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Happy New Year

Hello again Everyone

I hope you are all enjoying the last day of 2021. As I, and many others, have said many times, what a year! There is no sign of the pandemic easing its vice-like grip on the world for now. At some point the vaccine needs to be made available to the whole world to try and stop new variants emerging. Perhaps 2022 will see that happen.

For now a round-up of what December has had to offer us in our little world tucked away in a beautiful corner of the Tarn in South West France, including a beautiful full moon, known as the Cold Moon.

Early December saw me head off for a brief trip to the UK without my eldest son, as new measures meant Day 2 PCR tests and isolating until the results. No problem for me with that at all, but for him it didn’t make sense to exchange space here for a small student room and isolation for the sake of a few days.

Part of the reason for the trip to the UK was to collect my Mother and bring her back to France for the festive period. Sadly I was also there to attend the funeral of my younger son’s friend. Overall my trip went like this: Long drive and overnight on the ferry, isolating on arrival, Day 2 test and waiting for the result, working, the funeral and taking some time out with my son Alex, as this is a tough time for them all following their lovely friend’s tragic death, more work, then a pre-departure test to return to France, more waiting for results and then packing. No time sadly to catch up with friends or family, nor see my new great nephew – yes I am a Great Aunt! I did manage a quick trip to my favourite place for tea and cake whilst in Salisbury, The Yard, and enjoyed some delicious bundt cake, plentiful cups of tea as they always serve their tea in huge teapots and a little retail therapy! If you are in Salisbury you should visit for coffee, lunch or afternoon tea! Their Welsh Rarebit is utterly delicious.

The journeys to and back from the UK were great. Ok it was very rainy on my way to the UK so not ideal driving conditions, but the roads were fine and I had a lovely tea break at some great friends near Chateau du Loir. I don’t know how much they appreciate me calling them the best motorway service station ever, but it is a very welcome break on a long drive and with very hospitable friends. On the way back after a reasonable night on a very clean ferry, we disembarked in Caen to an interesting start to the journey – two and a half hours trying to get through passport control, mainly down to Covid vaccinations and test results being on people’s mobiles which takes forever! I am conditioned to printing out copies of everything in France, plus am not that keen to hand my phone over in a pandemic to hands that will have touched countless other phones. I am sure the border control people feel much the same, ours certainly told us so! We stopped again at these friends for a welcome coffee break with some yummy food. I hope they know how hugely grateful I am for their generosity. We were treated to the most amazing sunset on the last leg of our journey – it lasted over an hour and a half as we headed south. Sadly I couldn’t take any photos but the colours and views were magical and are imprinted on my memory. It is particularly stunning when dusk hits and in winter you get the silhouette of bare trees against the sunset filled sky. If I could draw and paint that would be a perfect picture for me. Photographs are the next best thing but not always possible, especially on a motorway behind the wheel! Sometimes it is enough to just enjoy the scenery without any agenda and store it up to visualise later.

Back in the Tarn during my absence there had been torrential downpours of rain. The ground is utterly waterlogged. The cellar had flooded, this time so badly that it seeped under or through the wall into the back storage area behind the salon. Joy! For a brief moment Max had thought that our slightly errant cat who has taken to peeing in random places had had a big problem! Thankfully not this time. Another unexpected chore mopping the water up. It’s a wonder we ever actually get anything done.

Very sadly one of our lovely elderly neighbours across the way died very suddenly while I was in the UK. Max helped out and attended the funeral as this takes place very quickly in France.  Their son was there at the time thank goodness so that has made it a tiny bit easier for his mother.

Also during my absence the next door neighbour had continued to bring his cow feeder ever closer to our house and kept moving it along so that the entire area below our terrace is now a churned up slurry pit! Delightful. Don’t get me wrong I love the cows and their calves. We enjoy their arrival and watching the new-borns take their first steps, but this is deliberate on his part and not necessary as we are not adjacent to a farm and he has acres of fields. Hopefully it is making him feel better about his awful neighbours.

In between everything, Max had worked his socks off while I was away and had installed two very smart radiators in the salon. Not a permanent solution but finally some heat in this room. Once it has warmed a bit and some of the damp has dried out, we can start getting this room into use as our salon. Very exciting.

