Two weeks in France - some highlights

Saturday

As it is Wife's first trip to France for a while, we traveled down her favorite route which is Portmouth-St Malo on the mid-evening boat, so we can have a meal in the restaurant.  We have bunk beds tonight and I am on the top one.  Would the crossing be rough and I fall out - not this time

We stocked up LeClerc in St Jean for three days in the house - there is such a lot to do

Our first night treat is a trip to Les Cabanon in St Jean for dinner - two delicious steaks

Sunday

First work is on the bedrooms in Petits Chats - principally the floor.  This is reasonably precise work, but actually very enjoyable to do.  And progress is quicker than I had expected.

Also up today is work on the main bedroom of Cadran - initially painting the ceiling white and then working on the numerous repairs to the walls and priming reading for painting next visit.

The house has already descended into chaos as we sort through everything.  The wardrobe below is too big to go up the stairs and will have to be dismantled.  The rest of the stuff below is a collection of beds plus packs of wood flooring.

My DIY camp is at the bottom of the stairs in Cadran - more chaos

Monday

A morning visit from Grant for an initial catch up and check we were happy with the most recent work.  He is snowed under this week so we will see him again next week when we are planning a trip to Saintes to buy lots of bathroom stuff, electrical things, etc

Wednesday

St Jean market in the morning - highlight is the delicious duck moose pate.  We also buy chicken skewers with a curry sauce - not perhaps the most french thing

Over lunchtime, we went for a trip out with Dave, the estate agent, to see two properties.  One was a finished house and gites for around E300k and the other was the run-down farmhouse that I've been too twice before.  As expected, there is insufficient enthusiasm at this stage to take on the latter

Thursday

A very pleasant evening out in St Jean - Wife visited the dress shop where Daughter bought lots of stuff over the summer, then several drinks at Ellis Park, where it is warm enough to sit outside, before an evening meal at L'Annexe.  Excellent stuff all round

Friday

We have acquired a new house cat - a petit chat indeed.  Against my better judgment, we have decided to give it food throughout our visit.  It has been holed up in the garage, but now prefers to sleep on our terrace during the day so he can try and get food off us whenever we come out of the house.  He is very friendly though.

Saturday

A day out today.  First to Saintes and a trip round the market down by the cathedral.

Then to the Isle d'Oleron, one of the best places to visit in the local area.

At St Pierre we stumble across one of the finest patiseries we've ever seen.  It would be worth coming to Oleron just for that.  While we are acquiring products and admiring others, daughter calls and is very jealous.

Then to the very tip of the island.  The tide is out and the Atlantic breakers are way off in the distance.  We generally prefer it when all the rock pools are exposed.  By picking our way through the various pools, it is possible to get to the edge of the sea

Next stop is America

Sunday

More work on Petits Chats, this time it is wood flooring in the back bedroom and landing area.  Not a bad outcome, but loads of work still needed to do all the detailing required

Monday

Two bedrooms in Petits Chats are now trimmed up and basically ready for guests.  Such a contrast to just six months ago when we started work on the upstairs

This evening we had a trip out with Grant and Karen going to the Jacobins restaurant in St Jean.  We had thought this was just a pizzeria, but it is actually a full restaurant, and very good too.

Thursday

Our last day on this trip and a brief walk up to the nearby vines.  They have all been harvested of course and the leaves are turning brown rapidly

On our drive home we manage to take a wrong turn at Tours and only just make the ferry - odd as we haver done this trip loads of times before - another sign of approaching senility

Julian Cope - books and CDs

One recent download from emusic.com was Julian Cope's Psychedelic Revolution.  Despite having been a huge Cope fan for years, I was amazed at just how good this album is.  I really like at least 9 of the 11 tracks and the other 2 aren't that bad!  Particular favourites are the tracks Roswell and As the beer flows over me.  I have probably heard the album a dozen times now, perhaps the most times I have listened to any album this year.  Excellent stuff.

