Rural Life

Let summer begin!

Apologies for not rounding off the 30 Days Wild with a wild post yesterday, but I was anything but wild - tied to the computer until 10:30pm getting a report finished for a client.  With a couple of chums, I've been doing a quick scheme review for the Fifth Continent Landscape Partnership, but at a distance.  It brought back memories of afternoons on the sands at Littlestone when I was small, walks on the shingle at Dungeness when I was older, and the litany of villages we used to have to go through to get down to Littlestone (Matfield, Brenchley, Goudhurst, Sissinghurst, Biddenden, Tenterden, Appledore, New Romney).  My Dad used to love it down there.

Anyway, now summer should be here and soon the holiday makers will arrive, but it will be a strange summer, as so many of the festivals and capers of summer have been cancelled.  There will be no 14th July festivities and fireworks, no Comice at Echimiré, although they promise they will do it next year instead, no festival of the giant croissant (and at 800g each, they are indeed giant), no car boot sales, no concerts.  We will have to make our own entertainment.

And that is where things can get bizarre.  We grew small pumpkins (potimarrons) last year, but didn't eat many of them, as they weren't as tasty as the butternut squashes we also grew.  They sat in the garage and slowly went off.  "What happens if you bury a whole one?" he says, and does that in the wild flower meadow.  I imagine that they sit in the soil until some enterprising worm or beetle nibbles through the hard outer shell, at which point the seeds, which are in a nutrient rich soup of putrid pumpkin, go "weh hey - an escape tunnel" and go for it.  One has produced four seedlings, the other?  Well see if you can work it out!

With life here in France returning to close to normal, I'll not be doing a daily blog, but I will provide updates a few times a week.  I will leave you with the portrait of Fergus I promised a couple of days ago.

 

Day 28 of 30 Days Wild - Saturday fun, Sunday work

I did warn you that there would be no blog yesterday - we were out celebrating with one of the Chinon Two.  I have to say that weather-wise, it wasn't really the best day for celebrating.  Before we even got to that, we had to brave a cold, moist and windy market to get supplies.

Before settling in to a delicious and copious dinner at the Bistrot de Marché at Chinon, we went on a bit of a wander and café tour - this was in the main square, and a bit moist and windy.

So we moved location to the admirable Café Français and sat indoors, and admired the collection of confinement cartoons by a local chap, many of which had appeared in the Nouvelle Republique.  We then strolled on to the Bistrot de Marché, inspecting menus as we went - in many instances, that was actually just an academic exercise as quite a few had signs up saying they were complêt for the evening, even before opening time!  I tried to emulate the wonderful sunset scenes that so many friends post at the moment, but failed totally - if you look very closely, you might just spot a chateau on the horizon.

To make up for a day of lotus eating yesterday, this morning was spent working hard on the vegetable plot, while the afternoon has been spent clamped to the computer, working on a report that has to be submitted on Tuesday (so long as it arrives before midnight, that is OK).

Fergus is guarding the strimmer while we do other things - tomorrow there will be a Fergus portrait I think!

But now it is time for Sunday aperos - bring out the Gin!

 

Day 25 of 30 Days Wild - what I would like to be doing!

It's not news to say it is hot, stinking hot.  Here in my office it is nearly 30ºC and I will stop work as soon as this is done and find somewhere cooler to be.  Or that would be the ideal - but it will be difficult to find I fear.  There are storms doing the rounds but not near us - to the north east of le Mans took a real hammering earlier.

My evening walk to look at the view is fast becoming a bit futile - it is now up to my shoulders and allowing for the curve of the hill and so forth, you really can't see anything beyond maize!

These long high summer evenings should be the ideal time to watch the evening primroses open.  That sounds weird, but sit with a plant and a glass of something chilled and just watch - they open over about a quarter of an hour, and there is a real ping moment when the sepals curl back and release the flower, and you can almost see the petals moving.  Great fun and very therapeutic!  But they open very late at the moment, so the best I can do is admire them in the morning when the flowers are still open.  By midday they are gone.

Watch out for storms!

 

Day 22 of 30 Days Wild - it's all about relaxing

Yes, I finally made it to a yoga session.  As we all listed our aches, pains and ailments, poor Maëwa looked a bit bewildered (well it is yoga for seniors) at our multiple complaints and decided that we needed to concentrate first of all on breathing properly. 

