shore on the other side.
I continue to watch the lake until I can’t see it anymore as I walk along Avenue du Léman. There is a cluster of old buildings and one is labelled Maison de Concise. Ivy coils across the old gray stone, its dark green leaves aging orange and red along a tower with perhaps a place for horses to stable at the bottom once upon a time. Three stories and a little attic, it feels ancient. Concise is the name of the village, essentially part of Thonon-les-Bains, right next to Château de Ripaille. In Concise, the name of the street changes to Avenue des Ducs de Savoie.
In the steps of my ancestors, I see a street named for the Green Count: le Comte Vert and another for the Red Count: le Comte Rouge, who died after a fall from a horse and many suspected his ambitious mother was involved. It would make a terrific historic drama.
When I reach the rond-point, I see fields of golden vines past harvest and a castle overlooking the lake in the distance. Château de Ripaille.
It was built by le Comte Vert and his wife, Bonne de Bourbon. Le Comte Vert was busy fighting the 100 Years War, so Bonne de Bourbon administrated the building of the castle and its activities. Bonne was known for her skill on the harp, so those activities included musical concerts, and her desire to entertain meant that the rooms were very large. Her grandson, Amédée VIII, son of le Comte Rouge, became the first Duke of Savoie and was ordained Antipope Felix V. He expanded Château de Ripaille, giving it seven towers, and made it a place of holy retreat, establishing an order of knights called the Order of Maurice. He found it best to lead a life of seclusion and austerity in the grand castle whose name became the French phrase for feasting (faire ripaille), an irony not lost on the poet Voltaire, who wrote about Amédée VIII, causing enough of a stir that he had to revise the original verses to keep the ecclesiastical peace.
The road is called Avenue de Ripaille. I walk it and turn at a huge sign announcing Château de Ripaille as a Site Remarquable d’Histoire, d’Art et de Nature.
The château is surrounded by hedges and old stone walls. A long driveway leads to a small archway painted dark red like a barn. A sign indicates that visitors are to open a little, black door, so I do and enter a sparse, unheated gift shop with some cards and bottles of Ripaille wines. I would love to drink the wine that comes from the ground where my ancestors were buried, but I won’t be able to take it with me, so I don’t want to buy a bottle. I hope I might find a glass of Ripaille wine on the menu at a local restaurant.
With a quiet kind of friendliness, the young woman behind the counter lets me know the château will open in fifteen minutes and I am welcome to look around while I wait. She sells me the entry ticket for 9 euros.
When the time is right, the gate across the archway opens and I walk through to enter an enormous courtyard with sculpted hedges, fruit trees, and benches. To my right is the château with its remaining four towers, and to my left are buildings from when it was a monastery for the Chartreux.
Inside the château, everything is enormous like it is a home for giants. The broad, shining, off-white marble stairs go up in a slow curl. I find the grand hall with its soot-stained fireplaces that look too big for normal-sized humans.
The kitchen is the largest I’ve seen in a château. It has stairs up to a storeroom. And there is something so spread-out, shining, and window-lit about the kitchen that makes me wish I could cook there.
The front door, the windows, and the ceilings are made of wood. The entrances and exits are arched. There is a video about the history of Ripaille playing in one of the rooms. If I arrived on a different day, there would be a tea service, too. I hope to return when it is available.
Downstairs, there is an art exhibition and I have to laugh when I see that the lead image is a polar bear and the subject is Inuit art. The Alaskan comes to France to see Inuit art in the castle namesake of her ancestors. That’s some interesting strata!
There’s a small winding staircase down to le Chemin des douves or path of the moat. There is a garden walkway where the moat once circled the castle. First, I pass through the basement cave with old oval wine barrels. Posted on one of the vats, I find Voltaire’s poem about bizarre Amédée, who by wanting to be pope ceased to be wise.
There is a Forêt de Ripaille next to the château, but I decide to return to Thonon-les-Bains to find lunch and visit the forest another time.
I take a different route back, following the shore of Lac Léman. Swimmers in shiny tight pink caps approach the protective banister over the lake. Undaunted, they slide over its white bars and hop into the cold, deep water. Nearby, fishermen wait patiently for the swimmers to cross before casting again. There is a reliance on paying attention in the French culture that I find admirable. People look out for each other.
The day is so beautiful, the water sparkling with sunlight, Switzerland beckoning from across the lake. I find a place for lunch. It has many tables and two floors, yet is so crowded that I feel fortunate to be seated at a little table. After a light meal, I walk around Thonon-les-Bains.