Inspired by the album, I have re-read Cope's book on Liverpool, the early Teardrop Explodes and the early part of his solo career.  No doubt he is very busy, but hopefully a new volume of autobiography will appear at some point.  I have also bought Copendium - a collection of his online music reviews.  I have heard of a handful of the bands reviewed and even have one or two of the records - not many though

What I did on October 15th 2013

4:30 Woke up - currently my normal waking up time.  Thought about the changes necessary for our French property advert

6:10 Went to the gym - one hour of swimming, about 80 lengths, 2 km.  Front crawl stoke is getting better, but still can't do multiple lengths

8:00 Read the Guardian and worked on house advert

10:00  Drive to western edge of London to deliver mirror bought from us on ebay - the most expensive item we have ever sold and deserving of care and attention in delivery.  Thought about going into central London, but too much to do at home.

13:00  Called in Homebase for final DIY purchases before our trip to France.  They don't sell overalls any more apparently - I had planned to buy Wife some for her role as my new apprentice.

14:00  Worked on new structure for house advert - lots of text changes and a complex message to deliver for next year.

16:00  Half an hour of French practice - actually mainly a skim read of the next few chapters so I know what topics are going to be covered.

17:00  Nearly finished Julian Cope's Repossessed.  Listening to Cope albums - but also the first couple of CDs from the huge King Crimson boxset, The Road to Red, which arrived this morning.

19:00  Dinner - old stuff from the freezer - some sort of fish

20:00  Watched the first half of the England football match

21:00  Watched an episode of Breaking Bad with Wife

23:00  Asleep

Constant changes to plans - not good

Swimming progress - great leaps forward

A few week's back, I decided that I ought to learn to swim front crawl - so I don't look like a plonker when competing in my next triathlon!  Initially, I was able to swim just 10 minutes or so before taking in so much water that I had to come up spluttering for air.

But the last week or so has seen quite an improvement.  First up, I downloaded half a dozen educational videos from Youtube and have been very impressed with how I have been able to constructively use these.  From the very moment I started watching them, I have realised so many things that I was doing wrong.  Perhaps the main one of these has been the need to rotate back and forward off the body's central axis in time with arm motions.  For some reason, I had never known this before.  The other main issue has been breathing without drinking water - which is taking me a little longer to sort out

Secondly, I have been reading a couple of books about triathlon technique.  These have incredibly detailed instructions on swim technique and I have been slowly putting these into practice - each morning swim session features one new thing to try and remember.

So gradually some milestones have been passed.  Managing to swim one length, managing two lengths, managing twelve lengths in a row (though with rests between pairs of lengths), managing 50 lengths front crawl out of a total swim distance of 80 lengths, swimming a length front crawl in 25 seconds compared to the 40 seconds that was my fastest time doing breaststroke, and so on.

Today's extension?  Swimming 80 lengths with the final 40 being all crawl and with minimal stopping between lengths.

I now have decent breathing technique and need to work now on upper body strength so my strokes are more powerful

Probably exactly how I look when swimming front crawl

A quick trip to France - 27 hours at the house

The day after Daughter's move to Oxford is complete, I am off to France for a lightning fast visit in our van, spending just 27 hours at the house and more than that travelling.

During this visit, I have

1.  delivered 60 boxes of wood flooring, four chests of drawers, an armoire, four single beds and two double beds, plus six mattresses.

2.  liased with our builder about the plan of the work for the next few weeks and the outstanding amounts due.

3.  visited the other farmhouse we are interested in and taken loads more photos and measurements

4.  started the painting of the main bedroom - some wall tests and the white for the ceiling

Interestingly, the pool looks really good now - the best it has been all season.  I am considering not replacing the liner next spring.

And while I was there, Wife and I had something of a bust-up about our future plans.

On the way back to Caen, there was a huge electrical storm that illuminated the sky after dark for over an hour.  At its peak, there were probably as many as 10 flashes of lightning per second!  I have never seen a storm like this before - quite headache inducing after a while.