She probably had a point. After 5 minutes of being instructed through deeper and slower breathing, my angst about tweaking my ankle again receded as I tried to make one breathe last for a count of 10, then 15, then 20.  I don't think she actually wanted us to count, but as a numbers person, that does calm me down rather.  Later in the class, as we tried to touch our feet with our foreheads, or spent 5 minutes with our feet in the air, I think she felt rather more relaxed too.

The relaxation class started with meditation before moving on to the sonic bit with bowls and gongs and the like, but again that was trying to anchor us into nature, imagining our stresses, fears, pains and anxieties flowing away with a stream and then becoming one with a meadow.  How I have missed that weekly letting go of all stress and tension!

We have one more week and then it is the summer break, so I will be back to my own resources and the yoga videos Maëwa sent round during lockdown (only to be tried when I am convinced a cat won't sit on me).

One resource, when the weather is right of course, is my evening walk to my view over the country - it is only 100 yards but standing at the top of the maize field, watching the swifts, swallows, martins, pigeons, and if a bit late, the bats swooping over the corn, trying to catch insects or a thermal is really rather lovely.  It will depend of course on how high the maize actually gets...

A demain!

 

Day 20 of 30 Days Wild - if only I could add sound!

It wasn't just that Friday evening is beer o'clock time, but also that I knew that yesterday would be hyper dull, which made me miss a day with the blog, but most people seemed to get the message from the number of hits.

This morning as I went out to the market, I noticed poppies flowering around the steps to the front door - clearly we are slovenly as they should have been grubbed out weeks ago, but actually a blaze of red poppies is such a cheerful thing, I'm glad we hadn't.  Not sure what the neighbours think though!

The Moroccans were back in the market, which was good news.  Not such good news was falling over in the street (sober!) and hurting my knee and ankle - the knee is now fine, but the ankle is starting to look unpleasant.  However it isn't so bad that I can't go mowing, which I did this afternoon.  Once it was all done, I went for a walk round the lake while the mower cooled down so I could pack it away under its covers.  The carp were leaping which is fun but slightly scary to watch and impossible to photograph.  While I stood on the bank waiting for them to do it again, a frog chorus started up - I'm not fluent but I think it was along the lines of "That one's injured, if we work together, we can take it down - hooman for dinner team!"  I recorded it, but haven't worked out how to get the recording off the phone and onto here.

Finally as I checked emails before doing this blog, I found a lovely present from a chum in the States in the shape of this photo.  I've no idea exactly what it is, I assume some form of cricket, but he is totally correct in describing it as a leaf with an eye!

La vie est belle!

 

Day 17 of 30 Days Wild - but fairly brain dead

Which is really my way of saying that apart from going to the market this morning, I've been stuck indoors either stretching my brain with work, or stretching my brain talking to our French financial advisers about investments. 

John has had the same brain strain, between talking to French financial advisers and then working out how to fix a new to us ride on lawnmower blade engagement system that uses a spring.  We had to get a new spring, and it arrived today - a huge, chunky and impressive thing.  I gather working out how to flex it enough to fit it was an amusing puzzle, but the good news is that Mambo (ride on lawnmower number 5) is now back in service and ready to roll.

So once again I will have to delve into the Guadeloupe archives to find things to please your eyes - birds and chocolate!

So, a pelican in flight.

A lorakeet in captivity (not native to Guadeloupe but to Australia, where every time I tried to photograph one, it pooped on me).

And finally, unripe chocolate.

Day 15 of 30 Days Wild - vegetables and a feathered visitor

Yesterday I was very excited about butterflies so didn't bother with the vegetables at the plot which are starting to do useful things.  The tomato plants, that John was given in return for helping to fix a ride on lawnmower and I just jammed into really unprepossessing ground, are doing really well and are covered with young tomatoes.  They are ridged and furrowed, so I expect they are some form of beefsteak tomato or heritage type.  If all the rain we are getting doesn't give them blight, I think I will be making a lot of tomato sauce this year!

Most years, the courgette problem is the same, the first flowers are all male and while pretty, they do nothing for our dinner plate.  This year, we have a different problem, the flowers are all female, and bizarrely, that does nothing for the plate either as with the young plants, the female flowers excluding the actual flower bud are no more than 4 centimetres long.  I think it is due to the hot, dry May weather, although I'm sure people will tell me if that is wrong.  Whatever, it is now clear that you need a good mix of male and female flowers in order to get courgettes worth eating!!

