Adventures in France Episode 9

The change in the weather which began just in time for last Sunday’s Vide Grenier, continued throughout the week, getting steadily hotter with each day. . I can definitely see us complaining about the heat before long, which will make a small change from us complaining about the cold or the rain.
However, it was just what we had been hoping for, for Tuesday, when Goldie took us on our longest excursion to date – all one hundred and forty kilometers of it! (Or nearly, anyway) Distance really takes on a completely different meaning here, out in the country. It is only twelve kilometers to our nearest shop, but we think twice before going there. Our excursion to Vazerac on Tuesday was only about twenty kilometers more than going to visit our family in Cape Town, which we do at the drop of a hat, and here we were, planning it as if it was a major undertaking! The reason for the outing was to visit some friends we had made in 2008 while touring with our campervan. We happened to choose this particular campsite near Vazerac, out of the campsite guide, and had a wonderful stay there. Owned by a Dutch couple, who work unbelievably hard to keep everything spick and span, and helped every season by the husband’s parents who travel down from Holland for the summer, it was actually the parents that we got to know. I used to take my laptop up to the office building to take advantage of their computer connection, and it was then that we got talking to the parents. Over a day or two, we discovered that they were busy researching a family tree but had come up against an obstacle as some of the family had moved through South Africa on the way to Batavia, now Indonesia, but there is so little of this type of information on the internet, that he was quite stuck. We offered to try to find some information for him when we got home again and so the contact between us was maintained. Shortly after we arrived here, and quite out of the blue, we received an email from them asking if we were by any chance in France again, as they were back at the campsite and would love to see us again. We really couldn’t refuse an invitation like that!
Assisted by the ever-helpful Jane, we had a trouble-free run to the little town which is just north of the Garonne River. We moved out of the predominantly grape-growing area into the sunflower fields and I was quite sure that the sunflower plants had grown between our outward and return trips! Returning to a place one has enjoyed is always a bit of a gamble because things change and people change, but when we arrived, we were greeted like long lost relatives and there was much kissing of cheeks and patting of backs as we all got re-acquainted. The campsite is currently even more beautiful than before as they have sown wild flower seed in the grass on the steeper slopes which are not suitable as campsites, and also have a massive pot-garden in front of the house and office which was ablaze with colour on that particular day. We lunched on the terrace overlooking the campsite with conversation in English, French Dutch and Afrikaans rattling back and forth. It was wonderful to see them all again and to cement our friendship.
The rest of the week was very hot and we spent most of the time indoors where it was coolest, only venturing out into the garden after five o’clock in the afternoon. It seems ridiculous to have to say this, but if it doesn’t rain in the next day or so, we will definitely have to break out the garden hose and do some watering.
I have also had occasion to practice my French again, and my faith in the politeness of the French has not been shaken. I needed to buy a bottle of mouthwash- bain de bouche - from the chemist, so marched in with my little speech prepared, but am almost sure that at the last moment I changed it to ‘bain de mouche’, which translates as fly-bath. The shop assistant didn’t even twitch, or ask me why I didn’t go to the vet if I wanted to bath my pet fly, but just reached up and got a bottle of mouthwash off the shelf. I have to admit that if one mumbles a bit all sorts of odd words slip through!
The end of the week also saw an increase in our social activities, in that we were invited out to dinner on Friday evening and then to lunch and a chance to watch the Grand Prix on Sunday. Friday’s dinner was very jolly affair which resulted in us driving home some time soon after midnight. I always find this exciting as there are always animals to see when one travels at that time of night, and we were not disappointed. Standing at the side of the road in a fairly bushy area was something our driver called a ‘fween’ (We were not in our own car this time) When I got home and had worked out that it was probably spelt F.O.U.I.N.E., I looked it up in the dictionary and found it is a stone marten in English and is related to the weasel, but is grey with a white bib. There! Now we’ve all learnt something.
Today, Sunday has seen another slight change in the weather. It feels very thundery and muggy, and I see that storms could be expected. I just hope we don’t have to drive to Toulouse tomorrow in the rain. We have all our required documents and the vast amount of Revenue stamps, so let’s hope that something positive comes of the trip.

