Day 53 – 57 at Massat then onto Bagneres de Luchon

The next four days I went back into work mode, so I’ll skip the boring details about which bugs I fixed and why I nearly threw my laptop down the hill. It’s a fantastic spot here. On a little hill overlooking the village with fantastic views of the mountain opposite. The town has one patisserie, one cave (wine cellar / shop), one hardware shop, a post office (with cashpoint), a tiny supermarket, and a hotel / bar. Oh and two churches!! In fact the other African guy (who’s “quite rude to the French”) is teaching a bunch of women singing in one of them. I often hear their voices rising on the air. They are really very, very good!

So come rain or shine I’m sat there in my mobile office environment working. I’m sure many of the people who see me there (often with my head in my hands) are wondering, why waste your whole holiday working?? Well I see it the other way; I need to get this done, and I’d much rather be doing it here than sat at home. Besides I don’t really see this as a holiday (not when I’m in work mode).

So I kind of got stuck here for 5 days in all. We had four days of terrible weather. Each time I made my mind up to move on it was bucketing it down, or when the weather was good I was making really good progress and didn’t want to interrupt my momentum.

The storm

On the second night there was a terrific storm. Lightening was all over the place. I was lovely and cosy in my landrover accommodation. Now I noticed something quite odd. When the flash of lightening lit up the interior, it was bright orange... not the blue white flash you normally associate with lightening. It was the colour of fire! Thankfully I wasn’t actually on fire. Rather than trust my life to my homemade electric system I installed an expensive smoke (carbon dioxide) detector with carbon monoxide detection also (faulty log burners can give off carbon monoxide which is far more dangerous than smoke). When it goes off, it screams in a very, very loud and very posh voice “Carbon monoxide, Carbon monoxide detected... you are in danger!!!”. If it ever actually went off in the night just inches above my head I’d most certainly die of a heart attack. Suffice it to say... I was sure I hadn’t been struck by lightning.

Me and Christian (the Ghanaian guy) have become really good friends. He lives here in the old gypsy caravan with his dog Ben. He makes everyone feel very welcome. As well as making his own Cider he also makes Apple juice, Jam from some kind of berries (I got one of each as a present), and he collects and dries out some kind of leaves and makes tea from them (not THOSE kind of leaves!!).

The huge mountain opposite (the very same one I got stuck on the top of earlier), is green, covered in trees and dotted with tiny houses (oh to own a place there!) and often the top disappears in the clouds. Most of the people who come here in the summer are either walkers, mountain bikers or kayaker’s... (with a small minority of internet nerds who just sit there working! ;-) ...weirdos!)

The Cider ritual

Each day when I pay for ‘yet another night’, Christain says... “Would you like to take a seat?”. This is an invitation to drink more Cider. The writing out of my receipt... “one car... large tent... electric.. how many people again? Oh yes... just one...” is a complicated affair, but really we both know, it’s an excuse to drink lots of Cider! At the end of a working day it’s just what I need to help me forget about stuff.

The Bird, the Cat and the Cassoulet

Now a cat has taken to entering my abode in the middle of the night. No sooner do I get off to sleep (he must lie in wait for the light to go out or my snoring to start) he / she enters between the wheels (I haven’t deployed my wind flap as it’s not actually that cold). The first night this happened I was awoken by a right old commotion below. I stuck my head over the edge and saw a very guilty looking cat looking up at me. I shooed him away and went back to sleep. The next morning when I went down I realised I left my unopened tin of Cassoulet on the side. He knocked it over and tried to get it out. He didn’t get much, I must have given him quite a scare as when I move about the whole car rocks on its springs. Now that next day was raining solid, I didn’t want to leave the cozy warm and dry accommodation in search of food, so I had to eat the cats leftovers. I heated it up first... that kills cat germs right?

Now the bird... luckily they both weren’t in here at the same time! On my last day a tiny robin had also entered via the same route and after doing a poo on my pillow, was flapping around trying to find a way out. When I realised what had happened I quickly jumped up and out, into the rain... opening all the Velcro flaps to try and let it out. Eventually as I stood there barefoot in the mud in just my boxers getting soaked holding a flap of canvas, he flew out... “Bonjour” I said to my French neighbours who were already up and about and regarding me suspiciously. It was actually 8am and time to get to up anyway, and while I was at it, get dressed too!

Cheap wine

Now I love red wine. I’m no snob about it. I can always find a bottle I like under £5 and occasionally under £4. And only a fool tries to impress his peers but spending good money on fine wines when a cheap one will do. That’s always been my philosophy and I still think in the large part it holds true. The cheap new world wines we get in the UK are pretty good. However.... in France you can buy wine even cheaper, but mark my words its best not too. A wine taster in South Africa once said to me, there is no such thing as good wines and bad wines, just those you like and those you don’t. It seemed to me like very sound, non-pompous advice, coming from a world dominated by the pompous. However few would argue that very acidic tasting wines (ie vinegar-like) are not good, irrespective of your taste. Now only on 3 occasions have I tasted wine like this, and two of those times were in France. I just bought a 9 euro ‘box’ of cabernet sauvignon (3 litres) and had to throw it away. It was that unpalatable.

Saw tooth baby

There is this French family on the campsite with a very young baby. Babies aren’t my thing but I would suggest it’s about 6 months old. Now it makes a noise which is unlike anything I’ve ever heard coming from a human being before. It happens in short sharp bursts. It’s difficult to imagine how a person has the vocal equipment to make a noise like this. Now I’m fairly sure that it does it when it’s happy, I suppose is a laugh but can’t be sure. For those that know what a saw-tooth wave is... well that’s the noise! It penetrates you in a way that makes you cringe in the way someone scratching their nails down a blackboard does, however this noise is more like high speed industrial machinery. And it seems no amount of foliage, canvas, wall, rock or mountain will stop it. The name ‘Saw tooth’ comes from the fact that the shape of the sound wave looks like the jagged triangular teeth of a wood saw. Maybe it’s no coincidence that its effect on your aural equipment is similar to a wood saw cutting through your cranium! It’s probably the most disturbing noise I’ve heard a human make. What must they have thought the first time it did it? I would have taken it back to the hospital and got them to exchange it.