Now on to the feathered visitor, and for once it is Zola who has to hang her head in shame.  I was just about to start a Skype interview and the little darling was scrabbling around in the office, making out she had lost something.  I had to assume it was (yet) another mouse, but could do not more than ask her to find and take away her little friend before talking to my victim.  Once the interview was done and I was sitting and thinking, there was a rustling noise behind me, so I got my glass (empty) and went to trap the mouse.  Except it wasn't, it was either a swallow or a house martin.  Zola came to help so had to be locked in a bedroom while I tried to trap the little fellow with a cloth or my hands.  While it was quite happy on the floor by my desk, it was even happier flying along the landing to the front window, which I opened and it flew away.  I hope she hadn't damaged it too much, but it didn't do the baby duck lurch, it definitely flew, so fingers crossed.

It should have been yoga tonight, but once I got off my last call of the day and checked the rain radar, it was clear to me that it wasn't going to be a clear one and a half hours, and frankly, today I didn't feel like getting rained on while doing the sun greeting or other moves with more dodgy names.  I did a bit of CPD instead.

 

Day 14 of 30 Days Wild - rainbows and butterflies

We seem to be getting a lot of rainbows this year.  Yesterday I showed the one that was looking south east from the pub on Friday night when we left.  Today I share with you the double rainbow that could be seen from our back door yesterday evening, this time looking north east.

A few days ago I was worrying that history would be covered up in terms of the stonework on a house in the village.  I'm actually pretty hopeful that they are going to leave the stonework visible though, as there is a fine repointing of joints, but the scaffolding is coming down, and there is no covering render.  Fingers crossed guys, because I find this quality of stonework beautiful and fascinating.

John had his work cut out cat minding today.  This made it easier for me to tend to the needs of the tomatoes and check up on the haricots and tie in more bean poles for the borlotti beans.  It didn't make it any easier for him when it came to mowing around the plots though.

In places the buddleia is out and providing lots of lovely nectar for the butterflies.  I spent a happy (and Wild) 10 minutes chasing around the bushes, trying to photograph butterflies and got some reasonable pictures this time I think.  This is the one I like the best - it's a peacock butterfly by the way.

Tomorrow it is back to work and also back to the uncertainty over outdoor yoga or not - don't be surprised if there is no blog, as I could be stuck with my foot round the back of my head (boasting), or be spending the evening rubbing horse liniment into my aching joints.

 

Day 13 of 30 Days Wild - bar society

So after writing yesterday's blog, we packed up and went to the pub - because we can here in France!  I'm still a bit concerned about closed spaces with other people, so we sat out on the terrace although it wasn't as warm as it might be, and it was nice to sit and watch the clouds and the birds and the people (shock horror - two people did the Faire le bise!).  It helps to blow away the cobwebs of the week.

As we left, looking over the valley of the Couasnon, we spotted a strong rainbow with magnificent colours.  There was no rain around us, but clearly a few miles to the south east, someone was getting very wet indeed.

The air was very crisp and clear, so that standing in the Place d'Eglise and looking up at the church, it was possible to see every detail of the stonework and the slates on the twisted spire - at its most beautiful I thought.  The flower displays are not yet fully developed, but by August there will be magnificent flowers along the wall below the church.

Today has been remarkable for short but very intense showers.  I drove through one that was like driving through a waterfall.  The country cats weren't stupid and were hiding when I arrived to feed them and didn't come out from their lairs until the rain had passed.  So while I waited for them, I admired my Guadeloupe avocado tree, now it is outside and enjoying the weather.  The volume of rain should surely be reminding it of its ancestral tree in the Caribean!

 

Day 9 of 30 Days Wild - I said I might not post yesterday!

The weather was not propitious yesterday for outdoor yoga, but it was good for getting a lot of work done on the computer and by the time I had finished, I just wanted to rest my eyes.  Later in the evening I went out and photographed the rainbow.

Today I have been over to Chinon, which has a very fine chateau that you can see from the house there.

The walled garden has red valerian growing in it, which attracts the butterflies - we saw whites, a peacock, and this which I think is a White Admiral.  And yes, I do know it is sitting on a pink rose, but it started out on the valerian.

 

We also went wine tasting and buying at Restigné again - all very good!

Tomorrow I may be more verbose, but I still have 50 e-mails to read before bedtime!