Getting Lost Deliberately

It was a kind of deliberate getting lost, I might add. We had one of those 'let's go down there' moments when we 'escaped' from the house, late this morning.

Instead of turning right at the bottom of the driveway, we turned left and went up to the top of the hill to see what we could see. I know we were going back the way we had come, two weeks ago, but that didn't matter.

It was a COLD start to the morning with -5C registering on the thermometer although it didn't feel that cold when I stuck my nose outside prior to putting the cat food out. There had been no new snow in the night, but what was there had frozen...solid!
I wondered why the cats wanted me to make a hole in the pond...which I did with the sharp end of a small watering can (plastic)...but only just! as the ice was a good inch thick on that small body of water. I actually don't think I was very successful, because half an hour later that hole had frozen solid again.
See where the ice is all 'choppy' in the foreground? It had frozen over again, so quickly. The cats weren't too impressed with my efforts.

As I went to renew their drinking water, which had stayed outside, but undercover, last night, I had to laugh...it too was frozen solid, with a good inch on the top. I put warm water in this time, but it too was frozen, within an hour. This is the chunk I took off the top of the cat bowl.

Elsa and Alfie(at back) were the first out the door to find a drink.

 Alfie was frustrated at not being able to crack the ice, and I didn't have any tools handy to help out. Im watching from inside, anyway! Brrr...outside.

 The window at the end of the lanai with the decals on, had glorious ice crystals on it.

 The pool was frozen solid. The sun was just coming up, so we were hopeful that it would stick around, today. It did!

 Elsa had trouble getting back up the small slope, from the frozen pool. The rubber surface is slippery when wet at the best of times, but with frost on the surface it was hopeful...almost.

 This is how frosty it was.

 These two don't give up easily. They literally circled the whole of the pool, looking for somewhere to drink. You can see Alfie putting out his paw to try and depress the ice, so water would rise to the top.

 Isnt this lovely? The view of the barn across the main road which is just on the other side of the fence.

 This is the pot I found the rosemary in, for our lamb dinner, last night.

 the time is actually 8.51am. but yes, that has warmed up to -3.9C.

 This cracked me up...Waz drew my attention to Holly sitting on the INSIDE of the fire screen this morning. She usually sits on the side, but obviously the heat was out front, this morning. She even tries to sit in there with the fire going, strange wench!

 The sun coming out was just gorgeous. Blue sky appearing is always welcome.

 We wish it was warm enough to sit outside in the sun, but it wasn't!

 A lot of the snow disappeared yesterday and no new snow on top of that meant that whatever was there just froze. It was VERY crunchy this morning. We had to be very careful when walking on the flagstones, as it was hard to see where the ice was.

 When we go outside and walk around, we always have a kitty entourage. Scruffles is a real character. She is the most active in playing in  the snow. She had fund on the table and through the holes in the chair. Elsa came to join the fun, too.

 Silly cat!:)

 Sorry...overload on this view, but it was so pretty, this morning.

 Elsa STILL trying to get to the water. This was before I discovered that their water bowl was frozen solid. .If only they could talk!

 Scruffy!

 Glorious sunshine. That view is south facing, so it has lost most of the snow.

 I had filled up the seed tubes, and they were almost empty today However, on closer inspection, there was plenty of seed on the ground. Waz redistributed the Suet balls. The birds are clearly enjoying the suet cake I put out there three days ago. We see red breasted Robins and plenty of little finches.

 Bored with sitting around, and having now cleaned the house from top to bottom, we decided to go out, just before lunch. We had an omelet for breakfast, so we didn't need food immediately.
We turned left, as I have said. The road took us up and out of the valley that we are residing in. There was much less snow on the ground up there...as you would expect. We turned off the main road going west, and onto a small side road...I don't think this was even a D road...more like an E-road.

This little village appeared as we came over the top of a hill. You can see that the road is slim.

 It is a village because it has a church in the middle of 'town'.

 Large houses around the town square. Some looked like they needed a lot of maintenance.

 Yes, we passed the Brocante (2nd hand stuff) and went towards the Chateau...well, as you do, right!

 I wonder what the significance of these items on the side of the church, are?

 Look...Dinner on the hoof! Plenty of lambs out there on the high plateau. We are in the Dordogne now. Where we live is in the Haute Vienne (Oat Vee enne), but we also border the Limousin Department.

 From the plateau we looked down to a deep river valley below. There is bound to be a Moulin (moo larng) or Mill at the bottom. There was, but I discovered it too late to photograph...we had already gone past, the road was windy and there was some traffic. The tower in the background turned out to be the ancient chateau.