Daughter has started her MPhil / DPhil at Oxford

After a year of travelling and various other things, Daughter has officially moved out of our house and into her accommodation in Oxford and has started what we hope will be a two year MPhil followed by another two years doing a DPhil.  Moving her in took two trips to Oxford, but her room already looks nice and should be very good for the next nine months or so.

For the past couple of months, Daughter has been studying maths for a few hours a day.  For the next two weeks she is doing a maths primer and then her proper lectures start in mid-October.  She also has a huge list of possible going out events and we are slightly concerned that she may be distracted by them.

But this is an event of major impact.  Four years of study at Oxford.  What I wouldn't give to be able to do that!

New College, Oxford - Daughter's place of study for the next four years (we hope)

My second triathlon - Highworth

Again, my triathlon preparation has not been perfect and I keep getting a recurring calf strain whenever I run very far in training.  But regardless of this I have turned out again for my second event - the 2013 Highworth triathlon.

It was a slightly damp and chilly morning as we all assembled around 730 onwards.  I was number 24 and set off at 8:30.  I am one of the few wearing regular swimming trunks - I really should buy myself a tri-suit.  My transition to the bike is so much slower than everyone else's.

I rather enjoyed the bike ride - a 22 km circuit of some local villages.  I passed half a dozen riders and was passed by 2.  I was slightly concerned throughout that putting in too much effort might affect my calf and stop me completing the run.  I could have gone quite a lot faster.

The run is round part of a local golf course and featured a really difficult uphill slog at the end of each of the three laps.  This was really difficult first time round but then got easier the next two times.  And my calf, though slightly sore, does not give out.

My time was 1 hour 35,20 - about 9 minutes inside my time for last time, though the bike ride was a little longer.  My next target will be to get a time around 1 hr 25 mins.  I beat about 25 others and probably came about 110th overall. 

A very enjoyable way to spend a Sunday morning!

Another project in France?

The initial thoughts on the farmhouse I saw in France have been positive.  If we bought it now, we would settle the transaction around January-February, spend the summer planning the refurbishment, then we would aim to spend a year in France from the autumn of 2014, having rented out our UK property for that period of absence.  This is an extremely radical idea about our future but working through this plan in detail seems to show that it is a very robust plan, and it appears to have a number of features that are considerably better than the original plan, which was to try to buy something else next autumn.

But this new plan also relies on the fact that this particular property was quite a lot cheaper than the other renovation projects that we have looked at.  We could be cash buyers for this property, which would considerably improve our chances of doing the deal as well.

Looking at the property in detail, the initial job would be to refurbish the farmhouse itself ready or the rental season in 2015.  The main structural work would be to knock through the wall between the landing and the large grenier and so create two new large bedrooms.  The downstairs bathroom would have to be stripped out and re-done completely and probably one of the rooms upstairs would become a second bathroom.  The two narrow bedrooms downstairs would have their dividing wall removed to make one larger room.  This would leave the farmhouse as a four-bedroom, two bathroom property. Then the entire house would have to be redecorated - in fact there would be barely a single feature that would remain untouched (though the wood floors and beamed ceiling are fine as they are.

Structurally, this is less work than our current property, though the decoration work is far higher.  It looks like a ideal project if the two of us are going to be there.

The barn conversions are much more complex.  I really need to see some more examples of finished gite complexes so I can get a better understanding of what work had to be done in these cases.  We do have some other resources for this though, for instance, a very-detailed book on complex renovations which has loads of checklists to work through.  Loads of thought needs to be put into this part of the project prior to us going ahead with it I think.

But I am going to try and see it again in a week or so's time when I am doing a wood flooring and furniture delivery to our current property.  Hopefully I will have a proper working plan for that visit and can accumulate a load more info.  Then Wife and I will try and see it again two weeks after that and make our decision then.

Barns in the distance, 30 vines in the foreground - a major challenge!

Addendum - some day's later

Bogged down in other discussions, I suspect that the initial momentum behind this project is slowly seeping away.  Though it appear to fit the bill, it might require too much thought now.  I may still go and see it again, if only to work through the detailed questions I have so far thought of - maybe for next time.