Dirty protest

Any lingering thoughts I had of setting up a campsite in France vanished today when I saw someone had made a dirty protest in the toilets. In England your enemy would usually either invite you to step outside or he’d shut up. Not smear his merdes on your toilet wall knowing that by the time you realised he’d be tucked up in bed with his coco many miles away. I think something like this is the most cowardly thing someone can do. I don’t tolerate people that do stuff like this. Thankfully I’ve met precious few of them. I’m pretty sure I know who did it too. Christian has had an ongoing battle with a group of teenagers who play ball all day long on a tarmacked court just below the campsite. I never noticed until he mentioned it, but once he did, I could hear it all day long... bounce... bounce... bounce! I can see why it was driving him to distraction. The rights and wrongs aside, he tried to make peace with them by inviting them to the campsite one night, offering them some of his Cider and making a compromise. I was impressed with his diplomatic efforts. The next day I noticed this in the toilets. If it were me diplomacy would go out the window... I’d hang them upside down and open their veins with a rusty implement.

Christian next to a tepee – When I took the picture I didn’t notice the tiny woman climbing up the side

The teepees

Christian is very proud of his campsite. Although it’s a municipal site (ie. owned by the government), he has styled it in his own very unique bohemian way. At one end he has three authentic teepees which each sleep about 8 people. Although it’s possible to light a fire inside the tepee (the canvas isn’t pulled to a point so the smoke can go out through the top) the government don’t allow it. There is an undercover ‘outdoor’ kitchen area for communal cooking. It costs 20 euros / night to use the teepees plus 5 euro per person. Now that those that haven’t figured it out, that makes for a very cheap holiday abroad for a long weekend. Ryan air / Easyjet to Toulouse for £30 return, hire a car or get train to St. Girone (+ hire mountain bikes here), taxi / bus / car to Massat, sleep in in a teepee and mountains right on your doorstep.

Loophole in the law

The day before I left, as I sat there deep in concentration... blood oozing from my eyes and ears... a guy walks over; “can I please take a look at your vehicle?”, “of course you can” I said. God knows I was glad for a break, all this concentration is starting to hurt. I’d seen this guy around... “I thought you were French” I said. “Well half and half really.... born and raised in Essex don’t you know... now live in France with my lovely wife”. Don’t talk like anyone I ever met from Essex I thought with a wry smile. To his credit though he had something of an Engineering mind and was very impressed with my efforts. He told me so. And so did his wife, who was also there. And he was dead right, she was ‘rather lovely’. He also pointed out that if I ever did get pulled by the French gendarmes in contravention of the ‘not paying duty on fuel’ law, there is a loophole in ‘European’ law that makes it legal. Would I dare invoke it though?... “Well this guy I met on a campsite told me....”... Hmmm!

I promised a Friend some more pics of the camper, so here it is in the stages of packing up

Before

Loosen Velcro

Flatten roof, with ‘upright struts’ inside

Fold over ‘back strut’ on top

Fold the remaining flaps on top

Put the cover on

Escape

Finally on Monday 26th July, there was a slight break in the weather. I had come to a natural break in my work. I packed up early, did the dishes, said goodbye to Christian and Ben and made a run for it; to ‘Bagneres de Luchon’ to be precise. It was a place that Sarah from Narbonne Plage had recommended. Its dead center in the Pyrenees; about equal distance from either west or east coast. A ski town in winter and a summer sports town in summer. A very pretty place with lots of tourists and a campsite just 1Km walk from the centre. A campsite with Wifi internet!!! It is here, as I sit now, about 7:30pm that I update the blog.

Day 52 – Massat

This morning the festy shirt came out of summer retirement. It is cold again up here and it has been raining again. In fact the climate here in the mountains is very much similar to the UK. Also last night back in Foix I left the windows of the landrover open overnight and it seems to have made everything damp. I’m surprised as the bottom is always open and the damp air can blow in between the wheels, however this doesn’t make things damp. I’m not sure why. Maybe because the air has nowhere to go it tends not to blow in. With the windows open, a circular path can be set up.

Bumping into the Ghanaian guy this morning (must remember to ask his name) I asked if I could buy 3 bottles of his excellent cider. “A present for my buddys back home” I explained. He sold me 3 for a 10 euros. Bargain!

Me and Christain at the teepee kitchen aread

I spent the morning writing more blog... (I am really enjoying it) before stopping for lunch. Lunch was Cassoulet with more confit of duck.

Confit of duck

Now beans and sausage aside, ‘confit of duck’ is really worth trying for those that haven’t. The French unlike us dull Brits are really adventurous when it comes to food. Ours tends to come in just 4 flavours; beef, chicken, pork and lamb. Why? When there is a whole gastronomic world of adventure out there? The French each a lot of duck (or ‘Canard’). More in fact than chicken. Now duck is a fatty, red meat, a little like lamb. Very tasty. As a kid I was never a fan of fatty meat... it made me cringe! As an adult I realised that the fat is where all the flavour is stored. You don’t have to eat the fat but it releases a lot of flavour during cooking. Some of that flavour is re-absorbed by the meat, and if you’re careful to use the juices, you can use that flavour in the gravy or sauce. Confit of duck has been slow cooked so that the meat is falling away from the bone, but then the whole thing is immersed and preserved in the fat from the cooking process and sealed in a tin so it can be eaten years later with no loss of flavour. It is cheap, tasty and convenient in a way to this day not achieved by any ready meal I ever ate!

Today has been a work day. Updating the blog this morning and software development this afternoon. I feel the blog went well but the afternoon work didn’t go well at all. It’s been too long since I did any development on this project and it took me hours to find my feet again by which time I was mentally exhausted. It doesn’t do to lose momentum. I might have to give the blog a rest again for a few days while I focus on it... Early start tomorrow I think!

