It seems only a few weeks ago that the Languedoc was mostly brown. A fecund brown, it looked, but one paused while it waited for more light and warmth.

The thousands and thousands of vines were still dormant, in their rows and rows, earthy furrows dug out between many of them. Naked and slumbering trees waited yet for a new suit of leaves.

And now this.

A few days in the 60s, a couple of days of soft, persistent rain, and the countryside has exploded.

Now it is a riot of every shade of green, as the vines and trees bud and sprout in a hurry.

But nature’s palette includes the gold of wild flowers (see photo above) as well as the purple of irises or other strange plants in the eco-diversified no-man’s-land between vineyards.

We can also find the occasional poppy flower, a deep and fragile red, as well as the occasional orchid, pushing its way to the light.

An orchard of a sort we could not identify a week ago looked like 50 sadly dead stick trees. Today, during our two-hour walk through the fields, we went past the orchard and every one of those fruit trees was sprouting, and now we watch to see what sort of yield these seemingly spare and feeble trees produce. (Something that doesn’t weigh much; nuts, perhaps?)

Whole tracts are given over to olive trees, which are prized both for their olives as well as their oil.

Figs grow wild here, as do asparagus and two types of almonds (the bitter and the really bitter), as well as walnuts and even pomegranates. White dandelions have popped up in some wheat fields, looking like flakes of snow on a greensward.

It is a garden, here in the south of France. Much of it is man-made, some of it is nature finding a way. Nobody planted a seed that led to the orchid pushing its way up through its less-colorful neighbors, but there it is. Birds to thank? Bees?

Spring is running amok, and after a winter of lots of overcast days and temperatures in the 40s or low 50s … it is thoroughly welcomed.