‘We are what we eat’….If that’s to be believed, Tony and I should
have probably turned into ducks by now!
We’d only been here 5 nights and had duck three times (2 nights of
‘magret’ (duck breast) and 1 night of ‘confit’ (duck thigh cooked in it’s own
fat) each night the duck was accompanied by potatoes sautéed in duck fat and
washed down with a healthy amount of inexpensive local red. That said, we’ve not quite turned into ducks
but possibly put on a few pounds and so the ‘regime’ begins next week as I’ve
just taken the bikes out of the barn and cleaned them up so we shall be getting
into our cycling routine – we have a beautiful bike ride that does a loop
through the adjoining hamlets, passing a chateau and some beautiful old stone
houses which we hope will take our minds off the pain of cycling up various
hills that although quite small can feel quite mountainous coming from Cayman!
Back to our eating – or actually our growing….Tony and I are
determined that by the end of the summer we shall be eating home made cherry jam
with our croissants (photos of our first cherries picked from our trees below) and
enjoying salads for lunch comprised entirely of what’s in the veggie patch and
with the selection of seeds planted today it’s all looking quite positive – as
an example and almost entirely made up of heirloom varieties we’ve been
collecting, we have 10 different types of lettuce, 2 different types of
courgette, 3 different types of beetroot, radishes, 2 different types of kale,
3 different types of cucumber and now 12 different types of tomatoes – in
addition we have a variety of herbs, some onions, and potatoes, brussel
sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, 2 different types of melons and some
sweetcorn – if we can’t make a meal from that lot, we should probably think
about a ‘Plan B’! (our first plants in the
ground pictured below).
We just enjoyed a traditional English roast today (I’m writing
this on a Sunday!) – not something we normally do but having been to the market
yesterday we couldn’t resist – the ‘poulet fermier’ looked too good to pass up
even if it still had it’s head on! The
butcher was kind enough to take it off but I later discovered the giblets were
still attached which I was brave enough to un-attach and make a rather nice
giblet gravy out of (if I do say so myself).
In addition to the serious stuff, I’ve also planted approximately
200 sunflowers including a variety we discovered called ‘Titan’ which I’m a
little afraid of – the stalks grow up to 12 feet tall with flowers spanning up
to 2 feet across…..photos to follow (in 75 days apparently)!
The work on the roof is progressing, although we’ve already gone
over budget (as far as what the insurance company paid out) given the initial
quote was for 6 pallets of tiles and so far we have 10 pallets of tiles in the
courtyard (2 have already been used for half of the main house) which we’ll
easily need for all the buildings but the good news is our roofers are true
artisans and are salvaging what they can of the existing tiles to mix them in
with the new ones so that the end result is still quite authentic. Photo below of the finished 1st
half – it’s amusing to see that tyres are used to secure the tarps – there’s
been a real market for 2nd hand tyres in this area!
I popped to the ‘Mairie’ yesterday to stock up on ‘sacs jaunes’ –
these are the large yellow bin bags that all recycling material goes in to
(aluminium, paper, plastic etc.) and can only be obtained from the Mairie who
take your name and write down the numbers of the bags they give you so that if
at any time anyone finds non recyclable material in the ‘sacs jaunes’, the
offensive ‘sac’ can be traced to an individual – France really is a fascinating
place and although lots to learn and a few rules to follow – it all does seem
to work fairly seamlessly – at least in rural areas! Whilst chatting with the ladies there, they
expressed concern at not being able to get hold of us after ‘la grande tempete’
last year – it seems the local ‘Mairie’ did in fact attempt to get hold of
everyone to check in with them after the storm, to ensure everyone was
accounted for but also to provide an extensive list of local roofers to help
with the rebuilding efforts. They’ve
asked if/when we next leave we can leave them with a contact number so they can
get hold of us if need be in the future – I was so thrilled and it really feels
as though we’re a part of this lovely little community.
We’ve caught up with most of our neighbours having been hijacked
for ‘aperitifs’ at odd times of the morning and evening and have to visit with
the butcher today to make a date for a meal or an ‘apero’ with them also –
sadly, our butcher’s cousin (who ran the local ‘tabac’) died 2 weeks ago – he was
one of only 2 very unfortunate people who were caught out in the storm last
year and had the hail rain down on him and suffered a tragic head injury (not
surprising given we’re told the hail was the size of golf and some even as
large as tennis balls all falling at about 200kms/hour) which sadly he never recovered from. The local farmers also lost a large amount of
livestock and our local duck farmer lost ‘une centaine’ (approximately 100!)
ducks. So all in all we do feel fairly
fortunate even if our friends who were staying ‘chez nous’ during the storm
didn’t feel quite so lucky, firstly to have suffered the storm and secondly to
have their car written off as a result (photos below of the post storm destruction).
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