Escape to the Mountains

The sun beats down relentlessly on Montauban. With temperatures in the high thirties, low forties, it was time to escape.

The Pyrénées has been used for escaping the rigours of life over many centuries. We (that is Annick and I with Annick’s mum and Evil Lynne) (oops, Evelyn) simply wanted no more than to escape the heat and relax. This time, however, we decided to go on a little adventure. We headed off into Spain, to a village called Canejan. We passed through Saint-Béat, a village all but wiped out two years ago by flash flooding of the Garonne river when it burst its banks.

Almost every business in this riverside village was destroyed.

But work is ongoing to bring it back to life.

Two elderly locals lost their lives.

It is only now regaining some of its vibrancy.

We arrived in Canejan after a somewhat hairy drive up a narrow lane with the usual precipitous drops to the side.

This beautiful hillside village is nestled high up on the side of the Aran Valley, Catalonia, about 40 minutes from our little bolt-hole in the Pyrénées.

Its views are stunning

and vertiginous.

Its buildings perched dangerously

and sometimes colourfully.

There has long been a mountain border trail connecting Canejan with France, used in the Spanish Civil war by those trying to reach the rebel forces, later by those trying to escape Franco’s rule, and then by hundreds escaping Nazi occupation.

All this adventuring caused Maman some degree of tummy troubles, so we paused our return to dine in the hillside French village of Melles

partaking of a drop or two of vin rouge at the same time.

Thus we managed to cool down somewhat, the weather being between ten and twenty degrees cooler and significantly wetter.

The storm over, I had time for my favourite pastime, walking the dogs…

Sunny Sunday Afternoon

Off on the quads again this weekend

Up and over the mountains at the end of our valley

Explored new valleys

 

 

Stopped for a beer in the mountainside village of Melles

Watched an alien encounter in the horse trough

Then back through the woods

To finish off the previous night’s barbecue

Not bad for a (very) hot sunny Sunday afternoon.

Day 1 - Lyzëa

Link: Day 1 - Lyzëa

All those baby photos in one comfy package…

Lyzëa - first day on earth

Baby photos - don’t you just love ‘em?

Well look, it doesn’t happen often does it? That very first day on earth?

As much as I love babies (er… a touch of sarcasm there) this one does seem rather fetching.

You won’t often hear me say this, so make the most of it.

Of course, I haven’t been involved with the mucky bits as yet. And that is not an invitation…

Us grandparents keep ourselves to the clean and pleasant bits

The actual parents meanwhile have a beatific glow around them

Lets hope that they can keep that smile through the noisy smelly bits

So best of luck to Sophie

and Ulrich

not forgetting Lyzëa

Down on the Farm.

Much of my life has been spent ‘down on the farm’, so you’d think I’d have had enough of it by now, wouldn’t you?
There is a certain misconceived romantic view of working on farms. For me it could mean farm visiting in 'normal’ hours and shoving my arm up a hundred cows’ bums. It sometimes meant farm visiting at 3 o'clock in the morning and shoving my arm up other parts of their anatomy.

Either way, a lot of arm-shoving was involved.

Well, it’s been a long time since all that deeply engaging animal immersion took place. I think I must either be 'over it’ or possibly just slightly unbalanced, but I’m heading off to the farm again. This time, to live there.

This is a huge project. It may have charm and character, but this old farmhouse and outbuildings also has termites, rot, damp, and a certain 'sixties’ style imposed on it.

Our job is to delve deep into the heart of these buildings and find its soul. A bit like arm-shoving again.

Generally, things do not move fast in the South of France. 'La semaine prochaine’ (next week) is a phrase oft uttered. Our experience with builders here in laid-back land has been more than exasperating, it has cost us dearly. This slow learning experience has, at last, sunk in. We have finally found the exception. A team of builders that work so fast and intelligently that my eyes water at the thought.

Thus, what was to be a two year project, looks to be finished this year!

After two weeks, the demolition has been finished, a new drainage system in place,

the outer walls damp-proofed below ground with a meticulous eye to detail that I have never seen before, and the extension to the future snooker room already is up to ceiling hight.

Oh. Did I forget to mention that they are Portuguese? The normal French (or British) response to a requested change; “Oh, I don’t know about that” whilst scratching head. With these guys it’s “Anything is possible”.

Just watching them is exhausting. They work a twelve hour day, six days a week. So to recover, we wandered down to the village for a meal Al Fresco on the beach of the Aveyron.

So, a moment to relax before heading back to watch them work again, maybe with a little wallpaper-stripping thrown in. Hard work? Not, I think, like shoving arms up bums…

Speed King

Speed is not something generally associated with me of late, being much reduced with broken bones and coughs. 