A few days in France

A quick trip down to France for a short visit - down on the overnight ferry on Sunday night, back on the ferry Friday night.  Daughter has come with me as she fancies a few quiet days away. 

It is quite autumnal now with rain expected for most of the week.  Arriving at the house for the first time since md-July, I was surprised by the tall, daisy-like flowers that currently dominate the front garden.  Grant and a workmate were there when we arrived, so we could have a quick catch up on the most recent work being done, and what might be done by the time of Wife and my visit for two weeks at the end of October.

Late afternoon, I had a quick walk up the road to see Oscar the donkey (who I forgot to buy carrots for at the supermarket earlier) and to see how the vines were doing, as it is close to harvest time now.

Work on Petits Chats has continued at a good pace.  The partitioning walls are now up and are being plastered, the electrical work is continuing well, etc.  The hope is that two of the rooms upstairs will be ready for decorating in October.

I have brought down some samples of the wood flooring we intend to use.  They look pretty good against the stone walls (see above).  And the corridor has been put into the end bedroom (which is now smaller)

The largest of the new rooms has an alcove at the end which could be perfect for the large armoire we have (unless it is too tall).  I have another trip down in two weeks time when I am bringing furniture, so we'll see then.

The rooms do look good, with the stone and the wood beams highlighted

The view below is from just in front of the bathroom upstairs and looks back towards the "Asian" room in the far distance, showing the two main bedrooms with their new walls

 

My own work over these few days is focused on the main bedroom in Cadran, where I have removed most of the wallpaper and done some test paints.  This will be one of our main jobs in October.

Later in the week, I went to visit a Gite complex for sale near St Jean.  This consisted of a three bedroom house and three gites that had been converted out of barns.  Our proposed next purchase could be a renovation project that would ultimately be like this.  The place I saw had been finished to an exceptional standard and I was most impressed.

The next day, I went to visit a really dilapidated farmhouse and barns about 5 miles form our existing house.  This is extremely cheap and could be exactly what our second project could consist of.  But the thought needed to really think through a decision like this is very high and I don't know if it is worth thinking about now.  Still it is what I thought about as we drove home on the Friday.

So an interesting trip with lots of food for thought.  Daughter seemed to have a nice time - she did some work for her fast-approaching return to University, did lots of exercise, ate and slept well . . . So not a bad trip at all.

My next triathlon!

I have signed up for my second triathlon, taking place just three weeks after my first.  This one is in Highworth, where we cycled to in my first one.  I am intending that my training be much better this time  I am going to the swimming pool each morning at 6:30 and doing an hour or so.  Much of this is still based around learning to swim front crawl.  Indeed I am now doing alternate lengths of breast stroke then front crawl, so progress continues.

Then at some point in the morning, I am doing a second event.  Yesterday I rode 40km in about 80 minutes.  Today is was a 5 km run.  The run is still a bit of a problem as I still have some muscle pain in my left calf which comes on at about the 3 km point.  I had been resting the calf for the last few days, but the pain occurred again today.

I am off to France for a few days on Sunday and will be swimming and running there, with a view of finishing training on Thursday before the event on the following Sunday.  The website for the event has posted the cycle and run routes plus loads of other information.  My target time is 1 hour 40 this time, but it depends on how hilly the cycle ride is and whether my calf holds out on the run 

Then I shall be moving into just winter training until maybe my first event of 2014 around March.

I am even thinking of getting a new bike next spring (I could take my current one to France maybe, as it would be great to ride there)

Learning to swim front crawl properly

My fitness goal for the next 12 months is to do an Olympic-length triathlon with an outdoor swim , where I do the entire swim using front crawl.  But one obstacle to this is that I can't actually swim front crawl.  I learnt to swim at a swimming club when I was about seven, but just as I was about to move onto learning front crawl, the swimming club's evening switched and it clashed with cubs.  The choice was clear - cubs it was!

