"We're All Going On A Summer Holiday" Friday 15th August

Jean's new bird house

I reckon that’s what the technicians have done. It’s a public holiday today; the last of the summer long weekends and apparently everyone and his grandmother goes off and does something jolly, and definitely doesn’t seem to stay at work trying to get people’s phones connected!

We’ve hung around in a half-hearted fashion apart from a little walk up to the village to buy a copy of The Daily Telegraph from the nice lady at the Tabac. She informs us that there are other English speaking villagers who come in and buy a copy and she says that if I give her some information slips, she will pass them along. It would be fun to make contact with a few local folks, even if it is for the occasional drink and a barbeque. Without any contact with the outside world at present, I do enjoy just occasionally catching up, and the Telegraph seems like a nice way to do it. There’s something very satisfying about sitting out on the terrace with a good cup of coffee, a fresh pain au chocolat and the crisp crackle of the morning paper. My parents used to get The Telegraph, and I would skim through it on the odd occasions when I was at home in the UK. Now I read every single word, even wading through the “Hatched, Matched and Dispatched sections. Happy Birthday to the Princess Royal and I do hope that she is enjoying the Olympics in Beijiing. I would be enjoying it IF I HAD AN INTERNET CONNECTION.

We walked back from the village via a rather nice little country lane which runs along the back of our property. We noticed the “A Vendre” sign which announced that the field behind us is for sale, but hopefully nobody will decide to move in with heavy earth-moving equipment and large teams of noisy builders. If it wasn’t for the sounds of passing traffic in the front of the house, we could be forgiven for thinking that we were living in the heart of the country and we are totally surrounded by large established trees. Jean commented the other day that he has ceased having to use a nasal spray, without which he could hardly breathe in Miami. I am quite certain that the health giving properties of trees are manifesting themselves and it has definitely made a welcome change to his snoring habits.

Michelle rushed in this morning. She has two regular Friday morning hair-dressing clients and she fits in a whirlwind cup of coffee and a catch-up on her way to the river where she gets organised for her first canoe clients. We pointed out the levelled rock and the altered state of the lounge, but she didn’t seem to notice either until we made her have a second look. However, she was impressed with the state of the potager and is going to dash off to Sommiere market and buy some plants as soon as she has time.

The day started showery, but has got progressively better, and by midday, we were outside and getting busy. I added a ginger coloured tint to the rather pale paint that we bought the other day, and managed to come up with the right colour for the side wall. I then got carried away and painted the tool shed and a chunk of wall in the courtyard, and now my arm feels as though it is going to drop off. It’s really hard getting the colour just right because the sun goes to work on the mushroom biscuit colour that every house is painted here in the Herault, and walls can vary in shade from one end to the other. Fortunately a house which is well into it’s second century is very forgiving, and whatever improvements that we make help to give it a far more lived in and loved look.

Jean got busy building a bird table which started out as a simple tray and now has a pitched roof and little dividers on the floor so that the seed doesn’t get blown away. He is now talking about gutters and I teased and asked if a drainpipe and water barrel was in the offing!

My dear English friend Maggie gave me a miniature 1940 edition of a French/English-English/ French dictionary which had belonged to her mother, and it’s fascinating to see just how many words are tied into the English language. It gives me a bit of confidence, but my French lessons have slewed to a halt due to the fact that for some reason, the programme won’t work on the computer without the disc, and of course that’s in the luggage WHICH IS STILL STUCK IN ENGLAND! I know everyone is amazed that I am unable to speak French and yet have been living with a Frenchman for the best part of sixteen years. There’s no real excuse, but English has always been our home language, and try as we might, we just never get around to conversing in French.

We actually had to come inside yesterday evening and close all the windows as it suddenly got quite nippy. It occurred to me that we each have one light sweater with us and that is the sum total of our cold weather gear. There is plenty coming as we spent last Christmas in Toronto with my brother and his family, so we object having to purchase anything else until our stuff gets here, so let’s hope that the nip in the air was just a passing weather system. I am creaking like a rusty gate at present and bearing in mind how fit we should be after three months of packing, stacking, moving and carrying stuff, and now a solid month of gardening, it must be the weather that is getting into my joints.

Oh the joy of being able to hop into the car and make the most of a sunny spell. We took a break around 4.30pm and went out on the road from the back of the village that cuts through the vineyards to St Jean de Cornies. From here we somehow got onto a dirt track which ambled its way in the general direction of St Hilaire de Beauvoire, but rather than get onto any main routes, we found another little side road that eventually wound its way back to Beaulieu (which is pronounced Bollyoo). For much of the drive, we could see the outline of the Cevennes mountains and the huge outcrop of Pic St Loup and it never ceases to fill me with delight that it is all really just an extension of our own back garden and it is there for us to enjoy whenever we want.

We are now back home and I am enjoying a glass of rather excellent rosé wine from Chateau Saint Alban-Costières de Nîmes. Jean is about to put his bird table up on the pole and I must go and act as ladder holder. All I have to do then is to think of something tasty to put onto the barbeque. Life isn’t exactly hard here in France, even though we do more physical work than we have done in the past five years. It’s the rewards that make it so worth while and you know life is good when you get a huge kick out of seeing a row of little radish seeds popping their heads through the soil. Now about those ants!