Day 51 – Somewhere in the mountains – Massat I think

This morning I headed into a mountain valley just south of Foix. One of the estate agents I spoke to had a property for sale there. This house was on at 260,000 euro but the prices seem for more speculative than in the UK. I didn’t really want to waste the estate agents time, as at this stage I’m really just fact finding and seeing what you can get for your money. I suggested I drive there myself and look around the outside before getting them to come along a second time. I didn’t have an exact address but just general directions and a picture. So I was quite surprised not only to find it half way up a mountain track, but as I pulled up, the owner was outside just saying goodbye to what I assume were other potential buyers. He welcome me and invited me in to look around. He spoke no English whatsoever so we made do in my French.



Now this place was brand new. Built of natural stone and oak on a mountainside about half a kilometre from the nearest village on a plot of about 2000 m². It’s almost ideal. The only issue is it didn’t have a garage (ie. Workshop) and I need a big one. Is the kind of thing I want but I don’t want it built for me. I’d rather buy the land and do it myself or buy an old one cheap and renovate it. This place was new and polished and the views were awesome.





Business done I headed back out of the valley. I stopped at Aldi’s to pick up some more oil when disaster struck. I got out of the car and shut the door and it just bounced back open. Taking a closer look I realised that the aluminium strut that the locking catch bolts onto had become torn. I know how this happened, often as I jump into the land rover my belt gets hooked onto the catch and yanks it. Eventually it tore. It is only aluminium. Now this wouldn’t be such a disaster if, a few weeks ago the actual lock barrel on the passenger side door hadn’t completely dropped out of the door. Since this happened I can only lock the passenger side from the inside. But now I can’t even close the driver side door except from the inside (by holding the catch in place). The passenger seat and foot-well is a storage area for much of my stuff so I cannot climb across. So now I either leave the door OPEN or climb out through the back. I can only climb out through the back if I’ve set up camp and so the back isn’t full of stuff. The long and short of it... If I drive into town, I have to leave the door open!.. unless I’ve put the tent up and the back is clear... clear?... yeah... like mud!

So facing the prospect of shortening my trip (not just this... money reasons too) I headed west from Foix, taking the scenic route to St. Giron. Now ‘scenic’ it definitely was, ‘steep’ was another way of describing it. Only 57 Km to St. Giron but when you are averaging 20 Km / hour in second gear that is a very long way. The shear 500m drops, first on the left... then on the right, combined with a large drainage ditch on the other side and many hair pin bends where you couldn’t see what was coming around the corner, means you couldn’t take your eyes off the road for a second, not even to admire the views. Neither was the slope shallow enough to provide for the odd viewpoint where you could pull over.

The big problem

Now this is a Land rover, it has a huge amount of torque but it is also carrying a lot of weight. A 2 ton car, with 2 tanks of fuel (plus a case load of oil from Lidl’s), a 20 Ltr water tank, a log burner, food, wine, fridge, quite a bit of ply wood (in the interior and bedroom) and a leisure battery and gas tank. This is not a car... it is a small house. By the time it struggled to the top of the mountain, steam was starting to appear from under the bonnet. I literally just reached the pass and pulled over as the engine let go and emitted something akin to a mushroom cloud of steam.



“What a fantastic place to break down!!”. The views are incredible; you can see the plateau forming the base of the really high mountains in Andora. A faint line drawing the distinction between land and sky, but not down there... up really high about 80Km distant and on a level with my eye. 80Kms of Earths surface seems to have done nothing to diminish the height of those mountains! ‘Col du port’ is the name of the pass here.

There are quite a few cars and motor homes up here and in no time a crowd had gathered around my steaming car. There was much scratching of chins and agreement of “c’est grande problem”. I sat down and consulted my cheese and olives for inspiration while taking in the view. I would be quite happy to set up camp here only the last time I camped on a mountain top the wind blew my tent right off the edge, almost with me in it... in the middle of the night... I was butt naked! I still have a small scar to remind me of that night.

Don’t worry... the universe is cool

Now I’m quite philosophical about situations like this. Everything happens for a reason I believe even if it is not immediately obvious. The Desiderata says something about “the universe unfolding the way it should” and to accept everything that comes your way. I believe this to be true. The mysterious plan the universe had in store for me was still a secret. But I’m beginning to wonder if it’s not something to do with the blog. The story certainly seems to be writing itself with little or no help from me. So much happens that is write-worthy the only problem I have is deciding what to throw away, and believe me, it’s quite a lot.

As I sit there my fear of being stranded on a mountaintop is re-affirmed by an approaching storm. I could hear thunder getting closer... with each clap it seemed to get considerably louder and the sky is darkening all around. What’s the chances of getting struck by lightning on the very peak of the highest mountain around in a metal box?

The gloaters

One of the gathered gloaters asked me where I lived, “Angleterre” I said. “Huh? Angleterre??? Sacrea bleu!! C’est TRES grande problem!!”. “Oui... Oui”, everyone agreed that this made the problem considerably worse, while giving me a look that suggests I’m really up shit creak. Thanks to all those concerned for the moral support and offers of help!

Now I wasn’t overly concerned... yet! I knew the land rover had a small split in the overflow tank and it tended to leak steam under high pressure occasionally! It happened once on a very small scale. This time though there was a huge amount of steam and water pouring out from underneath and so far I hadn’t opened the bonnet for fear of getting my face burnt off. The reason I bought a Land rover Defender is because 75% of all those ever made are still on the road. They have been making them since 1950! This says something about the ruggedness of the vehicle. The engine is unlikely to cease the first time it overheats... unlike that piece of merde they call the Vauxhall combo van (I only owned it for 2 days!).

