Country Life June 27 2018 looks at clouds, calvados, chickens – and the best places to buy a home in France.

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FRANCE: A celebration of our cousins across the channel, with fine food, beautiful scenery and wonderful property.

CLOUDSPOTTING: A beginners’ guide to deciphering those shapes in the sky.

CALVADOS: The finest way to ‘drink’ an apple, bar none.

BLUEBERRY PANCAKES: Plus blueberry cakes, blueberry muesli… you get the idea.

CARS: VW’s new SUV tested by Charles Rangely-Wilson.

CHAMBORD: The finest chateau in the Loire Valley?

LIVING NATIONAL TREASURE: The rare-chicken breeder.

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INTERIORS: A kitchen that’s a perfect complement to an Arts-and-Crafts house.

ITCHEN TO CATCH SOMETHING: Our roving angler David Profumo reports back from Hampshire.

LUXURY: Adventurer and globetrotter Charley Boorman is used to roughing it – but that doesn’t mean he has to all the time.

PARSLEY: The potent past of a humble herb.

HEAVEN SCENT: Irises are now being bred for smell as well as cover – Jackie Hobbs explains.

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