All in a Day's Work

Our local SuperU supermarket is all decked out in Easter colors and decorations. We dont follow this calendar event in particular, but it was amusing to see the decorations and food/chocolate (oh yes, Chocolate has it's own designation!!) for sale inside.

These things are huge!

We were about to do a large 'pantry fill' shop here for basics that dont require refrigeration. Basics that we could ostensibly live off for about three days before craving fresh food! I think we did rather well for about 80 euros.

We have had a few days off from working at our house, which were most necessary as we stare down the next week full of busy days before we fly back to Florida and the super busy following 5 weeks.

Today we were back at the coal face with a long list of projects to be completed. I find myself half finishing things, then having to come back to complete them, but complete I did, and Waz had his own long list that started really well, in my opinion.
We had stopped (Wednesday? or was it Thursday?) off at Leroy Merlin  Hardware to find lighting for sever rooms. We have also bought bulbs to replace burned our ones here and there. Those done, Waz set about replacing  the pretty but useless wall sconces in the green bedroom, which will be our master bedroom for the foreseeable future.  These new ones are flexible and individual reading lights.

 Dont worry about the holes in the wallpaper...those will be prettied up later. The previous sconce lighting was so poor you could barely see. These ones are only for reading in bed, as there has to be a central room light installed, when we return to France. Currently the only way to turn on the lights is by walking into the room and reaching over the headboard to turn on that central switch. I wonder who thought that one up?

As lighting was one of the orders of the day for Waz, he took to the 'skies' in the 'pink room', to install lighting for both task and general ambience. This room was previously poorly served by a low watt strip light. These new ones are amazing....LIGHT!!!


Waz is removing the old strip light. I had asked him not to climb on tall ladders without me there to steady them. He agreed, thankfully...known to be VERY independent, but we need to watch each other's backs these days. No more injuries...especially this close to leaving the country!

 Voila! LIGHT! It is amazing the difference it makes to this formerly dark and dingy room. There is only one natural light source in this room...for now...which doesn't please us, but we will address this issue when we change all the current windows from single pane to double pane, some time in the not too distant future. A small patch of beam to re-stain, methinx.

While he was traipsing up and down the back stairs from the basement and workshop, with various tools, I was cleaning out the room around us. It had rather been the repository for all things we didnt want in the rest of the Rez de Chaussee (ray de show say), or ground floor. The existing furniture was cleaned and rearranged, the floor vacuumed and mopped by hand to get all the spider poop off the tiles and clean out the corners of livestock. This spider body was a bit large for my liking...I didnt have a comparison to put there at the time.
The walls also needed wiping...dust and mold!!! the tiling has been poorly done, and in a hurry. Much tidy-up work to be done. Like I have said before...we wanted a 'project' house! lol.

All finished and the lights about to be turned off for the day. These were taken without flash, so the new lights are providing plenty of light. That wall where the blue sofa thing is would look out to a lovely view. We are contemplating what kind of window we would put there. As it is also a sunny side, it would have to have shutters for the mid-summer sun.

 The only natural source of light are the double glass doors. Waz had already closed up the shutters, as we were about to lock up.

 I also 'attacked' the small room now known as the Pantry. With the big fridge out of there and just the little fridge remaining, I could now get in there and remove some of the black mold off the wall behind the small fridge. Again, scrubbing the tile floor by hand (and foot!) was essential, as there was much to get off the surface. I put a fan in there for a good hour to help dry out the wall that I had sprayed mold retardant onto, and damp wiped all the surfaces. With the central heating having been on all day, the house was starting to feel warmer. This pink room has no source of heat, so we are thinking of how we will install that. Simple enough, as the basement is just below here, and the boiler not far away. A few more pipes will connect to  the boiler and Voila! Heat! We will probably install a tall wall heater on the wall behind the white door, above.
This room will be our office and 'family room', as it were. It opens onto the lovely large roof terrace, and is just down that bright green hallway from the kitchen.

There is a little bit of artwork on the walls in here, that I haven't shown, and I didnt want to take it down yet as it gives a little more 'color' to the walls that otherwise are a bit overwhelming. Once we lighten the color of the room it will give it a much more open feeling. Pretty oppressive right now.

I also want to change the steps to the Terrace. The ones just below the doors there are not even a foot- step deep, and as such are a bit dangerous. The white door still has to open, so we will do some creative thinking on that one, because it opens onto the wall where the heater most likely will be installed. A sliding door of some kind might be a better idea and to the left behind that small shelf unit? Those walls are Breeze block, under that green paint..(concrete).

Also, while Waz was doing his thing, he found me some razor blades and I set about scraping windows with paint and stain on them. Nothing says 'amateur' quite like paint on windows.
It appears that much of the 'renovation' and decoration in this house has been done by those who really dont know what they are doing. Some of the tile work leaves a lot to be desired!

On a more positive note, the hardwood floors that I damp mopped at the beginning of the week are looking lovely. They natural golden glow is showing, and I am encouraged to do the same on the upstairs floors.
Look what we found in the hall cupboard, upstairs!! This is a vacuum/polisher, which badly needs me to take it all apart and clean it!  I took this photo AFTER I had wiped it down and de-cobwebbed it.