Now by the time the engine had cooled down a bit I was almost out of cheese and olives and was slightly anxious that this didn’t turn into a double tragedy. I remembered a trick Sean suggested; heat up a spoon and melt the side of the tank to close the split. Trouble was it was so windy up there it was difficult to get my teaspoon really hot with the wind blowing the flame around. I did my best... I certainly didn’t make it any worse (the engine that is... my future cups of tea on the other hand might need work)... I poured in 6 Ltrs of water from my leisure tank and resolved to keep a close eye on it. I keyed the ignition and was rewarded by the familiar clanky old rattle, that was the engines way of saying “...had ya! I’m just kidding you around... nothing is seriously wrong.... now go tell those French gloaters to go buy a Land rover with a big union jack on the back!!”

All the same I decided to take the road of least ascent from here on, at least for a while. I borrowed a Dutch ladies map to check there were no more serious peaks from here to St. Giron. There didn’t seem to be any.

Best give the old steed a rest

A few kilometres on from the pass and back down in the valley I came across the small village of Massat (or something like that). It’s not on my map. Anyway there is a municipal campsite signposted and it’s just on the edge of the village on a small hill. ‘Great’ I thought, it gives me time to check the car over. I setup camp close to a line of trees for shade. It’s a really lovely spot with great views of the mountains opposite. Hmmm cheap too. I could stay here a couple of days I reckon. No sooner had I finished setting up than the campsite director came over. He was smiling (a good sign). “I like your Land rover” he said slowly in English.



He was a thin, intelligent looking man with a walking stick, about late forties I’d reckon. I liked him instantly. Not because he likes landrovers, although that is a good sign, but because his lined face looked like it had a thousand stories to tell. Maybe that or maybe because he reminded me a little of an old mate called Ade. I’d also like to think that he would remind me of me, in a few years time... maybe if I laid off the sausages.

“Merci” I said. He was from Ghana. “I’ve seen these in the Sahara”, he said. “Yes I’ve heard”. They use them a lot in Morocco. I apparently did not invent the roof tent :-( You need a tough 4x4 in the sand and the landrovers are simple enough to fix if they go wrong. Let’s face it, in the dessert, if you can’t fix it, you’re probably gonna die! “I designed this myself”, I said.

So while we did the business of paying for the site he invited me to sit at a small terrace behind the municipal reception office. A Dutch guy was also sitting there waiting to pay. “Would you both like to try my homemade cider?” he asks. “Oui... of course”... that would be very agreeable to the both of us. This is not the kind of treatment I am used to. I have noticed however that the hospitality of those from African decent really knows no bounds. So we sat there drinking cider while listening to ambient African music. It was very chilled.

He did the Dutch guy first. Now they have quite a complicated pay structure on most of these campsites. It’s something like;

cost of place +

cost of camping-car (motor home) OR cost of tents +

cost of adults / children +

cost of electric (if required) +

cost of car (if accompanying a tent) +

animals (if you have any) +

tax

Suffice it to say you never quite know how much you’re paying till they tell you, especially if you have an unusual setup like me. I am often amused when they ask; “Do you ‘ave a dog?”.... “Do I need one?” I usually reply. An additional complication is that this campsite has different costs depending on the size of your tent.

“So.. ‘ow would you describe it”.. he says to me, pointing to the landrover. “A car + small tent” I said (naturally, it’s the slightly cheaper option). “Hmmm” he muses, at which point another older African guy walks over. This guy is another one of the tenants and speaks perfect English with an English accent. His voice reminds me of some of those I’ve heard narrating documentaries. “I’m quite rude to the French he says... I remind them that the whole world talks English now”. He is actually French himself but was educated in England. “So”, the other guy says to him “ ’ow would you describe it”, “what?” he says, “..it... what is over there...” he says again pointing. “What? I can’t see it” he says again, “it... what is next to your tent” he says.... “...ooo la la!” the other guy exclaims. So it is generally agreed in all good nature that we need an ‘oo la la’ category within the payment structure. I suggested it should be cheap on the grounds of encouraging ingenuity.

Indians are here in their tee-pees

From here on the conversation moves to the Ghanaian football team and their recent success in the world cup, moving to France and considerations thereof and women (and where to find the best ones). They then asked for a closer look at the Land rover. They marvelled at the log burner and the huge box of oil I had bought for fuel. I explained that I have two tanks, a small one with diesel in, and the main one for oil and / or diesel, whatever I can find really. The Ghanaian guy laughs pointing to my bottles of wine and said something in French.... I couldn’t translate but it was instantly obvious what he meant; “...and this is fuel for you??!!!”. And that, I found really funny!

Gypsies too??! Actually this is where the Ghanaian guy rests

A question of sexuality

At this point the other guy looking up at my bedroom area says, “Is there room for a woman up there too?”. Now I find it’s often important to lightly address the subject of sexuality when in the company of men you don’t know, just so everyone knows where you stand and so that you know which side of the fence they are on. The last thing anyone wants to do is cause offence by an ill-placed remark or joke, or give any false impressions. “But of course....” I said, in a tone which suggested that although I travel alone I’m not terribly happy about going to bed each night on my own... “... a short one!” I added. “One taller than me will require modification of the vehicle”.

This guy seemed impressed enough with the Land rover to come back later with his camera. I was impressed enough with the easy going hospitality that I’m starting to think my next trip will be to North Africa. Indeed as I sit here I’m wondering if the universe’s secret plan is conspiring to send me there.

Now the other guy pointed out that its illegal in France (like England) to pour new veg oil (meant for cooking) into your tank because fuel duty has not been paid. And I’ve put a sign on the back of my vehicle telling people why they can smell chips!! As the Ghanaian guy pointed out, luckily I included the word “dechette”, ie. Waste. I believe if you’re recycling waste then it’s not counted as fuel. As well to remember though, if I get pulled by the police for a blinker not working, steam coming out the front, door hanging off, something on the roofrack flapping, best not let them see my boxes of cooking oil from Lidl’s. That would be a double tragedy. I supposed I could always say, like I said to the girl in Lidl’s at Rodez... “I really like chips!!”

