This may well be the last blog post I write here at les Hirondelles…although I will continue to write the blog, but maybe with a different name & content as we move to pastures new. This month has been very hard emotionally & physically as we pack up our lovely home here and say goodbye to the many friends we have made here. Having been here for over 13 years now, you can imagine all the baggage we have accumulated… and we brought out a lot of stuff from the UK which has lurked in our attic and outhouses untouched in some cases. So, the many trips to Les Mains Ouvert, the tip and the recycled clothes bins have continued all month. We are lucky that our buyers want as much furniture as we can leave them so at least we havent had to get rid of all the beds etc! Even so deciding what furniture and kitchen stuff needs to go where has been a monumental headache and I dont feel as if I have slept properly for ages. I go to bed exhausted, sleep eventually for 3-4 hours, then the brain wakes up and its no more sleep until morning. The removal van for the Carlisle stuff arrives on Friday morning (yes I am writing this a bit early as I suspect events will prevent this being written on Saturday as usual) and so at least some of our goods and chattels will go then and I might be able to start phase 2…packing the stuff for the St Aygulf move. I am travelling to the UK on Saturday, so that I can be at the flat when the lorry arrives although where all this stuff will go, I have no idea! Thankfully Hazel will be there, along with a couple of friends so that should help.
We did have a nice weekend at St Aygulf at the beginning of the month when we drove down to sign the compromise de vente on the flat there. We enjoyed exploring a bit more and although the weather was a bit iffy at times, we managed to drive along the coast for a visit to St Tropez one day, which was lovely. It was very windy but we enjoyed watching the windsurfers and blade surfers playing in what they would see as ideal conditions. Geoff got all nostalgic about his windsurfing days …but he was told in no uncertain terms that his back would not survive that punishment anymore! We also visited the flat again and we were pleasantly surprised to see that it was a bit bigger than we had remembered and also had more cupboards and shelves. It also has a “cave” which is a bit like a thin storage room under the building. It has no electricity though, so putting stuff in and out of it should be fun in the dark! We immediately made mental notes to bring both of our emergency storm lanterns with us. We also saw the garage which we are already renting and which turned out to be massive, but also without electricity! Sylvie car will be lost in there as she is quite small, but at least she will stay dry at last (she leaks remember!) and even with her in the garage there will be loads of room to store stuff which does not fit into the flat if necessary. It is very hard deciding furniture needs at the moment! The compromise was signed on the Monday afternoon without any problems and we drove back home on the Tuesday.
I have been on packing duty ever since we got back, so we haven`t really done a lot. We have started to say our goodbyes to some folk though, which is a bittersweet experience. One of our good friends died whilst we were away, not unexpectedly, as he had been very ill and was also 95years old, but we missed the funeral which was sad. We went to see his widow though and I have to say if I was given the choice of where I would like to die, it would be as he did, in his own front room with a panoramic view of the mountains to die for, if you will excuse me the words. He had been brought home from hospital and had had his bed put into this room especially. Geoff and he used to have lots of chats together in this very room, so it was sad to bring all that to an end but we were also pleased that he had died in peace. We also went to say our goodbyes to our friends, George & Elise, before they set off to Brussels for the winter months. Elise wanted to buy a painting from me before they left, to have as a reminder of us. I, of course, was delighted to sell another painting and was also glad that yet another of my daubings will grace a wall here. In fact, I sold another two paintings to another couple in the commune the same weekend, and have also given some paintings to other friends, so there will be lots of “me” left here when we go. I still have far too many paintings coming with me though, not only mine but having 2 houses with lots of walls means that we have lots of artwork too.
My craft stuff was also posing a problem to me, as I have so many boxes filled with stuff I have collected over many years. Normally at this time I would be happily installed in the gite making Christmas cards and stuff for Christmas fairs here. Not this year though. Our Christmas cards have already been sent (I know…far too early) but we needed to let folk, many of whom we only get in touch with at Christmas, know our moving plans and our new address. So, the craft stuff…I had a lightbulb moment in the middle of one of my many sleepless nights, to give all my craft stuff to the village school. Our friend, Sylvie, who looks after the little ones and also runs the garderie (after school club was totally amazed to get all the boxes and I could see her eyes light up at the prospect of using all my hoarded stuff with the children. Another problem solved for me…even if it was a wrench…and I know the gear will be put to good use.
We went up to the ceremony of remembrance in the village on the 11th of November and although it was cold, there was a decent turn out as usual. It also gave us the opportunity to talk to lots of people, say goodbyes to some of them and receive a few invitations to visit and “prend un verre” before we go! Goodness only knows how we will fit all of these visits in, mind you! When you consider that we didn`t know a soul here when we arrived, it always astonishes me just how many good friends we will be leaving behind. I know that we struck lucky by coming to live in this commune, but the number of people who are saying to us how much we will be missed, makes me proud of what we have achieved. It makes me sad too that we will not see friends here again though.
The weather has been a bit up and down this month. We had our first flurries of snow and there has been quite a bit of snow over on the Sancy mountains for most of the month. Although we did get a lot of rainfall last week too, we didnt have any flooding…unlike the South of France. The floods there have been awful. One of our friends took photos from her 5th floor flat, of the torrents which surrounded her complex as the rain continued to fall. Her garage and cave were flooded but she had been able to move her car to higher ground, so didnt suffer not too much damage. Our garden is still a bit soggy but otherwise we were unscathed. The garden is beginning to look a bit neglected really as we just havent had much time to do anything out there…and if Im honest, I haven`t really had much enthusiasm for doing much as I already am thinking of the garden not being mine any more. I always knew it would be hard to leave here as I still love the place.
I managed to fit in a visit to my hairdresser last week for a last cut and colour. We had a good laugh remembering my first visits, when my French was very limited. I was always scared Id end up with bright red hair and she always cut my hair way too short! I just didnt know what to say to make her stop cutting! Nowadays though we chat away …and I can more or less keep her scissor action under control. I`m going to find her a hard act to follow though!
**So, my friends, we come to the end of an era here at Les Hirondelles. My house looks dreadfully bare and there are boxes everywhere. I cannot pack any more away now so its just fingers crossed time that all the stuff will go into the lorry. Phase 2 will be after I get back from the UK, when I start again packing stuff to go into storage and eventually to our bijoux flat in St Aygulf. Although we still have no fixed date to sign the final sale papers, we have decided to do that by “proxy” from a distance, which we understand is more or less the norm these days and so we have made the decision as to when we will actually leave here and have booked the shuttle for that, so we will be in Carlisle for Christmas. That my friends will be where the next blog will be coming from…so long as we get internet etc all sorted by then. **
Quick update…the van has just gone off to Carlisle with lots of our goods and chattels in it so phase 1 of the removal is complete. All of the stuff we wanted to go went in easily in the end and we were even able to add some of the “iffy” extras such as the mower & gardening tools. The house looks very bare now and I am missing things already especially the grandfather clock. One other bit of good news came yesterday too when we got a “sort of” date to sign the Acte de Vente at last so it looks like we will get that done before we leave next month.
All that remains then, is to wish you all a very Happy Christmas when it comes and, all being well, I will be back again from the other side as it were next month!
A bientot mes amis…