 Almost for no reason at all, is this wayside shrine. These are common all over France. There is usually a Virgin Mary in residence inside.

 A Crossroads. Left? or straight ahead. I forget which way we took. I do know that we back-tracked a fair amount.

 Skinny roads, but at least they have a little bit of shoulder or passing cars.

 The chateau rather took us by surprise. It is clearly old...perhaps 12th/13th Century? Hard to tell from the road, but it is fairly simple in design.

 The bridge at the bottom of the valley. The Mill was just on the other side of the river, but down a steep hill.

 We got lost in a small Hameau (Hamlet....Ham oh) where we found some very picturesque homes and barns. Love the little well in the foreground.

 We went through Sarlande, (Sar lond) and Angoise  (ong zhwarze). All those other little signposts are for the different Hameau. Some of them have no through road, however...as we found out. We WENT TO Laporte and found there was a dead end at the bottom of that Hameau.

 Rising yet again to the top of the plateau, this glorious view greeted us. I wish I could show you in person. It really looks second rate in this photo. The air was pretty thick with wood smoke, I have to admit. Wood fires being the preferred method of heating the homes.

 There was a warning sign further down the road warning us of logging activities. These logs on either side of the road looked like the firewood we have out back. Lots of it is Silver Birch, which is the prevalent tree in these parts. I love them!

 This is Apple Territory, as I have said previously. The harvest is well over, and all the pickers have gone elsewhere. This caravan may be accommodation for pickers. Then again, it might be the owners Summer holiday accommodation.

Yes, this small lake was frozen solid. We wondered how thick that ice would have to be to ice-skate on it?

 Another hameau, but this one had a church in the middle. With about 12 houses around the outside, we didn't think it would qualify for TOWN status, but what do we know?

 About 1 kilometer out of town was the 'Dead Center' as Waz calls it. The cemetery.

 More apple orchards, and all the way back down the hill...everywhere!

 Warning signs for ICE are everywhere in the Dordogne and other departments in this area. Verglas being ICE.

 All the orchards and rows of apples trees have netting on the top...mostly rolled back now. Some have plastic, interestingly, but they are few and far between.

 A barn full of wooden Apple crates.

So, by now we were entering the town of Saint Yrieix La Perche...(Remember...Eee ree eze la Pairsh) and through the medieval town we went, and out the other side to ...oh dear...the Boulangerie/Patisserie/Chocolatier is open! hmm....we are out of desserts for dinner, so perhaps...maybe ...we should really go and see what they have?
Why not!
Others were getting their sunday lunch and dinner bread, we were looking for fancy stuff, and that's what they had, to our surprise. As Waz said " Too bad we discovered this place going into our last week here", lol. Good thing, is what he really meant!
This Buchette (boo shette) is a log filled with and covered with pastry cream, and on top we have a meringue mushroom...this one is a bit cracked, so we will have to eat it, non? :) We couldn't decide on one, so we bought a Café and a Praline for dessert.

 Then there was dessert for lunch. Lunch was the last of the pumpkin/veg soup...without bread, because we had dessert....we could have just eaten Dessert...but we are civilized folks!:)
Here we have a half a Religieux and a Tarte aux Abricot. The Religieux  (Ray lizhe ee erce) is a pastry bottom filled with whipped cream and crème Patissier (Pastry cream), and the chocolate profiterole on the top is filled with chocolate Crème patissier. The Abricot (Apricot) tarte has custard on the bottom of the pastry, and then the apricots, glazed with apricot jam!  Delish!

 Oh dear...I forgot that there was some chocolate Crème Patissier at the bottom of all that whipped cream.

And so, it is now dinner time! Lamb again...or Deja vu!..or YMCA, if you will. (yesterday's mess cooked again).
Might even pour some wine to go with it.

That was just as good the second time around. Sorry...no photos...refer to yesterday's blog for those:)

As I write there are only two moggies inside. Old boy Jolly, and little girl Holly...the black and white ones. Who knows where the others are, but they will come in before long, no doubt. The fire is cranking out the heat...though not as much as we would like. It is back down to freezing point! I have closed the shutters, which really keep any heat inside, but we now have no view outside.

We have been reviewing our plans for our return in January. There are a couple of places we would like to go, previously not visited, in the north, and we might just do that at the beginning of our time here, on the return.

The UK news is on, and we are getting WORLD NEWS! Such a treat. We don't really get world news in the USA. Here we get everything, and yes, even the USA news. The opinion of his orangeship is interesting. People really don't care about him other than to state that they think he is dangerously crazy! We concur! Nuff said!
Im out of here for today.
Monday tomorrow! A demain!