I am sitting here on the edge of the Italian Alps (I think) in a Chambre d'hotes perched on a hill, central to my view is a huge bridge about 2 kms away which is the main highway to Roma, so not so romantic. We have arrived here via the South of France where we stayed four nights in two different locations in Provence, the views and the surrounding countryside is quite spectacular (sorry as an add on to my current view a bloody great train has just gone past about 1 km away). Back to Provence, we had a drama getting to our last B & B (would one of my blogs be complete without a drama??) getting to the house we took a very narrow lane which was for two way traffic up a very steep hill, our poor van which is 7/8 yrs old was really struggling especially in the low gears, we had to pull over for a car, of course it was rush hour going the other way on 'La steepe 'ill', and we ended up having to turn the car round and in the process hit a rather large boulder on the driver side wheel, this incurred a very unusual hissing sound ?puncture ?break line ?air conditioning the list went on and as the wheel was not going down and the metal bit on the wheel was badly buckled, it was obvious that was the problem, then we got to the actual drive of the house and it was a vertical drop, at least we hopped it wasn't the breaks, all fixed now and just to continue the car troubles we are experiencing an unusual knock on the right front wheel any ideas???? As we went to a mechanic in Italy and as its holiday time everywhere is closed.
Tomorrow we are walking the Cinqua Terra Trail which is 5 villages perched (as usual) on the side of a mountain with the sea below, it is quite a challenging walk up and down steps, in fact I don't think it will the walk that will be challenging but the weather, the last week we have had temps of up to 40 degrees plus. This has been difficult journey with the respect of directions, got lost a few times, I have been telling Terry we need a GPS for weeks now and he thinks I only wanted it as it is a gadget (he calls me gadget women, I call myself an up to date with technology women not a technophobe like Terry) so yesterday before we set off for Italy it was straight into our Harvey Norman/PC World equivalent called Darty and bought a TomTom which covers 42 European countries, that should be handy for next year me thinks!! So here we are with our GPS called Jane on our way to Le Spezia in Italy via Monaco and Monte Carlo and he is arguing with Jane and she got her own back and got us lost in Monte Carlo!!!!! To be continued.....
We have been in France for two months now and we are amazed where the time has gone, I am beginning to get frustrated because I am getting behind on my reading ala relaxing, but as Terry is quick to remind me we have been doing lots of things.
This includes our last adventure six days trip away with 4/5 days of cycling along the Canal du Midi.What a fantastic experience that has been, there were six of us at the start, Helene and Dudley (from UK) went with us to Carcassonne were we met up with our Australian friends Dei and Rick then we cycled to Beziers.We are all relatively fit and relatively keen cyclists but only on the road, the tow paths are not what you would call smooth easy riding terrain!!The tow paths are beautifully shaded by plane trees but unfortunately for our deriers, plane trees have a fantastic root spread, which made our rides very very bumpy.Non the less the vistas were incredible from the long beautiful canals with the trees reflected into the green waters to the old medieval villages we passed through to the fantastic foods and drinks we consumed on route.Funnily enough our first lunch on the Sunday was in a small village that was holding a vide grenier (car boot sale) and they had a barbeque area where they was selling French sticks filled with fat dripping belly of pork, washed down with large plastic tumblers of wine all for the princely sum of 3 euros each.Did I also say this was the cheapest meal we had on our trip, cheapest by a mile or should I say kilometre.
The most import thing I forgot to mention is that we cycled 200kms and with the difficult off road manoeuvring we had to do around the roots, we think we have done very well, but as with all good journeys one does not survive without encountering a few minor mishaps......To be perfectly frank and honest The Trims encountered ALL of these minor mishaps.We both fell of our bikes, I nearly feel into the canal, no injuries except Terry tore a small coin sized flap off his knee.(I say small and down play his injury as it was nothing compared to my broken shoulder last year).In the photos you will notice we had to cycle along the railway track to get to the other side of the canal (we still think the French were having a lend on this particular route!!)To get to the railway track we had to push our bikes up a very steep gravel hill, Terry being Terry carried all the girls bikes up (one at the time!!) and feel down the hill through a bramble bush so twisted his ankle mildly and scratched his arm to shreds (slight exaggeration but there was alot of blood).Then guess who got the only punctures, a Trim, yes, me not one but three, so if nothing else the Trims as usual caused all the dramas!At the end of this marathon effort I would like to say that we are all ultra or should I say uber fit and slim but the French food and wine made sure we stayed true to form.
Since we have been back it is been pick up the social whirl and hang on tight, July and August is very busy in rural France with night fetes most nights, these consist of: craft market stalls, various bands playing and lots of eating and drinking.In our local village SOS on a Wednesday evening for example, it is the time all the villagers get together and have a good ole knees up, the local farmers sell their produce to consume in the square, generally on long trellis tables and benches.The food includes, duck (breast or leg), chips, wild boar roasted or on kebabs, pork roasted or kebabs, chips, snails in garlic, chips, chicken on the spit and of course chips.Local cheeses, breads, sausages, foie gras, salad, chips.Then crepes, strawberries and dreadful Chantilly cream or melon (no chips) Two or three local wineries have stalls selling wine for about 4 or 5 euros a bottle (not cheap for this area).However last night we went to a Medieval night market and had the obligatory chicken and chips followed by crepes, including a bottle of wine and a bottle of water we paid 10 euros each.This market was great as all the villagers dressed up in medieval clothes and there were fire eaters/dancers, local artisans demonstrating their skills, iron mongers, stone masons, broom makers!, rope makers, wood turners, wool spinners etc etc, very interesting.
We are still keeping up with our French lessons while we are here and try to go once a week, I think it is helping if not its mainly our faults as the teacher is fantastic, today was a challenge for Terry as the house we were having the lessons had a team of carpenters in putting up roof trusses on a new workshop. Terry’s seat was right opposite the window overlooking the men working so as you can image he spent most of time wondering why they had cut this bit of wood this way and put a nail in that way!!!!!All the way home he had a long discussion with himself (as I wasn’t listening) about why the carpenters had put an extra bit of wood at the front of the workshop!!!! French lesson what French lesson!!!
No doubt everyone can’t wait to hear about Terry’s battle with the moles!!!We think it is a battle fought and won, which in a way is rather disappointing as he can’t play with his explosive devices but low and behold we was at a market on Sunday morning having coffee when a couple of our gay friends sat down with us and asked if Terry knew anything about getting rid of moles out of a lawn.This is how it went “do you know how to get rid of ‘a pesky mole in my manicured lawn’ Well poor buggers they wished they hadn’t asked, Terry’s enthusiasm was a sight to behold and now he has got two explosive devices and no moles in our lawn...you can imagine the rest. We are getting regular phone calls from the guys asking Terry to go over as the explosive has gone off, so far it has gone off twice with no body and new mole hills are appearing, the gauntlet has been been well and truly laid......
I suppose I should mention the weather, this is the third summer chez maison and it has been the best one so far, very hot and warm evenings so the above ground pool has been a god send when we get time to get into it....
Suppose I could catch a hour in the hammock with a book if I am quick as its moules and yes you guessed frites for tea at SOS night market tonight.