Well, times they are a’changing. I’m moving from Bob Dylan to Deep Purple…

Goodbye “Knock-knock-knockin’ on heavens door”’ - Hallo “I’m a speed king, see me fly”

Last Xmas, Sophie & Ulrich surprised me with a voucher to drive a Ferrari. OK, I know, you guys have all done it before, but for me; a first. 

At the time, my health wasn’t up to sitting in a car and moving at speed, so I waited cautiously until last week - coincidentally the 200-day anniversary of continuous hacking thanks to the old whooping cough. I’m fine, thanks for asking…

It was well planned. Setting off hesitantly, I soon mastered keeping the engine running for several seconds at a time. Heading off in the direction of Toulouse, I rapidly made the speedo register above zero. Closer examination showed the minimum speed available was 50 kph. There was a lot of space left on that dial.

“This is Jolly” I thought. “I’m really going for it now”.

I was beginning to relax. “This is easy” I thought. Not too fast, load of noise. Simple.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to me, my team of experts were scanning the local neighbourhood for police radars.

We turned off towards Albi, still pootling along but making a great deal of noise about it. A passing car flashed “all clear”, my copilot, studying his radar detector told me to turn back toward Montauban, then “floor the accelerator".

“OK” I said in my best French. “Did you mean push that flappy thing all the way down?” I asked. 

He said something that I presumed meant yes, so I did.

SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT

Those things can go really fast. I mean Really. Fast. Really. 

Thankfully I was wearing my brown trousers.

My Portable Weather-Forecasting Device

It is oft said that the English talk incessantly about the weather.

Perhaps not everyone has met Annick.

Conversations often start with something like “Hi! It’s 32 degrees here…”

Well, who can blame her. Flitting between the Wye Valley, Montauban and the Pyrénées is bound to destabilise our internal temperature controls. This ability to adapt to changing temperatures will prove important in our future survival of the coming apocalypse as foretold by some, (mostly Ruth actually). Despite the ever-present doom, we have proven ourselves able to live in the most diverse regions of the planet. However, it does take time to adapt. For instance, those living on the coast may have to adapt by growing gills or maybe just evolving longer legs.

Predicting the weather will become ever more important. We have already moved on to more accurate predictors than seaweed. ‘Green and wet’ might be a useful indicator in Wales, but elsewhere, greater accuracy is required.

Thus the creation of ‘portable weather-forecasting devices’.

Many use their phones for determining rainfall etc. This has proven to be nearly as accurate as looking out of the window. (There is even an app that looks like a window opening to show the weather outside…)

My portable device is called Sky:

Sky, so named because of her meteorological abilities (I actually wanted to call her River, but was outvoted. As it turns out, her water divining abilities would have made this name fit perfectly…) She is the ideal portable device, in that she can actually move of her own volition, although getting her into the car occasionally requires a fork-lift truck. 

Here’s how this device works:

Rain. If raining or looking like rain, no way on earth will she go outside, short of the aforementioned fork-lift truck. If rain starts whilst already outside, her coat changes accordingly:

High Temperatures: At any temperature above 30 degrees celsius, Sky becomes immobile. Up to about 35 degrees she lies on her front and pants , above this she schlumps onto her side. The only force available to move her in this state is, you guessed it, food.

Cold. This feature is a little buggy as Sky is well endowed with modern insulating layers. This is ideal for cold weather conditions, thus allowing her to run around whilst Pippa shivers. Unfortunately she has also been known to run at other times. The tell-tale sign of low temperatures is that anyone taking her for a walk wears a coat…

Snow. Sky LOVES snow. She goes into fits of ecstasy, rolling and squirming oblivious to all potential dangers, including any readily available precipices…

Wind. Yes, Sky definitely wins in this department. Difficult to photograph however…

Last week over here in France, we have been hit with an unexpected heat wave. Early June and temperatures in the upper 30’s may sound great, but does come with its downside. We knew it was hot because Sky was flat out panting on her side. We, too, were flat out, but for us panting is not an option. Sweating is. Our unprepared state also included mosquitoes. They arrived in their thousands (well, one or two mosquitoes buzzing in the middle of the night can seem like thousands). Adapting to ‘mozzies’ is another habit we take for granted. keeping doors and windows shut at dawn and dusk, plugging in the mosquito killers, these things are not usually necessary in June. Oh dear.

Our short term solution was to leg it to the Pyrénées. As usual there was significant temperature drop, making life once more bearable and allowing the hounds to reboot their scampering mechanisms..

…whilst Sky tried out her heat reducing tactics…

Even us humans managed to get off our bottoms and go for walks. (Photos of us walking were often photo-bombed)

Up in the mountains, we were reminded that the sun can be crowded out by clouds.

On return to Montauban, the heat also returned. But there were finally signs of change…

Perhaps, therefore, the vomiting and diarrhoea suffered by one of our hounds was simply the ‘Device’ informing us of a change of weather. I think that maybe this function should be made optional.

Phil