Quotes from Carol Drinkwater

Despite trying to keep luggage to minimum, I do like to have all my cleansers and my hair and nail things to hand.

My father started out as a musician but he had a salary from a day job working as a health inspector for the government. When he left to set up his own entertainment agency his income became more uncertain.

Technically, my husband and I are residents of the Alpes-Maritimes, where we are tucked away on our olive farm overlooking the Bay of Cannes in a corner that is, as yet, rather undiscovered.

For many of us, lavender's deep colour and its unforgettable fragrance encapsulate the heady joys of Provence.

The almond, the first fruit to flower round the Mediterranean, heralds the arrival of spring. It is also an early nectar for the honey bees.

I have discovered France's best-kept secret. Reunion is an island of some 970 square miles situated in the Indian Ocean south-west of Mauritius and east of Madagascar.

I have discovered a gem, a tiny, relatively unknown Greek island. Kastellorizo lies in the Aegean Sea a mile off the Turkish Turquoise Coast, the most easterly of the Dodecanese islands.

My first job after drama school was with Stanley Kubrick. It was only a few lines in 'A Clockwork Orange', but I was working with a master of cinema.

I travel so much that life has become a matter of honing things down to the barest essentials. Nowadays, I almost never go anywhere with anything more than hand luggage - and a laptop.

I was educated at a convent in Kent. It was run by Irish and French nuns. I mostly hated it but they did allow me to follow my passion for drama, writing plays, performing, and directing my works.

Tizi-Ouzou is the capital of Kabylia and makes an excellent base from which to explore these culturally untapped and very beautiful mountains. Conquerors from time immemorial have driven the Berbers inland from their coastal settlements and these mountains have become one of their strongholds.

While the olive is high in fat, it's monounsaturated fat, which, in a balanced diet, can help control heart disease by lowering cholesterol levels.

In Britain, we have a vague idea that being by the sea does you good, clears your lungs and regenerates your system.

Gethsemane - the word is Hebrew for olive press - is just across the valley from Kidron, which in turn is a stone's throw from the Wailing Wall and the Dome of the Rock.

Jerusalem sits on a hill surrounded by valleys. It is a dry, craggy region but ideal for olive trees, which require minimal irrigation.

I like the freedom of novels. With the memoirs, I always had to keep to the facts. I like that with novels, if I want to go off and write something quite dramatic or outrageous or something completely different, I can do it if I want to.

Reunion's ace card is its interior, its natural parks. Its volcanic origins have defined an extraordinary landscape, characterised by high peaks, deep canyons, lush ravines and vast plains, which are ideal for trekking, cycling and water rafting.

It was Captain Cook who christened the Whitsunday Islands while sailing past them in 1770 on what he mistakenly believed was Whitsunday. His calendar was askew, but the name stuck.

All Creatures Great And Small' is one of the most popular British television series ever made. When it was broadcast in the Seventies and Eighties viewing figures regularly soared above 20million.

To say I love the Christmas season at our home in the South of France is an understatement. I get such a kick out of preparing the house for the arrival of family; seeing our scruffy old villa bursting at the seams with loved ones.

Our farm is a 15-minute walk to Pablo Picasso's last home. Alongside it stands the lovely Notre-Dame-de-Vie Chapel with its 13th-century bell tower, which was visible to Pablo from his atelier.

I never think of people's literary potential when I meet them, but people do audition.