Adventures in France Episode 8

A strange week - full of ups and downs. Added to this, my diary tells me that the weather all week was ‘Grey’ except for Saturday when it rained all day. Not the sort of weather to excite us at all. The weather forecast kept telling us that it would improve on Sunday, which was good news for the Vide Grenier, but we didn’t really believe it. Imagine our amazement when we peered out of the window on Sunday morning to see patches of blue sky and a bit of sun that was definitely getting stronger. It was also marginally warmer than the freezing days we had been having, which was good too.
However, I am getting ahead of my self, so let me go back a bit to the beginning of the week. Some people we have got to know, who are restoring and altering an old house, asked if Neels would give them a hand with fitting a couple of wall sockets in the newer part of the building, so we made a date for Tuesday and after the usual scenic tour, meaning we got lost, we found our way to the house. The first part of the job was fairly simple as it really was just to fit a couple of sockets to the end of the wires which were already there, but they also wanted an extractor fan fitted and this entailed drilling a twelve centimeter hole trough the wall for the outlet pipe. As it was an outside wall, this meant going through plaster board, insulation (a bit like drilling through cotton wool), then bricks and cement. It turned into a really big job and we ended up spending all day there, and having lunch too. However, if they are satisfied with what he managed to do, perhaps they will tell a few friends so that Neels can have a few more odd jobs to do.
On Wednesday, we heard much talking and dogs barking outside when we finally surfaced at about 8.30 in the morning. When we looked out, there were cars paked everywhere, men milling about and dogs rushing everywhere. We were mystified until we heard a few short blasts on a horn which sounded just like one of those old-fashioned rubber-bulb car hooters. Aha! Now we knew! Hunting season has begun. Dogs and men moved off and for the next few hours there was plenty of barking and shouting from the valley below us, but thankfully no shots, so we guess they found nothing that day. It will be interesting to see how often they try the same area.
The same day we received an item in the post that gave us quite a shock but there is very little we can do about it now. When we arrived, as we had been instructed by the French Embassy in Cape Town, we sent off a special form and various copies of passports etc to the Immigration Office in Toulouse, in order to validate our one-year visa. They, we were told, would send us stickers which were to be affixed to our passports next to the visa to prove that we are legally here. However, either the rules have been changed or we were misinformed, as the letters we received instructed us to present ourselves at the office in Toulouse and be prepared to undergo a medical examination and have x-rays taken, and to bring with us Revenue stamps equivalent to a large amount of money. Failure to comply, the letter went on to say, would mean that we would be staying in France illegally. At first we were completely horrified, but then decide that this was what we had been aiming for ultimately, so we should just go ahead and not complain. So on Monday 28th June we will be off to Toulouse to try our luck with French Bureaucracy.
Later in the week though, we had an ‘up’ episode. We had been told of a second-hand car parts shop in Eauze, so on the off-chance we went there and asked if they had the piece of beading that is missing off the door of our car. They did, and so we came home and practiced a bit of amateur panel-beating until the strip could sit flat against the door. The effect is startling! No longer does it appear as if the car has recently been in a bad accident, and at first glance, it is hard to see the damage at all. Neels is as pleased as Punch, and now feels less embarrassed driving around.
After the miserable weather all week, we decided that, as we intending going to the Vide Grenier anyway, we would look for and buy ourselves a jigsaw puzzle as an occupation during the next spell of bad weather. We ending up buying two 1000 piece puzzles for a Euro each – not a bad bargain, but when we got home, we couldn’t resist the temptation and started doing one immediately.. We will have to eat on our laps until it is complete as it takes up most of the only table in the house, that is, if we get any food at all, as the cook finds it hard to drag herself away from the puzzle. It also explains why this weeks blog is a day late, for which I apologise.