First, the port. There is a little fishing village called Rives, built in the 13th century, with small fishing shacks in use by the professional fishermen who continue to catch white fish, perch, trout, Arctic char, burbot, and crayfish, supplying restaurants and locals with fresh fish. The Écomusée de la Pêche et du Lac is a museum in honor of the local fishing industry, demonstrating science techniques and equipment, kinds of fish, and lake-dwelling birds.
One of the buildings has the word Sauvatage with the flags of Savoie (red with white cross) and Thonon-les-Bains (yellow and blue) on either side of it. There is a plaque in honor of the fisherman Petit Jean who served as sauveteur, or rescuer, for 64 years.
In 1295, the stone gate, fortress, and tower of Château de Rives were built to protect the fishing village. The tower still stands and is called Tour des Langues (Tower of Tongues) because it was where butchers paid their feudal tax in ox or cow tongues.
Across from the Tour des Langues is the tiny Chapelle des Rives. Big enough for only a handful of people, over the entrance is a sign indicating that the chapel is in honor of the children who died for France in times of war with names listed on either side of the little door.
There are little stories everywhere in the rock if you look closely enough.
There is a sign blending quietly into a stone wall to commemorate the place where Saint François de Sales, the priest who recatholicised the Chablais, saved the life of an infant who otherwise would have died without baptism.
On the street side of Château de Rives, there is a historic sign from World War II. The flags of France, Savoy, and Thonon-les-Bains are at the top.
Essentially, it says: “Here, on the morning of August 16, 1944, the French Interior Force achieved their first victory to free the Haute-Savoie, which they had to complete through their own means on August 19 at Annecy. After six hours of combat, the garrison capitulated and 72 prisoners of the Wermacht fell into the hands of the French Secret Army.”
There’s a Place du 16 Août along the port in honor of the important day in history.
I go up a steep walkway called Chemin de Sous Bassus or the path underneath. There is a beautiful view of what was perhaps part of the old Château de Thonon, the remnants of which are now a museum for the town. There is a fun-looking funiculaire for those who cannot or who do not want to walk up and down.
In upper Thonon-les Bains, there is a church that is actually two churches merged together. One church, Saint-Hippolyte, would have existed when my ancestors lived here. The other was added to the first by Saint François de Sales, who recatholicized the region after the intrusions of the Swiss Bernese Protestants. To his credit, his conversion was peaceful, theirs was not. The Bernese Protestants were destructive to Château de Thonon and Château de Ripaille. It is my unsubstantiated belief that my ancestors left Ripaille during the Bernese invasion in 1536. The Bernese ravaged Château de Ripaille, so it makes sense anyone working in or near the castle would flee. The name Rippas appears for the first time in Ziefen, Switzerland in 1539 and Claude Rippas is noted to be a Burgundian basketmaker from the Duchy of Savoie.
Like most power struggles, it’s easy to want to identify a villain, however, the more I look at the history, the more I see devastation from both sides of the Wars of Religion. One of my heroes, the sister of King François I, Marguerite de Navarre, did her best to encourage unity among Protestants and Catholics, but it seems all of those efforts died with her. Her grandson became the first Protestant King of France, King Henri IV, but at a high cost.
Near the double church is the oldest street in Thonon-les-Bains: la rue Chante Coq, or the street of the rooster’s song, beautiful, narrow, and cobbled. There seem to be few, if any, vehicles as if the streets were made for pedestrians and not cars. After looking in the shops for a while, I emerge in a huge open square and find my go-to outdoor café for afternoon rest in Thonon-les-Bains: La Regence. I sit at one of a fleet of tables set in the expansive area outside and order a coffee. By listening, it is here that I learn to say, “Je vais prendre un double café” to order a slightly larger espresso. Thank you, young adult couple each ordering a double café. I also hear the price so that I can be ready with the right change to pay on receiving the coffee.
There are many things I love about the French culture. Sitting at a little table outside in front of a café, watching the world go by on foot or on bike, shopping, talking, the sun casting light and shadow as the day progresses, is definitely one of my favorite things. And I am not the only one. An older man comes along with his dog and sits where he must sit every afternoon for his coffee. People stop to have a word like the table is his home and he is its host. An older woman happens by and sits with him and the warm octogenarian companionship is as golden as the day.
I’m not far from the Ibis hotel, so I take my time, lingering in the twisting streets and over the view of the lake and the tiled rooftops below. Dinner is not an easy thing for a solo traveler in France. It’s too much of a social occasion with conversation as expected as the wine. There is a bit of a restaurant at the Ibis hotel, so I decide to try it. The food is not great, but it serves its purpose. Tomorrow, I will go down to the Port des Rives and take the ferry to Lausanne. Why not?
