Chers amis! Bon soir!
This is going to be a bit of a belated blog, but nothing changes, or 'plus Ça change', as we now say - I was always last, and when I was little was always described as ' the cow's tail'! Still, I have a very good excuse this time, because of Busy Days in Chamberet.
We arrived a whole four weeks ago, yesterday at 5.00 pm to be exact, or 17 heures as we now say. It has been some of the busiest four weeks of my life - work, work, work - dawn 'til dusk.
I've sent some real letters home, ie letters sent in the post, to family and friends as we didn't have any internet access for the first three weeks - I was lost! All we had were our mobile phones with expensive, long phone calls to Citroen UK and the bank, and the occasional visit to the local bar 'La Cabane de Pierron' (have a look on Facebook) wasn't a great success as far as Wifi (pronounced here Weefee) was concerned.
To save time, and not to miss even one exciting element of my letters, I'll copy them below. Hope you have a long spare moment to read them!
Letter written 12 October 2011
We
finally left Durham at about 9 o'clock on the night of Friday 30
September, with a detour in the wrong direction to Lanchester to
return the key for the cottage. We managed to get a room in a Travel
Lodge at about 11.30, somewhere near Peterborough I think, right next
to a lorry park, so not much sleep in the morning. But then we had
the best bacon sarnie and mugs of tea at Stibbington Trucker's cafe a
little further south, then we made good time to the ferry. The
following night we spent in a Hotel Premiere Classe (what a
misnomer!) at Dreux, about a 4 hour drive. (Never stay in one of
these places – most prison cells would be cheerier, but sometimes
you just need to get a bed for the night.)
We
arrived here in high temperatures at 5 in the afternoon on Sunday 2
October, and were welcomed by Ian Wright, (Euro Moves) who had done
our removal and miraculously managed to get everything into his van,
then unloaded into the house. He had even got the kettle on for us
for a cup of tea! I think Harry and I were both a bit overwhelmed at
how our belongings filled the downstairs (now there's a surprise I
hear you say), with boxes and furniture everywhere. We've spent our
time since then moving boxes around, emptying them and trying to find
things – we have yet to locate a frying pan, which we suspect is
still in the cooker at Witton Gilbert, but we still hope it might
turn up yet in the wrong box. We need to empty the downstairs as all
the floors are going to be sanded at some point over a two-day period
by a local craftsman (English) so may have to dismantle some of the
furniture and have the joy of re-assembling at some point.
Other
things we've been doing – Harry has been down in the cellar
spraying all the floor boards underneath with some horrible chemical
to treat the wood which had dried out, we've been to the tip a few
times, have been to the Mairie (which is like the Parish and District
Council Offices rolled into one, but very local) for advice on
various things and today we met the Maire himself, quite a scary man
who is also one of the local GP s and we've also registered with a
GP. We've also managed quite a bit of gardening. We have three pear
trees and one apple tree so have been well-provided for fruit from
them. It has been red hot most days which has been great as we're
able to leave all the doors and windows open to give the house the
good airing it needs. Mornings and evenings are cool though – very
autumnal and we have the wood burning stove going tonight. Just as
well, as we've discovered that the boiler (oil fired) needs replacing
and that will take a few weeks and a few pounds of course. We've
managed to find a good plumber/central heating guy just by chance.
We went to a local woodyard to see about buying wood, only to
discover that it's too late – everybody stocks up here in the
summer for the long, hard winter ahead! Anyway, the guy there was
really helpful. He recommended this plumber, and also put us in
touch with a farmer down the road who might have some wood. We went
knocking on his door and he and his wife were dead friendly and
helpful as well. He even gave us full, graphic details of his recent
prostate operation which means he can't lift much for a few weeks!
But he can sell us some wood, so no harm there.