All the hardwood floors are in reasonable condition. Downstairs in the living room, people have obviously spilt drink/water on the floor and there will be no getting that out without a good sanding, unfortunately. This is what happens when you rent your house out to those who pay! People just aren't careful enough for my liking.
Baseboards: I have a 'thing' about dirty baseboards.  I have had much delight (and exercise, I might add!!) cleaning all the baseboards upstairs...well, maybe not ALL of them, but most. Lots of elbow grease required in some places, I might add. In particular, I like to see an Hotel room with clean baseboards....this shows that cleaning staff have been well trained and pay attention to details. Can you see how clean the baseboards in the photo above are? :) Makes such a difference to the 'feel' of a place.

We left the house about 6pm, and as we headed down the main road towards the house sit, we decided to go via Barbezieux, which is just 8 kms away. Our direction was dictated by the need for a comprehensive Map/s of France book to have in the car. We stopped at E.Leclerc and the Espace Culturel, where there is a good book store, and Waz found what he was looking for. We thought there might have been some food on offer in the Bistrot, but the floors were being mopped and no smells of cooking emanated. I had rather run out of energy by now, and we sat in the car and waited while I inhaled an individual sized bag of potato chips...the only food we had on hand. The house was warm inside, today, so I may also have been a bit dehydrated. It is easy to forget to drink water when you are busy. A long drink helped for the hour's drive home.

We had left overs for dinner, followed by a tea and coffee, but it was 8.30pm by the time we had finished. A bit late for us. We have plenty of food to take with us today, so that we might avoid being over-hungry.

We are ready to go, so I will finish this now. 9am, Saturday! How quickly the days are going. This time next week we will have cleaned everything up at the house sit, and be on our way to Bordeaux to pick up the rental car for the drive to Paris. I will avoid commenting on the Rail Strike, just now....suffice to say we are not impressed!

A plutard! (See you later)

There is such a thing as being TOO efficient!

Lots to report, today.

Yes, there IS such a thing as being TOO efficient. Had we known this beforehand, we wouldn't have gone there, but as the saying goes, "You live and learn". A pity that we always seem to learn the hard way.
Having said that, all is not lost! What the heck am I referring to?
Strike action by the SNCF Railways personnel, of which the fast train, the TGV, is the main rail transport being affected by the strike.
Of course we had ticket  - very carefully planned tickets, I might add... to take us from Angouleme, our local TGV station, to CDG Paris Airport. This is a great way to travel under normal circumstances. That the French Rail Union (or whatever they are called) chose to strike 3 days on, three days off, on the very days that we want to travel, is just bah humbug...and very expensive too!

We have spent the better part of the past week trying to find a way around this strike action, but most unsuccessfully. We have definite deadlines to meet in our travel arrangement from now onwards and we only have a 3 day grace period in which to make any alternative arrangements.

Trying to find inexpensive flights to Paris from Bordeaux has been a nightmare. Hellooooo!!! $600 each! EACH! for a one hour and five minute flight! hmm....gouging?
Then there was the attempt to find flights from Bordeaux (one way) to Zurich/Frankfurt/Amsterdam etc back to Jacksonville, but they started at $2,200 and rose through $8,000 for economy! Nice!

So, here we are, doing what Waz had already found as the least expensive option: Drive!
We will pick up a One Way rental vehicle at Bordeaux Airport, and drive through to CDG/Paris on the Sunday. I refuse to drive through or around Paris on the Autoroutes or the Peripherique (the Paris ring road) on a week day! Looks like we will avoid those roads, says Waz. He has been studying the maps! Good thing. I just drive and do as Im told:)

This is potentially a 6-8 hour drive, including stops for loo and food/drink. Positive thoughts on this one folks, and NO RAIN PLEASE!

Speaking of rain....and Trucks! LOTS of trucks. You have never seen soooo many trucks! In the rain! Trucks are not fun on a fine day, but in the rain they are the absolute pits!

Yesterday, Tuesday, we had a rendez-vous with our friends from Provence, who are in Bordeaux visiting their children/grandchildren. It was wet from start to finish, but this didnt dampen the pleasure we felt at seeing them again after 14 years... I hadn't seen them for that length of time. Waz was meeting them for the first time.

We joined the N10 AutoRoute not far from the house sit, and stayed on that for about 85 kms, heading towards Bordeaux. We stopped at the agreed upon rendez-vous point, a lovely restaurant next to the train station, as luck would have it.
We enjoyed both the catch-up and the food, of course:)

The other three had the Lamb Tagine with Couscous, and I enjoyed the Risotto.  The Café Gourmandise for dessert was excellent. This little 'tasting' selection of desserts is always a good idea. It is accompanied by an espresso.

As it was our hosts 'day off' from Grand Parenting duties (think school shuttles!) they invited us to take a short journey to Bourg, a small town on the  River that they had visited before. As always, these places have history to spare and unique places of interest. Armed with our umbrellas (Parapluie), having parked alongside the river, we made our way to Le Lavoir. This is where the women of the town would gather to wash the clothes. You have to read the explanation...the English is at the bottom of the sign!

