There are storms in the UK and we are due temperatures below 20ºC at the weekend - summer is definitely on its way out.
During the summer we had the migrants from the south - swifts, swallows and house martins - who made each day special with their aerobatics and their song, loud and strident for the swifts, soft and bubbling for the swallows and martins. We also had the migrants from the north - friends with second homes in the area, finally allowed across the Channel to enjoy their other homes and gardens and breathe a bit more freely in our rural paradise.
The UK Government-imposed quarantine on the whole of France (other governments do localised ones, which seems a bit more sane) saw the northern migrants flee home, with no real idea of when they can come back "officially". There are still a few stragglers for whom quarantine holds limited fear, although insurance might be a bigger issue. The weather and the seasons mean our other migrants are heading back south. It is a couple of weeks since I heard the shriek of a swift, and the swallows are grouping up and heading off slowly now: we won't see them again until March or April next year.
This year the drift to autumn feels sadder than usual - normally there is a gentle melancholy once the Comice is over, knowing that days are getting shorter and cooler and wetter. This year it feels more stark. There are no Comices due to Covid, and in a normal year, every weekend in September is taken up with some event or other (mechoui, Patrimoine, forum des associations, the Bake Off, the volunteers' picnic), this year events are few and far between. The forum des associations goes ahead with no demonstrations, food or drink and patrimoine will happen, but rather reduced and with less fanfare. And then nothing.
We all sit and wait to see what the Second Wave will be like. It will be important to seek out the small discoveries that make life more joyous - I might have to start a new blog series on that!
In the meantime here are photos of the new windmills at Chigné, not yet commissioned and some nutters are trying to get them removed via judicial review! Also a photo of an unhappy carp - the oxygen levels in the public lake don't seem quite right for it, and a nice view of the church and a dramatic sunset.