Day 50 – Back at the campsite in Foix, again!

Early the next morning I was up, at 7. I wanted to pay and be out before the rush. Now that the tour was over I imagined everyone wanting to leave at once. I still had a 30Km drive back to Foix before my appointment at 10, and I was hoping to get breakfast first.

So get back in plenty of time I did, got the car parked and sat at a cafe in the centre of Foix with a croque monsuir for breakfast.

’Cafe avec cream’

Now the ‘cafe au lait’ I usually ask for means ‘coffee of milk’. They use hot milk instead of water. I think we call it a laté. Often they use so little coffee it’s more like hot milk. More suitable for bedtime than first thing in the morning! Now if you ask for ‘cafe avec crème’ (coffee with crème), sometimes that’s interpreted as a cafe au lait, but most of the time you get something more akin to an Americano, made with water and a little cream added. Just the ‘billet’ for first thing!

The houses

The first place

The agents took me to see two houses. The first was on a 199,000 euro. About a 20 minute drive from Foix and an appreciable distance up a very steep mountain track. The old lady that lived there with her husband and 5 dogs said indignantly “I don’t want to move but my husband insists!!”. The views of the valley below stupefied me for a bit. The garden was very steep... probably a 20-25% incline. It could certainly benefit from some terracing or decking. It was a large single story building of stone with two bedrooms only curiously she was very reluctant to open the door to the second bedroom. Clearly she had murdered her husband in the dispute and was probably in the process of chopping up his body.

The garden

Anyway there were 3 outbuilding; a large wood store, a garage / workshop split in two with the back half used as a wine store (the French call it a ‘cave’), and another wooden shed converted into a large bedroom complete with on-suite. It was actually a much nicer bedroom than the others in the house!

The second place

One of the out-building

The main house

The second place, was just outside another village in the area on the lower mountain slopes (where it wasn’t so steep). This one was on at 160,000 euro. It was absolutely great! The only problem was the garden along with 2 large stone out buildings (both ideal for large workshops) was separated from the house by a small road. The house is actually two attached 3 story stone houses with oak beams knocked into one. Very solid and nice looking from the outside. Inside however... I have never seen such a constrast. It was like being transported back to Victorian times. No kidding, there was mixture of carpet and hideous old patterned wallpaper on the walls every doorway or opening was draped with some kind of old rotting stained fabric in place of a door. The tiny kitchen had no oven or fridge, or place to put one, and more resembled a tiled wet room than anything else. It was simply unusable as a kitchen and half the size of anything I’d ever seen.


Now if I were to take on this house, I would make them an offer of about 120,000 or less, which they probably would except. The French buyers seem to have an astonishing lack of vision when presented with something like this. Maybe the profusion of ‘Grand Designs’ type programs in the UK has shown us Brits the locked up potential in places like this. Next, I would gut it... completely! All the internal stud walls, all the museum piece wiring and switches, all the lumpy plastering (on purpose made to look like a ski mogul field – For the non skiers this is a field of man made lumps to provide a technical ski challenge), all the pipe-work, everything. This double house would benefit half the number of rooms made larger than it actually has. I would even go so far as to enlargen the hole in the supporting stone central wall to make it more open plan-like.


Now as if this place wasn’t already a bargain when we got back to the office they showed me something which took my breath away. This house comes with so much land you would simply lose track of it all; 52,000 m² in about 40 odd separate parcels, scattered all over the mountain. On one piece is an old barn that is also possible to renovate!



Once my business here was concluded I went back to the ‘camping du lac’. They have free WiFi there and I decided to spend the rest of the day uploading the blog. I didn’t realise this before but some campsites have WiFi that is free but you still need to register your email address before the browser works and often as the online instructions are only in French it’s difficult to understand what to do. However with the help of my friendly German neighbours the other day I figure it out. So today about 2 weeks of blog got uploaded. That should keep you all busy for a bit.
Having done my massive dump on the blog (as I’m sure a Dutch person might put it ;-) I went down to the river to relax a bit. This is the second time I’ve come back to this place but neither time before did I really have time to enjoy the lake. And what an absolutely beautiful lake it is too. The sun is low in the sky and shining on the water at an oblique angle in such a way that it highlights all the dust and insects and general bits and bobs of nature floating on the surface. Wow!

This is my favourite picture to date

The clear water close to the bank is emitting bubbles from small holes in the silt. The homes of some small fresh water creatures I guess, and the quacks and squeaks of the various birds over the other side are carried effortlessly across the surface.

Sitting there on the bank staring at the water I seem to have slipped into some kind of trance like state. I’ve no idea how long for. A couple of hours at least. It’s not at all dull, on the contrary, it is fascinating... just sitting there staring at the water... exploring the possibilities in my head. Not for the first time I found myself thinking about the beautiful places and wondering just how far-flung they are in the universe.



Eventually I called a halt to my astral excursions and went home to cook dinner... the last thing I need is to start levitating out across the water! As I was walking back I noticed a bright blue Damsen fly sat on my shoulder.... probably thought to himself, ‘I’ll give my wings a rest and hitch a ride on this human’. It certainly seemed in no rush to be anywhere... so we went back together.

An hour or so later as it as getting dark, I was back at camp, with my table out preparing herbs for my dinner with half a bottle Fitou already concealed in my inner person. It struck me what a pleasant place this is. Everyone is in their own little plot with their table and chairs out, all close to each other, but all going about their business, quietly and respectfully... reading books, cooking, snoozing, star gazing, and occasionally saying ‘bonsoir’ or ‘bon apetite’ to each other. The lake seems to have had a calming, almost hippy like effect on me! Best put some punk music on loud eh?! ;-)

Day 49 – Ax-les-Thermes – Day of the tour

[Again I've uploaded a huge amount here.. again I haven't had internet in ages, so if you want to catch up start reading at day 30-35]

This morning I moved the camper onto a place with electric. I saved myself about 6 euro by using the charge in the batteries. Plus these two Danish guys pitched their tent so close to mine I could reach out my window and touch their tent, this given that the next two tents were about 20m in each direction. They seemed friendly enough but I was mildly annoyed and moved my table and chair to the other side of the car so I could have some privacy eating my dinner. Have they abolished personal space in Denmark?