 But I am getting ahead of myself, a weeny bit!

Some of the town is on the flat (river front) and some is on the hill above. We obviously have to go UP there:)

 Not a great day for yachting, eh? That river runs very swiftly, obviously tidal!

 Just outside the Lavoir we disturbed the ducks! They had been having a wee swim in the 'pond'.

 One way to get light inside a dark place!

And....once inside...

This place is so much bigger than you think it might be. You can just picture the women in here, washing in one basin, and rinsing in the other, chattering away:)


Obviously, when you come across a scene such as this, you HAVE to go and see where those stairs go!(below)

The steps were so worn in places that they actually tipped downhill! Not too much fun on a wet and slippery day. They were steep too!

 Part of the Ramparts/town wall.

 This archway! WOW!

 You can see how steep this was to climb.

 This entry to the town on the hill is known as  the Porte de la Goutiniere. It was the site of the town's drainage system, from the middle ages through the 19th century.  I hope you can read the rest of the story. It doesn't sound very 'savory', to be honest.

 I chose to walk up the ramp, as did the others. Yes, that was steep too!

 The store with the lamp in the window (blue surrounds) was the site of another memorable visit!...later!:)

 Continuing around to the right we found  Les Halles...the undercover Marketplace.

 Yet another portal...and going dowwwwnnnn.

Next up...inside the church...

 LOVE these doors and their hinges. Some construction going on in the area of the Organ, which was missing a couple of pipes. I always like to look at the flagstones in these old churches. I think I have said this before....Imagine all the feet that has walked those stones! The stained glass windows were particularly good and the colors in them so clear.

 Again, read the English at the bottom of the sign.

 I have to say that the gargoyles were pretty underwhelming. I am partial to the ones that stick way out from the roof, thereby keeping the water well away from the base stones of the church. They are decorative spouting! really!

 Next up...The Citadel, which sits high above the river, and overlooking it and the town ramparts. I imagine the gardens look lovely in summer. A bit sodden today.

 It is very low rise, but rather pretty in it's symmetry. It looks like it is now used as a Salle de Fete. There is a catering kitchen on the left side.

 Look at all those new red leaves on the small bush frames perfectly by the stone portal :)

 Part of the town Ramparts, overlooking the wide river.

 The bell tower of another church. This one has a little more romantic form than the other.

 I love grand entrances. Does this one qualify?

 Exit the Citadel, and make our way up the road further. I had spied a ruin that needed inspection. This was to be the last of the discoveries, as there was a cuppa to be had, somewhere.
I hope you can read the French!

 It isnt a large building, now, but by the look of the large hinges on the top end of the building, it had huge gates. Perhaps they closed over one of the entries to the town! Alongside, were the ramparts.

 There appears to be a round tower...see it??

 Those hinges I talked about!

 Remember I pointed out the dark blue building with the lamp in the window?
This Salon de The was delightful, and a most welcome chance to sit and chat and enjoy a Chocolat Maison.

 The Lamp!

 You dont quite expect such a modern interior inside such an old façade.

 These cups are lovely...very sculptural. The Chocolat Chaud was excellent!

Much fortified, and having warmed up and dried out somewhat, we made our way back down the steep steps to the car, and back to the restaurant parking lot where we left our vehicle.

Our wonderful hosts spoke slow French/Franglais for and with us, and as happened in 2004 when I last saw them, the language instruction was valuable, if exhausting for all of us:)  We look forward to seeing them again, and probably visiting them in Provence, with much pleasure.
They went on their way back to the Grandkids and we made our way back to the house sit.

Back to the trucks!
The first half of the journey it rained heavily, but the rain didnt slow the truck traffic down. They were wall to wall most of the way home. Many times they were so close together, and often overtaking on the two lane Autoroute, that there was no way a car was going to get in between them. They are supposed to travel at 90 on the 110 kph (for vehicles less than 3.5tons) Autoroute, but I clocked several, when I passed them, doing at least 105kph. Scary in the wet! Travel is supposed to be 10kph less in the rain!

This made for very stressful driving, of course. Truck traffic on the N10 is heavy at the best of times. We pass trucks from Spain, Netherlands, Germany, and other northern European countries. The N10 is one of the main North/South routes through France. It is the route we will take most of the way to Paris, a week from now.

Back to that efficiency thang!

While at the restaurant, our hosts offered to help us get a refund on our TGV tickets. Their help was gratefully accepted, and a refund was done in no time at all.
We should NOT have done the refund BEFORE  calling the travel insurance company and asking them about how to proceed with the refund/new travel arrangements. However, they did tell us to send in any receipts for new travel, to claim a refund which would be 'considered'! Hmm...doesn't sound promising, so this is why we aren't booking those $600 (each) plane tickets...just in case there is NO reimbursement for that 'Disruption to Travel'.
I guess we will see a bit more of the country! Like I said...positive thoughts for rain-free travel!!

Night night!