(In fact I rather enjoyed cubs and scouts.  I played football for my troop, went camping every year where I once got hit on the head with a horseshoe, performed in 3 Gang shows including several solo and duet pieces, once hit the troop flag on a clock in a church . . . . )

For the moment I have been trying to teach myself crawl by watching videos on Youtube and practicing what I've seen as part of my morning swim at Faringdon.  I swim part of a length in my usual breast stroke and then finish the length in front crawl.  Progress has been slow but there has definitely been progress.  My main issue has been that I'm taking on water into my mouth at some point in my stroke and that this is throwing out my breathing.  I am also very unbalanced in the water

One big leap forward was when I tried to really slow the stroke down.  This produced an immediate improvement in my balance.  Next, I realised that I wasn't rotating properly to my left side and this was both affecting my left arm movement and was slowing down my rotation towards taking a breath to my right.  Maybe I should breath every three strokes (i.e. alternate side).  Some people in the pool's fast lane do that.  But for the moment, I am sticking to right-sided breath every two strokes. 

So I am constantly critiquing my efforts, trying little changes, and gradually I have been improving.  First I could do just 4 or 6 strokes before I come spluttering to the surface, then 8 to 10.  Gradually getting things better each day.

Finally, today there was an important milestone passed as I managed to swim one complete length of the pool (25m) without any breathing issues or balance issues, or taking on water.  True I did struggle to do a second length, but nonetheless, this is definitely progress. 

I can now swim 1/32nd of the required distance using front crawl.

Katie Jane Garside

Some years ago I had the pleasure of seeing Queen Adreena play a show - I think it was at the Zodiac in Oxford.  I have been a great fan of Katie Jane Garside's work since the far-off days of Daisy Chainsaw.  Recent listening has included the truly-great DC Peel session (1988?) and the Queen Adreena live at the ICA album. 

Most recently, I have been listening to her work in Ruby Throat.  She really is the most singular talent!

Procrastination - reading old press cuttings

This week is supposed to be about completing a long to-do list of things, but having written down the detailed list, I am struggling to tick them off.  One or two things get done each day, then I rather stop. 

In these large gaps, I have been reading some old press cuttings.  At the end of my desk, there is a pile of everything that I have cut out of papers in the last year or two.  My current reading is a batch of articles linked to the Swedish-Danish series, The Bridge.  Lots of articles about women with Asperger's.

I am also listening to Gideon Coe's Shedcast radio show.  Just after the half way point in the show, he has played Artery's Into the garden, a song I remember well from years ago on John Peel, where he described it as one of the most erotic songs he had ever heard, though he didn't know what he meant by that.

We are considering watching the US version of The Bridge - I am in two minds.  I would prefer to see the original again instead.

My first triathlon

Back from Italy just in time to compete in my first ever triathlon!

I found out about the Faringdon triathlon this time last year when it was using the pool on a day I had intended to swim.  This time last year I was still recovering from the knee problem I'd had all summer, so to compete in the 2013 event became my fitness goal.  I also felt it would be a good challenge on passing 50 years old earlier this year.

So off out of the house before 7:00 for registration.  I had little or no idea what was going on when I arrive and didn't have a clue what I was supposed to do with the transponder they gave me when I registered but things gradually began to come together, especially once I got talking to the guy next to me in the transition area who was doing his third event and was 7 years older than me.

And I have to say, it was actually really exciting getting ready with everyone.  There were clearly some very serious triathletes there, with some very expensive bikes and excellent other kit.  But then again, there were some very overweight people who planned to ride mountain bikes.  I was struck by how friendly it all was.  Probably 90% of the people there were there just to finish or were racing their own best times. 

So I was in the second block of 16 swimmers, setting off about 20 minutes after the first group.  I had thought this part would be very easy but I felt slightly intimidated by the speed of the people who set off with me and I went too fast at the start.  But once in a decent rhythm it was ok. 