A lot of people have come across from the Spanish border in Spanish cars but they are from all over. In fact this is the only time in France I’ve noticed the numbers of tourists roughly equalling the French. English, Irish, Australians, Norwegians and Americans are all heavily represented though interestingly far less Germans than normal. Most people have come here specifically for the tour. I would be trying to avoid it but eventually gave up and went with the flow. My Dad would call me a heathen for saying that!



So I walked into town along yet another the river. The road was heavily congested with people pulled over on the side and cyclists on the road. The town can’t accommodate a fraction of the number of cars and motor homes so people park along the roadside for mile upon mile.

So I got to a bar in town by about 12, and had a beer and waited. Now the cyclists are due to pass through about 4pm. They close the roads between 2pm and 7pm. There are only about 200 people in the tour but everywhere there are wannabe professional cyclists in their bright coloured branded Lycra. Maybe five thousand odd!

Talking Glaswegian

While I was sat there two guys from Glasgow who heard me speaking English beckoned me over. They had driven over to see the tour and they explained to me how it works. My Glaswegian isn’t great and I struggled to understand what they were saying... and quite honestly I wasn’t terribly interested in the tour, I really wanted to know when they were going to open the roads and is there anywhere I could sit down, have a beer and watch them go passed... preferably with them stopping so I could take a picture... from my location of comfort? It seemed the answer to most of these questions was no! So more standing around in the sun and waiting was the order of the day.

ZZ Top

Now one of these guys was a freelance programmer, so we skirted the issue quite quickly. I don’t think either of us wanted to start geeking out. The other guy doesn’t do anything he was proud to tell me, but clearly is he quite skilled in the beard growing department. If he could play an instrument surely ZZ top would have a position for him.

Now they did tell me that the tour ends a few kilometres up the mountain at a place called Boscare. You can get the telecabin up there. Ax les Therme is at 720m altitude and Boscare is at 1400m. From here four more telecabins ascend to over 2000m during the ski season. The 5 kilomtere mountain road is packed with campers and motor homes. Everyone has been staking out their pitch over the last 48 hours. Now this isn’t the end of the whole tour. It’s broken into sections which do not connect up. The riders stay in hotels over night and are transported by their support team to the start of the next section, which from here is tomorrow in the village of Pamiers about 20Km down the road. I stopped there on the way to Foix but couldn’t find any of the 3 campsites in the area and eventually gave up. There are several teams that have riders from all over the place (ie. it’s not England v France etc). If you have the money and some experienced enough riders anyone can form a team, but there is a qualification process (I guess that rules me out).

Programmer cyclists from Bath

So I jumped in the telecabin and went to the top. Incidentally I was sharing the cabin with a group of guys from Bath. I recognised them, they were sitting on the table behind me back at the bar... and guess what? They are also software engineers! Moving on... it turns out they are also keen cyclists, and one of them came a cropper the day before and busted his shoulder. Judging by the number of ambulance crews on standby I think this is a common hazard.



Now if I thought there were lots of people down there, it’s nothing compared to up here! The cabin goes right over the finish line so I got some good pics of the setup. There are TV crews, ambulance crews, journalists, semi professional cyclists, people whipping up the crowd by throwing free stuff at them (I got a hat and some cold water but ignored the large number of packets of sweets that kept hitting me in the head), people driving around squirting cold mist from the backs of vehicles to keep everyone cool... but nowhere could I find the comfortable beer laden shady table with the good view and the sexy personal barmaid I so required.



I had however locate a pizza and some beer and a good view of the mountains, then consumed said items while taking in the view... now THATS what I’ve come to see!




Now it was still 2 hours before the riders were due through (due about 5pm at the top). Knowing how much the French like to wait around for stuff (I think it gives them an excuse to be lazy) I didn’t want to be stuck up here with thousands of other people all trying to get down the only telecabin the minute they finished. So I went back down and caught them early as they came through the town.

On the way down I got a good pic of Ax-les-thermes

The climax

They were going quite fast and I took some pictures... then I enjoyed a nice walk home along the river. Sorry there wasn’t more to report at the climax there.

You can just about make out the guy at the front. ‘Peloton’ I think they call him. I thought ‘Brrrian’ was a better name. (By the way you can click on the pics to expand them!)

Day 48 – Onto Ax-les-Thermes

Tour de France

Now my friendly German neighbours point out that the Tour du France is visiting the surrounding villages in the next few days and bring their book over with the published routes. On Sunday they are arriving in the Village of Ax-les-Thermes about 20 Kms south of here. Then they go west over the next few days. This is a big problem for me. I thought the tour was going west to east but it turns out they are going the same way as me. Also because I have an appointment on Monday to see the immoblier I can’t get ahead of them. When the tour is in town the roads are closed the whole day and the day before is often clogged with traffic as people stake out their places.



I’m not a massive fan of this kinda thing but if there’s lots of partying going on then that’s different. Since I have some time to kill I decided to watch the tour go through. I’ll make my way to Ax-les-Themes today while it is still possible and find a campsite with a good escape route so I can get back to Foix by 10am on Monday. Then I’ll waste a couple more days and let the tour get ahead of me before heading west a bit.

There are many caves in the area, here is a model of one of them

There is always something going on in rural France. If it’s not the Bastille Day fireworks or the tour du France, it’s some kind of music festival or something. One of my current favourite bands, ’Gossip’ was playing at a festival on the coast the day after I left. The French love to be entertained
!
Ax-les-Thermes is a vibrant if tiny ski town. I have to say not one I’m familiar with from British brochures. It has telecabins that rise up from the centre to the surrounding peaks many of which are over 2000 metres. The town itself is at 720 metres. It’s very much cooler today and it’s not just the rise in altitude. There is no sun at all and for the first time in ages I had to put my jumper on! This is good news as one shower a day will suffice.