People
here are really friendly and most of them seem to know that somebody
English has bought Monsieur Salesse's house, and a lot seem to know
it's us! We've been shopping most days at the little supermarket in
the village, get our bread from the boulangerie and have had new
headlights fitted at the village garage – oh, and of course, have
had a drink at two of the three bars. The location is lovely –
greenery and views all around, and on the edge of the village is the
Maison d'Arbre – the House of the Tree and an Arboretum, like the
Botanic Gardens.
The
story of the car is this – you need to register your car in France
and need first to go to the Tax Office, with all your paperwork
proving that you have paid for the car and paid VAT on it. They give
you a form to take to the Prefecture (a sort of Government Office
North East) to register the car. For this you need to have various
identity papers, utility bills, a French MOT (even though we had ours
at the end of August), costing 71 euros, and a Certificat de
Conformite, saying that your car conforms and is roadworthy enough to
be driven in France – yes, I hear you say, but it's a French car,
made in France? (Oh, and nearly forgot, we had to change the car
headlights (£450) and will have to have French number plates –
another £20 for them). Before we left home we paid Citroen UK £100
for the Certificat, and it was agreed that they would send the
Certificat to our new French address. But, of course, they sent it to
Witton Gilbert, recorded. It was then sent back to them, and they
then sent it on to us last Thursday, but it still hasn't arrived. It
was supposed to have been sent Air Sure – a copy of the certificate
arrived by Air Sure in two days, so we are having severe doubts about
the original certificate arriving tomorrow. Very frustrating,
annoying and depressing.
Now
to compound all this frustration, I discovered just before we left
home that our car insurance only gave us 30 days driving in Europe
and we had used up this allowance earlier this year. They would only
give us an additional week's extension (£20), but it meant we just
had a week to get everything above done on the car in order to insure
it here in France. That hasn't happenned because of Citroen UK's
stupidity with the Certificat, but to make matters worse, we can't
get insurance here until we get a certificate from our UK insurance
re no-claims, etc. We can't get that until I cancel the UK
insurance, and although that has technically run out, apparently we
do have third party cover. I forgot to say that the Prefecture where
we need to return to do the car registration is about 30 miles away,
so we are reluctant to drive just in case anything happens. Not
having the correct car insurance in France is very, very serious –
punishable by prison sentence! So the car has been concealed in the
garage (which it just fits into) for nearly a week.
Oh,
and why we have no internet is that the nearest places to look for
packages for phones and the internet would be somewhere near Limoges
(40 miles) , or at Tulle, where the Prefecture is(about 30 miles).
And of course because of the car problems we haven't wanted to drive
to either. Also, it's bad enough in England deciding which provided
to go with, but with a different language and lots of different
possibilities, it 's difficult making a decision. Not having phones
or the internet has been very frustrating and makes us feel really
isolated. We both have mobiles but they are expensive, so roll on
the day when we are connected again.
At
Tulle we also started the process of registering with the French
health service, which apparently is another round of paperwork and
running about, so we need to go back to Tulle to get that sorted.
Other little downers on the same day as the non-appearance of the
certificate and news re the insurance, were a plague of flies that
night upstairs (horrible) and a demand from HM Revenue and Customs
for £2,500 tax which they claim I've underpaid! I've contested it
of course, as they've had all information from my employers and the
DWPensions – they took a month to acknowledge my letter about
moving abroad, but, my God, did they move quickly with this latest
assessment!
So,
our days are spent grafting and our evenings spent watching some
French television or DVDs that we've brought. We don't seem to have
many channels and a lot of the programmes are similar to England –
Strictly Come Dancing and singing programmes, but we have been able
to watch old editions of 'Desperate Housewives' with French
subtitles. That's really good for the French, as here they mostly
dub films as they don't like having subtitles – so the other night
we saw 'Chocolat' actually in French, and Will Smith dubbed into
French in 'I Robot'. Sometimes they get a good match for the voice,
then at other times it's nothing like the real person, and of course
the lip movements are way out. Harry enjoys watching 'The Simpsons'
or should I say 'Les Simpson' which is in French. They haven't quite
got Homer's or Marge's way of speaking right, so it's a bit weird,
but we still laugh a lot. We have been feeling a bit overwhelmed by
everything we need to do, but what else would we be doing? It's
going to take a while to be comfortable, and we just hope the heating
is sorted soon, or we'll be back!
