In the heart of the southern France’s idyllic region of Provence, is the pretty four-star Mas de l’Oulivié. Its pale stone walls and dappled roofs lie in the baking sun, among the green of the surrounding olive groves. Just like growing the best olives, creating the best holiday requires a combination of perfect climate, loving care, and great passion – all of which the owners, Isabelle and Emmanuel Achard, have mastered during the 18 years that they’ve been welcoming guests to this little pocket of Provençal heaven.
Lots of sunshine all year round...
The main reason Provence truly excels at producing delicious olives is its year-round sunshine, something the Mas de l’Oulivié encourages you to enjoy. Whether it be through serving you breakfast on their sunlit terrace, bringing you drinks by their rocky-bordered pool or pointing out the different varieties of olives they grow themselves amongst the Provençal herbs and flowers, they really do go the extra mile.
Years of patient, loving care...
Olive trees live can live thousands of years, and each harvest needs to be perfectly timed. The same care is lavished on guests by Isabelle and Emmanuel Achard, hoteliers for decades and the loving owners of the Mas de l’Oulivié. They and their staff are always on hand to recommend the best wine or olive oil merchants, book you a table in nearby beautiful Baux-de-Provence or bring your breakfast to your room for a relaxing morning in bed.
Using all of the olive in a thousand different ways...
Oils, salads, and the famous Provençal tapenade, olives are used in a myriad of ways in France, making the most of this fabulous food. At the Mas de l’Oulivié, this variety is evoked not only in the fabulous dishes laid on by their restaurant – flavouring lavish lunches and generous picnic baskets with products from the region and their own gardens – but also in the rooms. Each one is unique in its chosen Provençal style, from beaming sunshine yellows to delicate lavender.
Let yourself soak up the sunshine and be lovingly cultivated this summer in beautiful Provence.