Both of these are fine vehicles, although one is built purely for posing. You can tell by the lack of dirt of any description

The inside of the other vehicle; let’s face it, you wouldn’t bring your new girlfriend home if you lived here!

Day 47 – Foix and the surrounding area

Everyone on the campsite is very friendly and as usual the camper is causing quite a stir. I suppose I notice it less now I have gotten used to it and I’m far less self conscious than when I first started.

The politeness of the French

Now this is something I feel I should address, having pointed out a few negative aspects of French society this is something I should have mentioned a long time ago. One of the first things I noticed when I came here was how the vast majority of people you pass say ‘bonjour’. When you walk into a shop, everyone says hello, even the boy stacking the shelves. I noticed that it is something that is drummed into them from an early age. I have lost track of the number of times I have been overtaken on the motorway by a French car, with a snotty nosed kid in the back, face pressed up against the window, snot smeared everywhere, mouthing the word ‘bonjour’ as he passes. And if a complete stranger spies you eating your dinner they are liable to say ‘Bon appetite!’... To which you reply ‘merci’... with a mouth full of food. Of course none of this means they actually like you!!



Foix is a really lovely little town with a real Alpine feel. It looks and feels a little like Morzine (where they do the downhill ski championship... and where I learnt to ski) only on a much smaller scale. I had lunch in town and made an appointment with an immoblier to see some properties at 10am on Monday (its Friday today). I notice that prices are much cheaper here too. The average price of a plat du jour is 7 euro, compared to 12 in other parts.

Bloody dongle!

I also tried to find a spot where my internet dongle would work so I could upload all this new blog but there wasn’t one. I tried a hill over-looking the town but it didn’t even work there. The bloody thing is a waste of space. It hasn’t worked anywhere in 2 weeks and now the 30 day limit in which to use my internet time is about to expire. I paid 150 euro for it and barely got to use it. You can see why in the UK we have the ‘Office of Fair Trading’; they wouldn’t allow this obvious con. I don’t expect they have one in France. As my German neighbour said “of course it doesn’t work... this is France!”. Whereas the UK might not be the model of efficiency that Germany is, we are both light years ahead of the French in many respects and it seems we share the frustrations.

Property crash

I located a second immoblier in the town of Turascon. The lady there explained to me that over the last three years the prices have crashed here due to the aluminium industry closing down and 2000 odd people losing their jobs. Some people have panicked and it’s quite amazing what you can find on their books; A hotel for instance with 18 large bedrooms and a professionally fitted out kitchen for just 299,000 euro!! Also it doesn’t need to be run as a business. You could buy this and use it as your own private residence. Now I want to make an eco house... 18 bedrooms just for me (and any lucky lady I might persuade along) is a terrible waste. It’s a massive bargain for someone thou gh. I mean this crash will recover and that place one day will easily be worth a million.

Whoever is selling obviously needs the money now and must be selling at a massive loss. This does explain one thing though. If you say to the immoblier that your limit is 180,000 euro, the very first place they will show you has a tag of 250 odd. I think that’s how much their expecting the seller to potentially drop by.

So I drove around the surrounding area to get a feel for it. I really love it here. All things considered if I buy in France, this is probably the area. But of course I’ve yet to visit the Dordogne and Limoges. By the end of the day I ended back on the same campsite. Unlike last night though, this time I need electric as my batteries are dead. I was shocked at the price difference. 10 euro without; 22 euro with!! This is quite unusual and I didn’t really get a satisfactory answer as to why. In future if I remember to flick my override switch I can recharge my leisure battery while I’m driving around. Now every penny is counting quite heavily.

Day 46 – onto Castelnaudary, then Foix

With Bastille day out of the way it was time to move on. As I was packing up I noticed that one of the Alien UAV (Unmanned Ariel Vehicle) bugs had penetrated my force field (which is made of canvas). It was a curious looking beast... it wasn’t a beetle, it looked more like a locust without the big legs. This one was about 1.5 inches long. Right next to it was some kind of crinkly skin type thing. It wasn’t moving so believing it to be dead I picked it up by the wing. It objected most vigorously to this. Gave me hell of a fright. When it buzzes its wings its louder than a whole nest of bees. I realised that it had just shed is skin and was probably waiting for it wings to cure! Doh! I hope I didn’t damage it. It seems ok. I coaxed it into my boot and took it outside... after which it staggered about in a dazed like motion! (...joke). The funny thing is before I finished packing up I found a second skin of one of these things. Either it had been there long enough to shed its skin twice, or there was another one.

Photographic evidence of the alien UAVs

Well that explains at least one of the funny noises I’ve been hearing in the middle of the night. Another one was due to a hedgehog that actually comes into the camper at night and sleeps under my spare duvet which is on the floor in the corner. One night I awoke in the middle of the night to find the duvet moving and loud snuffling noises coming from underneath. Good to know that the camper has natures seal of approval.

So I said good bye to my Welsh biker neighbours and headed to Castelnaudary; a) because I liked the sound of the name and b) because all the really good pate type stuff has got Castelnaudray written on it. There wasn’t much there though and by this time I’m well out of the mountains so time to do a U-ey and turn south again towards the Pyrenees.

Gazole

After 20Km on a real back country road, I was almost out of oil and where the dregs were going through the fuel filter it was starting to judder. I switched to my secondary diesel tank but... its only 15 Ltrs and less than half full. Shit!.. How far to the next village? After another 5 Km I saw a sign 37Km!!! And I didn’t even know if there was a station de service! Or a Lidl’s for that matter. I wasn’t going to make it! So I turned around and drove all the way back to Castelnaudary. Note to self... think more... drive less!

