Goodbye France

 

Our 3 months are up; it'll be another 9 months before we return to our little home in France. In the meantime the fire will stay unlit, the rooms will be cold and lifeless, and the front door will stay securely locked. We have a gardener coming in to keep things tidy, otherwise all will be still.

There'll be no more games around the pool, our Lutyens bench will remain un-sat-upon, and the dull black plastic winter pool cover will hide all vestige of this year's Summer fun.

When we return next June (god willing) there will be a new man living up at the barn. We shall continue to maintain the garden until the 'completion date', then it'll be all his. We're looking forward to meeting him.

Ahead of us is the 700 Km drive North, a stop-over in Orléans, and a 4 hr overnight ferry ride from Dieppe to Newhaven. Billy tolerates the trip quite well, but I know he'll be very happy to get home. I do hope he's not sick!!!

Our phone/internet cables are still lying on the ground. We have the new pole, but no-one has come to connect the wires to it (am I surprised?). Our neighbour's temporary electricity connection is still also lying on the ground behind our house. His six month maximum legal-limit connection has turned into more than FOUR YEARS, with one person lucky not to have been killed after 'mowing' over it. I wonder if it'll take another FOUR YEARS before he has a permanent connection made? No-one seems to give a sh*t. 

I can almost guarantee that both our phone cables, and the neighbour's temporary electricity connections, will still be lying all over the ground next June (watch this space).

So, goodbye France. My fingers are crossed for an uneventful trip. See yer back in Blighty, with all the 

hussle and bussle of Brighton! Gosh, the past three months have gone by so quickly. But we've had a really great time. We should be home on Tuesday morning.