The next morning, I stop at L’Instant and speak with Marie-Anne again. If I lived here, maybe we would become friends. It is a warm thought as I make my way down to the port. There’s no one inside the ferry building to provide a ticket, however, I find instructions to use a machine. As soon as I insert my credit card, I realize I’ve turned it the wrong way. Typically, this is not a problem. I can try again. This time, however, it does not budge. It is stuck. I yank and yank. I punch buttons to see if cancelling releases the card. No. I yank again. All my might yields no result. How is this possible?! I try starting the transaction again to see if it helps, but nothing releases the card.
The ferry is about to leave. It’s not likely to get solved in time to board, so I won’t be going to Lausanne, but I do have to get my card out. Everything depends on that card. Hotels, meals, travel. How did we get to the point in our world culture that a small piece of plastic can be so critical to survival?! How would you explain it to someone living in 1536?
I walk toward the little fishing buildings of Rives. There is a man in a yellow vest doing some work outside of one of the buildings, a true gilet jaune. Would he be willing to help me?
He is in fact very willing to help. He returns with me to the machine and proceeds to do everything I just did just as unsuccessfully while I wait patiently. I don’t know the word in French, but I’m thinking we need pliers. “La pince,” he says. He does not have a pair, so we trek up to the funiculaire booth to see if they do. At first, the search is not fruitful. As we’re heading back down the hill, someone comes running after us. They found them. Et voilà, as soon as the pliers grasp the card, the card is out. Whew!
And so, the ferry to Lausanne will have to wait for another visit. Life with its failures and triumphs moves me in a direction like a current. Thankfully, this redirection appears to be of little consequence. Instead, I follow the lake path to return to Château de Ripaille and walk the forest where the counts and dukes of Savoy rode horses and hunted.
The entrance to Le Fôret de Ripaille reminds me of how I’ve imagined entering the mythical Narnia would be. There is a heavy gate to open and then I am immersed in forest. I follow the leaf-strewn path and crunch acorns with my feet.
There is a surprise on the walk: a park in honor of peace throughout the world with trees from five continents. The different kinds of trees are intriguing and exotic. I pick up a fallen leaf from a tree from Mongolia. This is Pansy Repass Stockton’s ancestral home and it couldn’t be more fitting if I’d imagined it for her. She used materials from trees and plants from all over the world. People mailed them to her. For her sun painting of the Holy Land, she used materials from the Holy Land itself. And so here, in her ancestral home, where her people lived for centuries, there is a park with vegetation from around the globe where she would be able to collect the materials she used in her art all in one park. And there’s a memorial to justice in the park. When Pansy Stockton spoke, it was about two things: her art and the ways of life of Native Americans, complete with a basket of instructional dolls. Her ancestral home represents the two things she held most dear: nature and justice. Very fitting.
I walk back to Thonon-les-Bains and stop at the restaurant La Voile for a lovely fish meal served outside. The placemats show the depth at various points and the total volume of water in Lac Léman. The rich red leaves shimmering in the trees make the sky seem bluer. The waitress says, “Dites-moi,” in the gruff familiarity of busy waitresses. Tell me what you want. That makes sense. I order and continue to listen. When someone asks for the waitress, her response is almost always, “J’arrive, j’arrive,” so that means “I’m coming; I’ll be right there.” A very little boy at a table nearby speaks to me in French, not realizing I am foreign, or perhaps more likely, not aware of the possibility of foreignness. If only we could keep that sense that we are all from the same place and not so different from one another.
I stroll around the town, its fountains, its shops, its twisting, narrow, cobbled streets, and end up at La Regence once again for a double café. Another sedimentary layer. The older gentleman I saw the day before arrives again and his dog eagerly licks water from the waiting bowl and all is well in the story of the world.
RESOURCES:
Click here for the Thonon-les-Bains website. For English, click on the flag at the top right.
For a stroll of the town of Thonon-les-Bains, go to Thonon-les-Bains map stroll.
For a stroll that goes to Château de Ripaille, go to Châteaux map stroll.
For Thonon-les-Bains history, go to Thonon-les-Bains.
For the official website for the castle, go to Château de Ripaille.
For some Ripaille wine history, go to Wine of Château de Ripaille.
Website of Ibis Thonon Centre Hotel where I stayed.
Next France for Two Months: Getting Up With the Birds Lac Léman to Lyon to Lille
This is #7. in a series of stories: France for Two Months. Follow the links below to read the other parts of the series starting with the first:
1. Santa Fe Depot Departure
2. Return to the Great Lady
3. Shakespeare and Company Bookstore
4. Paris Stroll
5. Paris – des heures exquises
6. Train to Thonon-les-Bains