Adventures in France Episode 7

At the beginning of the week, we picked the last of the artichokes off the plants and presented them to our neighbours who received them with obvious enthusiasm. We were just as pleased to get rid of them, as letting them rot on the plants was really not an option. A while later, just as we were about to sit down to lunch, there was a ring of the doorbell and there was Mr Neighbour, come to invite us over for a ‘starter’. His wife had cooked the artichokes in a very smart electric steamer which was plugged in on the verandah where we subsequently sat and ate. She speaks no English, his is minimal but he also knows a bit of German as he comes from the Alsace region of France, and of course there are many words in German which bear a close resemblance to Afrikaans, so between all the bits of languages we could summon up amongst us, we ended up having a very jolly couple of hours. And the steamed artichokes were actually delicious, although still a vast waste of effort, in my mind! I find it difficult to picture the scene at the first attempt to eat this vegetable – it has prickles on the tips of the leaves, which have to be cut off before cooking; then it has to be boiled or steamed for nearly an hour before it is ready to eat. Then the leaves have to be peeled off one by one, dipped in vinaigrette and only the very bottom half centimeter is eaten, the rest being too fibrous. After about fifty or sixty leaves have been peeled off and eaten in this way, the heart is finally exposed, and this is the real delicacy. First, though there is a nasty hairy layer which has to be carefully teased away from the ‘meat’ of the heart, until voila! It is exposed. A circle of flesh about half a centimeter thick and perhaps two centimeters in diameter, with the same consistency and taste as a sweet potato is what the diner is rewarded with after all this effort. Not for me thanks! Give me a real sweet potato any time. But at least we are now are pretty good terms with the neighbours..
He weather forecast for the rest of te week had not been very promising, but we took a chance and ventured out on Friday. First to the weekly market at Vic Fezensac about fifteen kilometers away to buy, believe it or not, Cumberland sausages! An enterprising English couple, realizing that a lot of English settlers were pining for tastes of Britain started a business selling foreign foodstuffs at the local markets. They sell things like English tea , tins of baked beans and packets of biscuits which one can’t get here, and for the South Africans they have Mrs Balls Chutney and Rooibos tea, with a few pots of Vegemite thrown in for the Australians. She has also managed to find a local pig farmer who is prepared to make sausages according to her recipe, so she has Cumberland sausage, Lancashire Sausage and just plain pork sausage and they are truly delicious.
After the market, we traveled on a bit further to a little town called Valence-sur-Baise where we stopped at the side of the River Baise to have our picnic lunch. At this point, the river is quite large and there are boats which are able to cruise up and down, with Valence being a sort of ‘port’ on the river. Our lunch hour passed very enjoyably as we sat in the sun on the bank and watched various people messing about in their boats.
At two o’clock when the world starts to wake up again, we drove on to the Abbaye de Flaran, which is a Cistercian Monastery. Being Cistercian, it is very austere, but also light and airy which makes a change from the usual terribly dark church interiors. As it happened, there was an art exhibition on in the monastery section, and we spent a long time marveling at the Picasso, Gainsborough, Monet, Braque and many other works. We were amazed, yet again, at the complete lack of security for these priceless paintings. We are obviously far too South African to be able to throw off our security-consciousness in a couple of weeks. I’m quite sure we are the only people around here who lock all the doors at night and when we go out, but we do now leave the car unlocked in the driveway all the time. Great progress!

