Every spring, the French town of Menton is covered with huge sculptures of lemons and oranges. You can meet ormans, dragons and the most amazing characters.
The French Riviera has many things to offer, but apart from sunshine and sea, there are two other things that deserve special attention: lemons and oranges. These two fragrant citrus fruits are the main attractions of the Menton Lemon Festival every year.
The festival has been held in February since 1928. The region is famous for its citrus groves, and its inhabitants decided nearly a century ago to pay homage to the sunny orbs with an annual series of festivities. The juicy fruits are used to form huge sculptures - using wire frames - of locomotives, mills, dragons and even people like Cleopatra and Fred Astaire. The colourful, fragrant celebrations are attended by hundreds of thousands of visitors and usually use 140 tonnes of fruit for decoration. The sculptures were on display for two weeks this year, with decorative lighting at night, of course. When the festival is over, the installations are dismantled and the fruit sold.
If you want some of these, you can still get there, this Sunday is the closing day of the Citromünnep. Maybe we can get a batch of oranges for some fruity desserts...
(source: atlasobscura.com)