And
so to bed – I forgot to say that the village is really quiet after
about 8 o'clock and I'm sure everyone's in bed by 9! It gets dark
around 7 anyway, then it's battening down the hatches, or rather
closing the shutters on 12 windows – it takes ages, then you just
have to open them again in the morning! Please pass our news on to
anyone who might be interested. A bientot!
Second letter sent 19 October 2011
We
have two phone numbers – one the landline which has the loudest
ring on this earth (and we can't always hear you though you can hear
us) and a line through the internet, which seems to work. We bought
a new phone (that you put in a cradle-thing) and are getting the hang
of that, consulting the French and English manual often and
remembering to bring it downstairs as it's quite a way to leg it
upstairs!
Well,
I must say, it has been an interesting few weeks (just 3 weeks in
fact) - quite tough at times, with lots of ups and downs. The car
business was a real bummer, but is now sorted and we have French
number plates! That makes me feel a bit vulnerable – with English
number plates, French drivers are aware of you being different, but
not now.
I'm
going to try and print a copy of a letter I typed a few days ago, to
save repeating myself here – but basically we have been busy since
we arrived and have had one or two nasty surprises – one being that
we need a need heating system. It's oil fired, and because it had
been shut up along with everything else in the house, the door to the
boiler was all corroded and the part no longer available. The new
boiler came last week and it's huge! It has to go somehow down the
cellar steps (about 12 of them, quite high steps, then through the
cellar to go on the plinth). The heating
guy came again today to measure up again as he said he'd been having
sleepless nights about it fitting! I'd mentioned this to his wife
who works in the Mairie (which is like a much, much smaller Civic
Centre, where you can ask all sorts of questions about taxes,
emptying the bins, etc) and poor man had been worrying about it. My
worry was about the weight of it – 175 kilos!, so fingers crossed
that all goes well tomorrow.
The
weather has changed today as well – up to now it has been red hot
most days. Clear blue skies, but cool in the mornings, and two
mornings of frost last week, cool in the evenings as well. Today has
been unbelievably windy and tonight it's chucking it down with storms
forecast I think!
We
have given ourselves time off, in case you think we've been hard on
ourselves. Last Sunday there was an autumn fayre and meal in the
salle de fetes, which is about 100 yards from us. There were various
stalls in this huge marquee, and outside a huge press where a family
were pressing apples and producing gallons of apple juice. A team of
little lads were busy happily filling empty water bottles with the
juice which was sold straightaway for 2 euros. We went to the meal,
pretty much at the last minute, as we felt a bit shy about joining
in, then ended up meeting about 4 other English couples who live near
the village. Not good for the French, but good to get information
from them about various markets, etc around here. The meal was
lovely by the way – 5 courses with wine for 15 euros, with
entertainment from a local brass band – more Latin American than
Durham – dead lively and pretty loud! We had a great time.
It
was interesting watching the marquee going up, as there was a gang of
men who came about a week before and constructed a level wooden floor
– none of this walking around in mud that you normally see. The
wooden floor though was really for the various dances that were part
of the 3-day accordeon festival which ended yesterday. From about
Tuesday last week camper vans started arriving and by the weekend
there were about 30, all parked in various car parks and locations
near the salle de fetes. They'd all come either to listen or take
part musically in the festival! Like a small, civilized Glastonbury
– complete with this strange rectangular block with two doors at
each end and a wash basin on the outside! It was certainly well-used
I can tell you – each time I went past or looked out, there was a
queue of people waiting at either end.
