Our dog Lea hates wzter, she is a collie cross and there is no way she would allow us to cool her down like that.
She does eat ice cubes, which will cool her core temperature, which is better for her.
Brian, we were house hunting in the Perigord Pourpre in 2003, without success.
We were actually delighted to stop and spend our last weekend in the hotel pool.
I swam yesterday and got bitten on my back. I am like a magnet to insects, like the mushroom in Alice “eat me”.
You're right Bruce...the whole thing could be cut...to just..
'be wet, but not sweaty'..
But thinking on...that can't be the solution for the Tuaregs...
"a damp baggy T-shirt".......too much information Jeanette!
Dog and I... easiest solution...is to be wet..ie...for me ..a damp baggy T-shirt works like an ancient fridge-less butter cooler.. the dog can be cooled to comfort zone with her fur sprinkled ..she doesn't like 'wet'..and glares at me, shivering.....I'm setting up a sprinkler for us in the garden today...Start the day at dawn...do almost nothing in the hottest part of the day...sleep outside..(last night...extra cool...because a light bed cover had not dried, so was still a bit damp and beautifully cool..still damp this morning).......For extra sun-shade in the 'tonnelle'...I discovered a double layer of roof works well...ie New, brainless cat jumped through the first layer, three times, making holes that had to have a speedy cover....the double roof...was thus, better isulation, against the amazingly brilliant sun. ( I wonder if we can pick up some tips from tent dwellers ...desert nomadic people... http://africa.si.edu/exhibits/tuareg/who.html. are they online? Sure to be..... The best people to ask....must be the people with x millennia of experience?). (Will look for Tuareg? forum next)..
What else...long term...I've sacrificed all hope of potagers and roses...and just let the trees do their own thing...the diffs. in temperature from open field...to under my trees...(now like a teeny forest, .is wonderful..and the 'forest garden' really does work pretty well..ie.. fruits like raspberries and anything that spreads or climbs...likes to grow up into fruit ..or any...trees).....the morning chorus, with so many trees ..is a choir of angels...
Our dogs too. Cat finds a spot and sleeps between meals. Daughters close shutters and stay in room. Pay no attention to me, I have worked in tropical countries a lot and can stand up to low 40s but the over 50°C as per the Gulf and a couple of other places, no way. However, be warned since you are in roughly the same area as us, this is not the hottest summer in the region and with temperatures likely to begin to drop in about 10 days, it is not the longest hot spell either. It is not far behind 2003 when it remained at 40°C plus for 10 days non-stop, at present this is mainly 30s only. We were in Portugal for a year and drove back through Spain and France to the relative cool of the mid to upper 20s that was paralysing SE England! That heatwave persisted up until the end of August.
The secret of thick stone walls is revealed, da-dah! The 1540 heatwave is recorded as having dried up most of the rivers, springs and well in the region and killed many people, thus one sometimes finds large reservoirs in cellars from later times. We have one that I am going to take out part of the wall from to install a shower for guests. It would have held a couple of thousand litres in its time, enough for the people and livestock if used sparingly, fed from a long dried up spring, allowed to trickle back into it when not required. Now we have bottle water when push comes to shove. However, if global warming prognoses are right for this part of France, perhaps it would be better restored.
It is quite a contrast with the below -20°C spell of nights in 2006, albeit daytimes went up to -8° or thereabouts. We had -14° this winter, now one day with 42°, which is a swing of 56°C (about 100°F) in about four months!
Our first summer here and we are slowly wilting. Until today we were coping okay but tonight we agreed we would love the temperature just to drop a little. 10pm and 30 degrees, found me sitting outside with my feet in a bucket of ice-cold water. I work from home and have decided to become crepuscular at least until September.We planned a pool at some point and it has now moved up the list of priorities.
I feel sorry for our five dogs who are missing out on the stimulation of their daily walks. Tomorrow we're going to try and get a paddling pool for them and some big bones to occupy them a little. They flop about all day, mainly indoors but come about 9pm when it cools a bit they want to be outside racing about and barking and letting off steam, just as we are wanting them to settle and be quiet and not disturb the neighbours!
My OH had a bike courier at about 1400. She was dressed in a chunky, quilted body warmer, had a balaclava and a mask for her mouth under her helmet, big chunky gauntlets, nearly knee high biker boots and took longer to take off stuff than take the envelope out of her pannier, then put it all on again! How do they do it? At least the bloke who delivered last week stopped a while, had a smoke and a cool drink from us. This lady just got back on and was gone!
Lovely and cool at home and today I went out for lunch followed by a lovely drive in an open car. This evening I needed to see a reasonably nearby friend and decided to take the little motorbike. Mistake! It’s too hot for crash helmets and even the most lightweight protective gear!
I feel your pain
Jim is putting up skirting boards in our corridor. On and off, his work not the boards.
I have been (ironically) insulating our guest room (to be) ceiling today and have to finish that tomorrow afternoon. Last year I was on stage one of a stone wall, I may move on to that next week. Last time it enabled me to shed kilos and kilos, this summer I have a couple left to get rid of and go for it when it is hottest. Nice tan and slimmer, as for drinkies, well I have several packs of Vichy in the cellar and various juices and squashes to go with it. I noticed a large bottle of Schweppes tonic water in the downstairs fridge, we have lemons and ice but no gin! Oh well, shopping tomorrow morning...
39 degrees and I have been melting while building a stud wall in our upper rooms. Had to give up after about 4 hours just to much liquid pour out of my head. DIY not for this weather I think. To compound it’s not getting much cooler over night still 20 at 5 am. Oh well another sleepless night. And to compound matters I am nearly out of pimms
Our forage is fed from underground streams so we are lucky with that.
The water is not coming up from the river at present, farmers are getting worried. So the forage is off, our well seems cold and fresh still. Will plumb-line it at the weekend though.
Brian, We are melting!
Fortunately we do have a forage, which means that we can water within the specified times should we have an Arret.
It is brill! The only downer was when I got in my car that was showing me 48°C, although we were only about 40 - 42° really. The steering wheel was so hot I had to use a couple of window cloths until it cooled down. The AC was barely starting to have any effect by the time I had done my 40 minute journey. Otherwise, I am worried our well will dry up so that watering gets difficult, although the other side of that is burned grass does not need mowing... A storm or two would be great though, just to recover growing things.