Instruments of torture in a pharmacy window... I wanted pain killers, not pain inflicters!

Eventually I got Foix (pronounced ‘Fwah’); the largest town in the area and at 310m altitude its right at the base of the Pyrenees. Each mile south from here takes you higher into the mountains and the road goes all the way to Andora (about 75Km away). I always had in mind to use Foix as a base for my house hunting for the following reasons;

It’s at the base of the mountains, and I’m looking for somewhere with mountain views

It’s in the Ariege which is one of the cheapest areas

It’s close to the ski slopes of Andora

It’s a stunningly beautiful area, all in all I can’t understand why it’s cheap here at all

If you go east from here it gets expensive the closer to the sea you get, and if you go west towards Lourdes it also gets expensive because they are more geared up for tourism there.

Creative cooking

I found a campsite ‘Camping du Lac’ on the lake, about 2Kms before you reach the town. I set up camp and cooked myself duck hearts in garlic and butter with French beans, shallots and new potatoes. Cooking for me is like inventing stuff, if you’re adventurous enough, every now and then you create something which is such a massive success you can’t imagine why other people don’t do it. This was one of the aforementioned successes... the Landrover camper of fine cuisine if you like. Now it wasn’t my intention to create something exotic, it was basically stuff I had left over plus as part of a cost cutting exercise I picked up a packet of 12 ducks hearts in the supermarket for 1 euro 42! Now a heart is pure muscle, there’s no fat, no gristle, no tendons, not even any tubes in fact. It’s really about the best meat you can buy. But because it’s pretty much a waste product of the meat industry and people go ‘Ugghh!... the heart???’, they can’t sell the huge amount they have left over, so they pretty much give them away. People who say they can’t feed their family on their income support should stop winging and open their eyes.

Having fuelled by brain with my gastronomique blend of food, wine and chocolate, I set up the laptop and wrote up the blog for the last 10 days or so... while burping quite a lot.

Day 45 – Carcasonne – Bastille day

Now Fred assured me that the firework display above the old castle is something worth seeing so try and be in Carcassonne for the 14th Bastille day. That’s today. Truth is I probably would have left this morning but hanging on another day is certainly not a problem.



I did a bit of work in the morning and at about 2 o clock stopped for some food and to do some laundry. They don’t have machines here you have to use powder, elbow grease and a washing line the old fashioned way. At least it’s not pure thought which I have to say gets really, really dull sometimes! Truth is work is going really well, and luckily I haven’t needed to use the internet for it yet... just as well cos I can’t get a signal here.



So having done my chores I went into the new town at about 6 o clock. The path along the river is packed full of people waiting for the fireworks. There are motor homes on the other side, some people with their sofa’s on the bank. They are really taking their comfort for the forth coming spectacle quite seriously. There are people everywhere! I asked someone what time the fireworks start. The general consensus seems to be about 8.30 to 9.

Market traders

I get to my favourite bar in the new town and sit down with a cold beer. The market is also on. Right opposite is a guy with series of clothes hanger frames with lots of ladies dresses hanging from them. This is a lady trying on a dress over her clothes and she’s getting the market seller to hold the mirror for her. While she checks out how awful she looks. It really looks terrible... Shes not the best of shapes bless her, but the dress is like a sack with an elasticated bottom. The colours on the dress are faded and kind of dirty looking. It looks like it needs a wash. In it she looked like a bag of spanners! “Dont buy it...” I was screaming with every ounce of telepathic power I had. “What do you think?” she said to her daughter? “C’est bon” she said. Her daughter was wearing a cheap tartan skirt pulled up around her armpits, huge oversized glasses twice as wide as her head and bright purple flip flops. “Don’t ask her!!!” I was transmitting on full power. While holding the mirror the guy looked round and saw my worried expression and bit his lip, as if to say... My god I think she’s gonna buy it!! Market traders eh? No morals! In the end she couldn’t decide whether to go for the pure brown or the purply brown so she bought two!



After my beer I headed back towards the river where the crowds are getting ridiculous. There are only two bridges and they’ve had to close the older one; presumably cos it wouldn’t take the weight of all the people. The bridges it seems give you the best view of the old town. The old town itself is closed today to all but the pyrotechnics guys. Now if crowds are anything to go this is going to be a spectacle the likes of which I’ve not seen before. Some people have been staking out there plot since midday. There are frogmen in the river in case people go over the bank or the one remaining bridge.

Everywhere people are letting off fireworks! Even kids about 8 years old are setting them off in amongst the crowds of people and no-one is batting an eyelid. Even the police who are everywhere. It may seem a little reckless but at least the nanny state doesn’t reign supreme here! I reckon there must be at least a million people within a radius of a kilometre of the old city... all sitting there waiting for it to get dark!



Now 8.30 came and went. So did 9.30, by 10 its pitch black and I’m getting really bored sitting around and waiting. I’ve seen countless fireworks displays in my time and really don’t expect to see anything new. Thing is it’s like a bad film... once you’ve bought it at the video shop taken it home watched the first really dull 45 minutes, you don’t want to switch it off in case something really good is about to happen and everyone raves about it at some point in the future. “What???... You went to Carcassone and went home just as the fireworks were about to start???” I can hear people saying.

The fireworks

Well, at 10.30 they started. Now this was nothing like anything I had seen before. I’ll try and give you an impression; You know those really, really big fireworks that go really high and explode in a huge ball of green or blue phosphor? Well every second, for the next 30 minutes AT LEAST 10 of these were exploding, EVERY SECOND! During the crescendos it was more like 30 at a time! Neither was it from a single point. A huge swathe of the night sky from far left to far right was continually exploding for a full 30 minutes. The shock wave from each one hit you in the chest with a dull thud, two seconds after each flash. It was like being machine gunned in the chest... for 30 minutes! I imagine the next day the old town must be carpeted with the carcasses of birds, insects, anything that had the power of flight. And it must have cost millions!