The
festival started on Friday afternoon at 2.30 and went on until 2.30
in the morning – that was advertised as a Tea Dance, then on
Saturday there was a song competition, 8.30 pm til whenever, then
yesterday another Tea Dance – for 6 hours this time! Hearing the
music made us realise that we really are in France!
Yesterday
we had a trip out to Mont Gargan, which is about six miles from here
– it's either 931 or 731 metres. I don't really know how high that
is, but the views were stunning with clear blue skies and a lovely
warm day. The night before we'd gone on a little recce, with the car
finally being all legal and insured, and we ended up looking for
another mountain or hill, Mont Ceix, which the information said had a
ruined chapel at the top. Off we went and followed the signs, no
mileage on them. We ended up on forest tracks, with deer leaping in
front of us, but thinking we'd made a big mistake. We finally
arrived at a clearing with a tiny old chapel with this poor Saint
Dulcet inside, all alone in the dark. We thought we'd be rewarded
with stunning views – if there hadn't been so many pine trees, that
would certainly have been the case. I must say, the scenery around
here is lovely – very lush and green, but you probably remember
that from your holiday to Bort les Orgues.
Other
nice things about being here are eating pears and apples from our own
trees, walking to the boulangerie for our daily bread, and to the
little superette – which as supermarkets go, is small but has
everything and is called G20 for some reason! Other things are the
majority of people saying 'Bonjour' to you when you pass them,
hearing the angelus bells at 12 midday and 7 at night. The midday
bell comes after the air raid siren which is sounded every day –
just to remind you - state before church! The neighbours are
friendly, especially an elderly lady who lives two doors down from us.
She's quite an eccentric 80 year old, with a dog called Vladimir –
Vlady for short. Vlady seems to spend most of his time at the
upstairs window, looking out and barking at passers-by and the dog
opposite. He's always running away from her, especially when she
takes him off in the car to have a walk in the Arboretum, about half
a mile away! Last week we had this huge delivery of logs from one of
the farmers, and his tractor wouldn't fit in our gate, so he dumped
them as best he could, mainly on the pavement. They would probably
fill your front room, so we spent a good day moving them into the
bucher (woodstore) about 10 yards away. I came back from the
boulangerie one day and here was Madame carrying a couple of
logs at a time to help Harry!
Well,
it's now Tuesday, 14.00 and the boiler is now in the cellar awaiting
installation. It was a bit like Laurel and Hardy – with the plumber, his little assistant who in build and looks is a bit like
Stan Laurel, Harry and a man from the water company (Lyonnaise des
eaux who used to own Northumbrian Water, I seem to remember) all
helping. I couldn't work out whether the water fella just happened
to be passing and called in for a chat, or if he had been asked to
come and assist. Anyway, it was a bit of a performance as they had
to take the casing off the boiler in order to get it down the outside
cellar stairs (which have a kind of concrete roof over them, then a
sharp corner at the bottom. We've been lucky up to now with workmen,
or artisans as they are called here – they have a reputation for
not turning up like English builders, etc., but they were here this
morning at 8.30 just as we were getting up!
We
had loads of rain last night and today is a bit fresh and cloudy –
I started washing the windows outside (can't get away from these
little panes of glass – loads more than at Logan Street) and
considered doing some painting, but Harry has now taken over with
that. Everything needs to be painted inside and out and French
paint appears to be very expensive (I've seen 5 litre tins of
emulsion for 40-odd euros!). We brought a lot of emulsion, which I
had bought to tart up Logan Street, but very little gloss. Here they
don't seem to go in for gloss, and the white that we bought looks too
bright in the sun, so we may have to bite the bullet and fork out for
French paint in the end.
I'll
finish this now and hope to catch the post at 3 or 15.00 as we say
now!
Monday 31 October 2011
And that was nearly two weeks ago now - scary! I'll be adding something to this, maybe each day if I have time, as a 'Dear Diary . . .' and hopefully it will be of interest to family and friends. I'll even add some photos if I can work out how to upload them.
A bientot!