Adventures in France Episode 6

Two special adventures this week; one local and the other a bit further afield.
Our idea for our first adventure was started a while ago when we happened to see a rather dilapidated small car parked on a heap of grass behind a barn not far from here. Although the body-work appeared to still be in fair order, the car had quite obviously been sitting there for a good long time. We took note of the name of the farm and when we returned home, we asked our fount of all knowledge, our bell-ringing friend, who the owner of the farm was. It turned out to be her son, and yes, she would certainly introduce us. We tried to explain that what we wanted to ask was whether we could buy the trim off his ‘dead’ car and put it over the ‘rhino-gore-mark’ on ours in an effort to disguise the dent, and we think she got the gist of what we were saying. Anyway she duly set up the meeting and on Tuesday, we collected her just after lunch and set off for the farm. She was a little horrified at the thought of going by car, saying that it was a mere kilometer and a half to the farm, but we explained that it would be a lot easier to explain to her son just what it was that we wanted, if we could actually show him the damage, which she admitted made some sense. When we arrived the family of three had just finished eating their midday meal with their dessert plates still on the table, but they quickly made space for us at the table and very soon we were being poured tumblers full of a deliciously chilled white wine. Conversation was a little slow but they were very kind and patient with us. The wine was soon followed by tiny cups of strong black coffee, and before that was completely finished, a bottle of 20-year-old Armagnac was produced. Neels accepted a splash in his coffee cup, but I declined, knowing full well the effects the spirit has on one’s ability to breathe. So instead, a sugar cube was dunked in the Armagnac and carefully placed in my teaspoon with the instruction to ‘Taste’. Half the cube took away my breath completely so I handed the rest to Neels, which they all found highly amusing. After all this and then some more light chat, the business of the car was finally got around to and the men disappeared outside to examine the cars. Sadly though, the one that he had was not the same model as ours and the trim would not fit so we are still driving around in a car with a huge visible dent. However, the day can hardly be called wasted as we met some lovely people.

On the subject of our bell-ringing pensioner – we have discovered that every Spring she turns her attention to cultivating a small piece of land on the outskirts of the village. The first we knew of it was when she stomped past our kitchen window one day with a large hoe slung over her shoulder. The next day she was wheeling a barrow loaded with seedlings, and bewailing the fact that she only had two tomato plants to plant out. The rest must have been killed off by the unseasonable cold. However the next day she was all smiles again as she had managed to find some more tomato plants from somewhere or other and was off to get them into the ground as soon as possible. We believe that last year, when it was very dry, she was wheeling her barrow loaded with two huge cans of water to her garden every day, until one of her sons took pity on her and laid a hosepipe to the plot. She is amazingly tough, but like everyone we have met, is also kind, generous and patient with us. She is real darling.

Our other adventure of the week was a trip to the top of one of the peaks in the Pyrenees by rack railway. The day’s outing included a two-hour drive to St Jean de Luz on the Atlantic coast, where we stopped for a while and had lunch, then another half hour or so to a little village called Ascain, which is a bit inland, where we caught the train. The coaches have benches which run across the width of the coach, facing each other in each open-sided compartment. There are about ten people to each compartment. The gradient varies, but at it’s steepest is about 25% and those sitting in the downward facing seats have to brace themselves so as not to fall into the laps of those sitting opposite. The mountain, known as La Rhune only rises to just over 900 meters above sea level so as peaks in the Pyrenees go, it is only a small mountain, but is home to some interesting animals. The two that caught our fancy were the wild ponies, known as ‘pottocks’ which were totally unperturbed by the train rumbling and groaning past; and the wild sheep known as ‘manechs’. These strange looking animals have long, silky hair that falls almost to the ground, rather like an Angora goat, and then hairless heads which are a reddish-brown colour. They look very odd indeed. We were also lucky to catch sight of one of the huge vultures that have been reintroduced to the area, but it was really high up on a rocky crag and not easy to see at all.
The ride up and down took 35 minutes each way to cover the 4 kilometres of track, and was well worth traveling the distance to experience. The weather stayed clear for us all day and when we returned home at a bit after eight that night, the sun was still high in the sky, something we are still trying to adjust to.

As a last note this week, we would like to say that our thoughts go out to all those who lost loved ones in the Lake District shootings. Although our family was spared being any danger at all, others were not so lucky and we send them our love and condolences.