The first job on my list on my return was the cats’ annual check-up and vaccinations at the vets, a date we have been watching with some trepidation. Not an easy task as they are not huge fans of the cat baskets. An understatement if ever I made one! So I booked 2 appointments on 2 consecutive days. I decided to take a girl and boy each day, specifically Nina with Raoul and Anya with Louka. Anya was first to be popped into the cat carrier, done before she even realised. The others, sensing something was afoot, took flight, even though they were shut into one room. Eventually I managed to grab Louka and shove him rather unceremoniously into the other carrier. All fine at the vets, both in good health and vaccinations done. The next day was not quite the same. After some stress Nina found herself in the basket. Raoul (the cat that bit me last time I upset him) had been out all night so was quite tired. However, not so tired that the approach to the basket did not fail to alert him to impending doom so he scarpered, with no argument from me. His visit was postponed to the next week. The following week I was a bit nervous but by taking a rather stealthy approach managed to get him into the basket. On the way to the car he tried to break out, but failed. He was so scared at the vets, poor thing, but again a clean bill of health. He had to be weighed in the basket as there was no way he was going to go to the scales in the arms of the vet. Job done for another year. Thank goodness, both that this challenge has passed but also that our 4 rescue cats are thriving.

A few days before Christmas, our little Château was not organised at all and I was seriously lacking the usual Christmas spirit. For one who loves decorating the house with lots of fairy lights and sparkly things it was unusual. Trying times! However on the Monday before Christmas Max and I set out to ‘do Christmas’, as in whatever shopping needed doing. The list was long but gradually got shorter, last minute gifts done, we found a Christmas tree for 12€ (6ft tall so an absolute bargain), a small turkey for 13€ – on offer – another bargain! All the food we needed and more was piled into the trolley, plus of course a few wines to choose from.

The 21st was my Mother’s 84th birthday so we had a day off work and Christmas preparations, to make sure she had a lovely day. In the afternoon we visited our local vineyard, Château Bourguet, for a wine tasting and to buy some wine for Christmas. The owner presented my Mother with a bottle of their fabulous fizz as a birthday gift. Such a lovely gesture. We then had a delicious meal, replicating our wedding supper as my Mother had not been able to come over for our wedding due to the pandemic. She enjoyed the salmon but I think the café gourmand with a twist was possibly her favourite. We serve it with an espresso martini – now you see why!

Finally a couple of days before Christmas I unwrapped my red sparkly reindeer family and Christmas spirit returned. They are so sweet and always make me smile.

A Christmas Eve trip to the station to collect my neighbour’s son put our evening on hold for a while but Max and Mum were very patient waiting for their aperitifs! The cats are very attentive to the Christmas tree as I am sure you can imagine. We had to abandon any idea of decorating with our glass baubles – only unbreakables this year! So far it is still standing.

So here we are at the end of 2021. A quiet Christmas has passed with my younger son, Alex, joining us for meals and drinks on Zoom again. I missed him being here and worried about him being alone but he perhaps needed a little time too given all that has happened.

The weather here is bizarre. After a stunning sunrise, the valleys filled with mist, the air was clear allowing a view of the Pyrénées in the distance. It was 18°C today, the sun was shining and it was really lovely outside, although still very wet from all the rain. We are set for a quiet New Year’s Eve too and a gentle entry into 2022. The sky tonight is clear and scattered with sparkly stars, Nature’s own fairylights. What will the next year bring I wonder? As you will have seen from the post C’est La Vie our B&B plans may possibly have to change, more renovation work needs to take place and my pile of furniture repairs and painting needs to be addressed. As an aside the cat that is peeing around the house needs sorting out as it is beginning to get me down and the little darling appears to be immune to my trusty product Urinoff (great name still makes me giggle). No doubt many an adventure and hurdle will present itself in our daily life here, as ever.

Thank you for your support and comments. I hope you will continue on our journey with us and I hope too that I can keep you entertained with our mishaps and discoveries, as well as the changes to our French home.

Over the weekend, please join me for a trip down the 2021 memory lane in pictures.

I wish you all A Very Happy New Year. I hope 2022 is a fabulous year for everyone.

Best wishes


Ali xx

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