Corflu Part 1

Wednesday, 24 April

Here we are, sitting in a lovely self-catering apartment in the hotel district just outside Charles de Gaulle airport, watching the snooker from Sheffield with German commentary on World Sport. How’s that for a good representation of life in the Europen community. (Marco Fu is leading Matthew Stevens, if you’re interested, but by the time I’ve finished this post the whole world will know if this is in the slightest important.)

Tuesday, 23 April

What an enjoyable evening at Arques la Bataille with the Connect Club. (Connect Club is a group of people who are interested in meeting different nationalities who are living in France. It is the brilliant idea of an Englishwoman who has lived in Normandy for 20+ years, and a lot of the members are British, but there are lots of French who want to meet Brits. Christine arranges lots of activities - meals out, barbecues, trips to various interesting places - of which this was another one.) In fact, what a good day overall. Almost completely packed for the holiday, and just a little housework to do. To be honest, if it hadn’t been for this Connect meeting we might not be so well prepared. You know how it is, work takes as long as the time available.

Wine and cheese tasting, with a lot of education on the wines - who would have believed that a Frenchman would be recommending a white wine for cheese! They are usually so tied to tradition. And to top it all, I liked the white wine that was recommended to accompany the Stilton (another surprise to have a non-French cheese represented, but maybe it was just a nod towards the English President). Unfortunately my notes are back in Le Boug-Dun so you’ll have to wait with baited breath for the details. It was again a very continental night - French & English (of course), but also Dutch and Belgian. Not bad for a group of under 20.

Wednesday again

“I don’t fancy 4 hours in a taxi to get to Charles de Gaulle Airport”, said John. So here we are, staying in OnlySuites ’hotel’ for the night, having got a lift at 9am this morning to Dieppe railway station, a train from there to Rouen, from Rouen to Paris St Lazare, RER to Gare du Nord, and then another to the airport, and finally a courtesy bus to the hotel which arrived just before check-in started at 3pm. 4 hours too long John?

Still it’s all part of the ’experience’ as is sitting here listening to the English of the referee and the German commentary of the snooker match. And tomorrow we’ll start again on our voyage of discovery. In particular we will find out if there is any drawback to BA paying us to fly from Paris to London and on to Seattle. Yes, you read that right. The flight direct from Heathrow to Seattle was MORE expensive than starting off from Paris and changing at Heathrow for the same flight to Seattle!

 

Corflu here we come!

Yet another new life. . .

 

Saturday, 16th March 2013

What a way to start the rest of our lives!  Just in case you can't keep up, this is the 2nd start of the rest of our lives. The first occurred when we moved over to France when we'd sold our house in the UK. The 2nd one has occurred now I'm retired and we've found the house in which we'd like to spend the rest of our lives (until we change our minds, of course!)

Anyway, this time started with getting up at what for us is the crack of dawn (7.30 am) to get the ferry back to France ready to start all the preparations for buying our new house down south next week. 

I even had the great idea that John could stop off at Sainsbury to get some more underwear.  Well you know what it's like, you buy new pants in a batch, which means they all wear out in a batch, which is what had been happening to John on this trip.  So far, so good, but then it all started going wrong. 

Firstly, Sainsbury had no underwear. Oh well, he'll manage, it's not like he hasn't got loads!  Then whilst queuing at the ferry port in Newhaven, we're told that as a result of the high winds the ferry can't actually get into the port.  Hopefully in an hour it should be OK.  And it was. The ferry got in and we were all moved from the warmth and comfort of the cafe out into the car to wait in the main loading area.  Another hour later, it'll be another 2 hours before they think they can attempt to get out of the harbour because the wind is again too fierce ­– but I can stand up in this wind, and I'm a lot smaller than the ferry, even after eating for the 10,000 this holiday!  They let us on board, so at least it's warm, and they’ve even given us a free drink in recompense – a soft one mind you, so generous!

So here we are at 12.15 am, sitting in the bar of a stationary ferry which should have left at 10.00 am, hoping that we'll get back home some time today!  However, the ever-present silver lining is that I have started my diary!!

Sunday, 7^th April

Boy, what a day!  Weather was good again (it’s been cold, but sunny for the last couple of weeks, so can’t really complain).  So got out to do a bit more weeding. None of that digging stuff, far too energetic when you’ve got chemicals that’ll do the job for you.  So finished the weeding that I’d   started yesterday. Still got the whole of the back garden to do, but at least it’s a start.  We’ve been meaning to do so much for so long now, but somehow something always seems to interfere.

First there was John being ill with cold/flu just before Easter, then me following with similar symptoms about a day later. For the first time in almost 40 years of being together, we slept in separate rooms.  Luckily John was feeling better by the time we had the trip down to Vendee for the signing of the final Acte de Vente for the purchase of the house at Nieul sur l’Autise.  That's where we are going to live this 'rest of our lives'. Unfortunately the owner, Olivier Croyeau des Loges, hadn’t finished clearing his stuff – to be honest it looked like he’d cleared virtually nothing. We agreed to give him an additional 2 weeks, and the Notaire had re-written the Acte de Vente, but Olivier started talking about wanting to take all the Porcelain door handles and other crap like that, so the Notaire said no to finishing the deal there and then. He actually went and confirmed with the removers when they could come, and that they would be paid directly from the money we had sent the Notaire.  So we’re due down again in 2 weeks and hopefully it will be 3^rd time lucky!!

Just parking in the garden on Thursday on our return when Tony arrived for Easter – good timing! House was freezing cold having been empty since Sunday but we soon sorted that out!

Weather was too cold to do anything much in the garden over the weekend, even though it was beautifully sunny.  Tony returned on Wednesday, about 2 hrs after Julie arrived!  LD Lines have the most annoying website – you can look up the schedule, which said Julie’s boat would be leaving Newhaven at 10 a.m., but that is only the planned timing. To find the actual time, you have to start to book a crossing, and if we’d have done that we would have known that for some reason Julie’s boat was leaving at 8.30 a.m.!  We only knew when she emailed us to say she was already in, so left the bar immediately and picked her up – unfortunately about 1.5 hrs after she arrived, but luckily it was sunny, so she was happily sitting in the sun listening to her iPhone.

Wednesday we did Rouen, though Julie didn’t get to see Richard the Lionheart’s tomb since they were working on that part of the church. We did get inside Joan of Ark’s church, which is the best. I just love the feeling when you get into it, and the shape of the outside is mind boggling! An upside-down Viking longship.

Thursday we did the funicular railway at Le Treport.

Brilliant!!!

Never been on one before but will sure as hell do it again!  This one’s very short, but it’s mind boggling to be in the tunnels and see all the work that went into it.  In the evening we introduced Julie to meat fondu – such an easy meal to make, but what fun!

Friday went down the bar and joined what looked like an impromptu cake tasting with Daniel, Michel and a couple of other men we know but can’t remember their names. (Must remember down in Nieul to make a quick note every time we meet someone so that we don’t get in the same situation where we know people too well to ask their names!) Then, after an impromptu buffet at home, we took Julie off for the return boat.  By 6 p.m. we were back home and alone!