Ron and
Pauline’s visit is now an annual event and they have only missed a couple of
years ever since we have been here in Brevands. We love to hear about their
camper trips into Spain and Mike is all geared up with all the best tunnel
passes and camp sites and is raring to get on the road. Our visitors spent
three days here camping in the garden and we did a day out to St Vaast and then
came home to play Crib. I have been keen to learn how to play crib to challenge
the number blindness I seem to have developed in my old age…..so a bit of card
game therapy was the order of the day and thank you to my excellent teachers, it
was well appreciated.
Just about every week we set off with our friends Graham
and Anne to have a picnic…..somewhere, and this week we decided to go to the
Azeville Battery evening spectacular. Billed as a picnic to music, followed by
an open air film show we set off with our camping chairs and cold bags to find
we were the only people to had read the notice in the things-to-do-in –June,
book. The event was so organised so that the picnic and the film were in two
different fields on either side of the road.
We set ourselves up on our own, on a picnic bench and after our repast as
always full of laughs and fun we made our way to the next field
There we
found a tent with local tourist officers offering a free aperitif of cider and
nibbles with a handful of people keen to participate. You can see we were among
the German batteries with their gun
ports patrolling what were to become our DDay beaches, now repainted as they were in the 40’s to look like houses in the village,
so after our aperitif we took a free unguided tour of these two World War 2
relics and as Graham is well versed in the history it was a good tour. I enquired if the film would be OK for a
bunch of ex pats and the very kind lady who works in the tourist office
apologised that they could not get the version with subtitles and in any case
it was a bit of a heavy film for English people without good French, so we took
her lead and set off home to finish the
evening in Graham and Anne’s garden with a cup of tea and more laughs and
putting the world to rights…..
The very
next evening we drove across the peninsular to St Lo D’ourville to be at the village music evening. Our friend Ray’s
son is on the entertainments committee and we went along to join in. We sat in
the ‘salle de fete’ and experienced a fantastic hour listening to a jazz group
playing a wide variety of music to such a high quality I was a bit bemused as
to why they were there. Usually at these events the music has a lot to be
desired but these musicians were amazing and thoroughly enjoyable. We then had
a sausages in a stick, a bucket of chips and bottle of wine and chatted ‘entre
nous’ and listened to the ambience of families enjoying their village bash. The
local line dancing team put on a show and although this is not my cuppa by any
means to see people participating and gathering for the only reason that they
all live in the same village is a joyous experience.
And
then the next day we were off again to have a plod around a couple of car boot
sales and finish off in St Vasst for a fish lunch. We drove a few more kilometres that we anticipated
as two of the advertised boot sales were either cancelled or in someone’s back
yard and we could find it. I did ask a lady where the vide grenier was and she apologised,
most profusely, saying that it has been rescheduled for July and they had
forgotten to take it off the internet site……she was only the messenger so I stopped
myself from slapping her about a bit. I
was a little rattled that no one had the
manners to put a sign at the village entrance
saying
‘desole vide grenier annule’
then the locals would not be apologising to the hundreds of people wondering
around the village eagerly looking for their Sunday second hand shopping fix
When we got
home from Canada I planted two rows of dwarf beans and I am delighted that they
have all germinated and I have the promise of a good crop. I am doubly pleased because
for 8 years of growing I have very rarely germinate in the final beds as I choose
to nurture these delicate little babies in the poly tunnel until they are
mature enough to go out into the wild big garden. I am now converted into
starting the seedlings later outside and getting the same result…..roll on next
year as I am taking May off again and sewing seeds later and in the spot. You
can see my dahlia patch in the back ground in full bloom looking great. We ran out of time in April to make a special bed
for these lovely plants from last year so as not to lose them after lifting and
caring for them all winter I popped them in a veggie bed and they are liking
it….. thank you very much……..
Mike and I
spent a morning clearing out the spent daffodil leaves and sorting out the rose
from the maple tree. As we went through
this bed we realised that we have done nothing with it for a couple of years
and we found tree saplings and rose suckers as thick as your arm but we both
set to and now I have a lovely rose garden
to look at from the house front door with the pond beyond.
Last
year’s dahlia garden has now become the rose garden and the box hedge that I
grew from cuttings three years ago and planted out last year is now a proper little
hedge for which I am very proud, and the roses in the garden are just fantastic
and just what a rose garden should look
So
while I am blowing my trumpet, here is the rest of the little hedge growing
around the pool. It just takes the edge off the blue blot on the landscape look,
we have inadvertently produced, but are prepared to put up with, as the daily
treat of a swim and a wolla are worth the worrying blueness against the
wonderful green vista we have created and enjoy
And lastly
the Storks are defying the extensive efforts our EDF engineers made two years
ago, and have decided that they like it on the electric pole despite the
expensive and ugly work. The engineer team rolled up with a lorry, a van, a car
and 9 blokes who worked for an entire morning to put up four spikes to stop the
storks sitting on the pole and nesting up there. The storks are however, back again this year eyeing
up the possibility of a home and vantage point looking over our garden and
home. I for one love them sitting up there clicking and clacking and then
launching themselves into the air to delight us with a fly past and then,
another fly past. They will be off to warmer climes in August so we make a real
effort to enjoy and appreciate them sharing our bit of paradise……
