Clue #1 (français) | The Great Coffee Break Treasure Hunt 2026

Mark Pentleton (0:00)

Bienvenue à la grande chasse au trésor de Coffee Break.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (0:03)

Welcome to a virtual treasure hunt across Europe 2026, episode 1 Bonjour à tous et bienvenue.

Mark Pentleton (0:17)

Bonjour.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (0:18)

Salut Max, comment vas-tu?

Mark Pentleton (0:19)

Très bien, très content d'être avec toi pour le retour de la chasse au trésor.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (0:23)

Le retour de la chasse au trésor. This is the return of the Great Coffee Break French Treasure Hunt for 2026 Now, over the next four episodes, we are going to be taking a journey across Europe, a virtual journey across Europe.

Mark Pentleton (0:38)

Exactly, we are sending you, Marc, on the virtual treasure hunt, and we've prepared some clues for you to figure out where to find the treasure.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (0:46)

Where to find the treasure. And of course, our listeners and our viewers can listen along and try to identify these cities as we go. Now, one thing to mention of course, is that if you do identify the city from the clue, don't post it in the comments. That's very important. Very important.

So, when does all this start? Well, it starts now.

Mark Pentleton (1:06)

Come on, let's go.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (1:09)

So, what's going to happen? Max will read through the clue all at once, then we'll go through it together. We'll talk about the vocabulary and make sure we all understand everything. And then we'll have a little discussion as to what happens next.

Mark Pentleton (1:21)

Perfect. A sleepy giant. Endormi. Plenty of fire in the heart. Veille sur la baie et les barques, sans peur.

Pate et tomate ont embrassé la flamme. Ronde, doré. A feast that we are asking for A hero all in blue. Le numéro 10 Souris sur la Let's chaîne go.

Les citrons lourds, le café noir et fort, scooters et chansons animent le port.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (1:56)

Hmm, très intéressant. One of the things I love about this whole treasure hunt is the fact that the language in the clues is, the kind of language you might encounter in a book, in a poem, something like that. It's a little more kind of literary.

Mark Pentleton (2:13)

Wait, so because it's poetry, it's a great opportunity to use some words we wouldn't use on a daily basis always.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (2:19)

Exactly, but it also gives us the chance to practice and to get more exposure to things like liaison, because I was listening to you reading these and there's lovely liaison in there. And we'll get to that. So let's go through the clue line by line. We'll begin with the first line.

Mark Pentleton (2:35)

Un géant endormi plein de feu dans le coeur.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (2:39)

Okay, so un géant endormi. That must be a giant who is asleep.

Mark Pentleton (2:44)

Oui.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (2:44)

Okay. Plein de feu dans le coeur. So lots of fire or full of fire.

Mark Pentleton (2:53)

Full of fire.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (2:53)

Full of fire dans le coeur, in the heart.

Mark Pentleton (2:56)

Oui.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (2:57)

Okay, plein de is interesting, because plein, the word, can mean full.

But it also can be used like say, ah, il y a plein de bateaux dans le port aujourd'hui. There are lots of boats in the port today.

Mark Pentleton (3:11)

So plein means full or lots of.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (3:14)

Okay.

Mark Pentleton (3:14)

So if you can replace it with rempli, which is another word for full, it's usually more the meaning of full.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (3:19)

Okay. Okay. Ça marche.

So this sleeping giant with fire in his heart.

Mark Pentleton (3:26)

Veille sur la baie et les barques sans peur.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (3:29)

So he watches over, veille is a word that we often see in these clues.

Watches over the baie et les barques and the boats, sans peur, without fear. Fearlessly watches over the baie. Okay. So a sleeping giant. Let's continue.

Mark Pentleton (3:46)

Ici, pâte et tomate ont embrassé la flamme.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (3:51)

So pâte could be d'eau.

Mark Pentleton (3:54)

Oui. And if you were thinking pasta, it's plural.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (3:57)

Plural, les pâtes.

Mark Pentleton (3:58)

Les pâtes, same word.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (3:59)

So d'eau et tomate and tomato ont embrassé la flamme. They embraced the flame.

Mark Pentleton (4:05)

Embraced the flame. How poetic.

Ronde, doré, un festin qu'on réclame.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (4:13)

Right. So ronde means round. Doré, golden. And we're talking about...

What are we talking about here? Is it the flamme that's doré? Is it the pâtes and tomate?

Mark Pentleton (4:26)

Maybe it is what pâtes and tomates become once.

Pierre-Benoît Hériaud (4:31)