The bike ride turned out to be much tougher than I had expected with a really hilly route down to Highworth that had three decent sized hills on it.  Coming back, the third hill was absolute murder, with some riders pushing their bikes up it.  I did pass quite a few people though during the ride (and was passed by one)  But once over this, I actually felt quite good as I finished the ride.

The first bit of the run was very poor, as the familiar "jelly legged" post cycling feeling occurred.  But things gradually improved as the run continued, until the last kilometre or so when I started to get cramp in my left calf.  I slowed down quite a lot in the last bit, though I did raise my pace as I came to the finish line.  I don't thnk I've ever been cheered by a crowd at a finish line before.

My time?  1 hour 44 minutes exactly.  11 mins for the swim, 50 mins for the bike ride, 40 mins for the run and 3 mins in transition.  Probably the run was the most disappointing as I had hoped to be sub-35 mins for that. 

So from here I am keen to do another one over the winter somewhere and then try and do the next distance up next year.

A really excellent event - really well organised by the gym

Stranded in Genoa

Tuesday

After dropping off Wife and Daughter at Pisa airport for their flight home, I was making steady progress on my drive home.  My target for the first night was somewhere north of Genoa, with a view of having an early start the next day and diverting to Chamonix for a few hours the next morning.

But around 5:30, just north of Genoa, the car seems to be losing power going up hill.  This got progressively worse and then thick white smoke starts to pour out of the exhaust.  I was lucky to be able to limp into a service station.  A few exploratory phone calls later, and I have managed to arrange for someone from the Italian equivalent of the AA to come and collect the car and take it to a garage back in Genoa.  By 8:00, I have even found a hotel just up the road from the garage and am booked in for a night - but I won't find out until tomorrow what the problem is - I hope it is just a blown exhaust.

Wednesday

Back to the garage late morning for some bad news.  It is not the exhaust but the "turbo compressor" that has broken.  They can get the part but not until tomorrow, and then it might take them well into Friday to fit it.  Not good

So I have changed my ferry to early Saturday morning and have booked two more nights at the hotel. 

My actual location is the tiny town of Voltri just up the coast from Genoa.  My hotel actually backs onto rather a nice beach.  But I have decided to try and get something positive out of the forced stop by doing some planning for the winter renovation of Petits Chats.  So I stayed in most of the day and ate dinner at the hotel's restaurant - actually quite nice.

I also have Wife's laptop which has a few movies on it and there is broadband in the hotel so I can download some radio shows to listen to.  So quite a productive day in some sense.

Thursday

Back to the garage early afternoon for some better news.  The part has arrived earlier than expected and has been fitted.  But the exhaust system is full of oil and needs to be cleaned out.  This takes a few hours but I am on my way again by around 5:00, 18 hours earlier than expected. 

Total cost of the breakdown - about £2000!!

I make it to Chamonix around 9:00 but there are no rooms available in any of the cheap hotels as it is the Mont Blanc marathons this week.  So I slept in the car

Friday

I have time this morning to do some exercise - the last before my triathlon on Sunday.  My preparation has been terrible for this event.  Two long days driving and two nights when I will probably be sleeping in the car.  This will not leave me in the peak of condition for the race!

So today I take a walk for a couple of hours up the Chamonix valley through the forest.  I also have time to buy a few cheap pairs of trousers from one of the outdoor stores

I left Chamonix around 11:00am and drove all day to Calais arriving around 11:00pm to find a huge traffic jam at the ferry port.  Any hope of perhaps getting an earlier ferry had gone, so I slept five hours in Calais town centre in the car and got the 5:45 ferry.

Home two days late in the end

Holiday 2 - 8 days in Trasimeno

Day 1

Travel from C

Wife not well

Day 2

Running first thing - triathlon

Pool day in the sun - remember how tired we both are - no "proper" holiday all year

Trattoria Del Pescatore

Day 3

Meet D at Chiusi - il molo

Day 4-5

Thursday - Perugia

Friday - Del P

Saturday - Il Molo

Sunday to Firenze - Pizzeria - thunder storm

Monday to Cortona - Frances Mayes



Tuesday - departure