France, Summer 2010: Week 7

Sunday 11 July - Saturday 17 July

Sunday was mostly a day for Roger to get ready to go to his retreat in Wales.  In the evening we had dinner early and walked eastwards: Caylus road, then up the hairpin path, along the ridge to the water tower and back along the terraces.

On Monday we got up quite early and drove to Nîmes, leaving Neffiès at around 7.30 am (we think) for a 10.20 am flight.  Then Delia drove back (she had been practising driving in France for a while).  The main difficulty was paying at the tolls, which she did by using booths with a person and getting out of the car to pay them.  She found that driving home from Nîmes was less scary than she expected.

Meanwhile, I (Roger) caught a train from Luton airport to Kettering, eating sandwiches bought at the airport while waiting at Luton Parkway station, and then walked to Rothwell, taking about 1¼ hours and just beating the heavy rain.  Delia's car battery had to be put on charge because it was flat; Pam had invited me to eat with her early, which I did gratefully.

Tuesday was a busy day for me (Roger)!  I got up and went to Kettering hospital for a fasting blood test at around 9.00 am, then went to the Co-op chemist to order our pills for the next two months, then home for breakfast.  Then I had to finish packing and get to On the Fringe for a haircut at 12 noon.  I actually locked up the house securely etc and went for the haircut on the way to Wales.  I bought and ate sandwiches at a motorway service station and arrived at St Beuno's at around 4.15 pm.

As every day, the Eucharist was at 5.45 pm and evening meal at 6.30 pm.  There was a tour of the house at 7.30 and a meeting of all retreatants (about 16) with the Directors at 8.00 pm.  St Beuno's is set in beautiful Welsh countryside and the walking from the house is really good.  Here's a photo:

The only downsides are that:

• the weather is bad, it rained on several of the days I was there and one day poured all day;
• the countryside is farmed fairly intensively and there is lots of poo (and flies) everywhere you go.

On the other hand I rather liked this stile that I crossed on a walk on Saturday:

My retreat director was someone called Rosemary Moffatt and she was really excellent.  I had told them already that my task was to decide what we should do next, ie stay in Rothwell, move to France or some combination of those extremes.  St Beuno's is an Ignatian spirituality centre and that spirituality has some really good tools for decision making.  Each day I met Rosemary for 45 minutes and she gave me tasks to do for that day, Bible readings and whatever exercises were appropriate.

Every day I made my own morning coffee in my cafetière after meeting Rosemary and had two biscuits bought in Rothwell.  Most days I walked in the afternoon.  Because I was in a cottage rather than the main house, I had breakfast at the cottage.  Lunch, at 12.30 pm, was in the house and so was supper.

On Tuesday Delia dined a la terasse then went for a wander round the village.  She found tables and chairs, stage set up and fire blazing in the corner at Place Jean Jaurès, at about 8.30 pm; looked like something might start around 10 pm.  No posters or announcements.  Then on the Wednesday she wondered at first why the village was so amazingly quiet.  Then she finally figured out why: Tuesday night's event on the square would have lasted well into quatorze juillet, the rest of which could then be spent in bed recovering in order to be fit to go back to work on the 15th.  Delia went for a walk for about 45 minutes at 8.30 but came back when she realised she'd stand no chance of explaining where she was if she had to use the mobile phone which she'd carefully taken and had switched on.  Maybe a plan before going and a map would be a good idea.

On Thursday it was a bit cooler in France: the car said 24° at 9.50, when Delia went to Roujan for her French lesson and 30° at 12.30 when she came back.  General conversation at the French class included “la crise financière” and Bérénice saying how completely ridiculous prices have become – outrageous prices for tomatoes and a “biro” she said and loads of local people paring their expenditure back to bare essentials.

Delia writes: On Friday after dinner I went to the Friday market.  Bérénice was there with her husband, daughter and son.  The entertainment was good, as usual – one man and five women doing little sketches as well as “ad libing”.  Forgot to take the camera!  They passed a hat afterwards.  Marie-Hélène (voisine) was sitting with a lady selling sketches of local villages.  This lady turned out to be English, Carol, lives part-time at “Libellule”, Rue du Prince, and Marie-Hélène introduced us.   It seems Marie-Hélène looks after her house when she's not there (had it for 10 years).  I bought 2 cards, Carol offered me a glass of rosé, Marie-Hélène offered me a slice of potato tarte.  Nathalie, from across the road, joined us and we had a little party.  We also spoke to a French couple who were interested both in Carol's drawings and in speaking a bit of English (she was one of the theatre troupe).  So I stayed until the market finished at about 9.30 then helped take Carol's kit back to her house.  After that I put my boots on and walked here and there on roads out of the village and back in the nearly dark until I'd had 30 minutes brisk exercise.  Drank a small glass of white wine on the terrasse (succombed to temptation the night before and opened the bottle of Trois Blasons).  Read in bed until gone midnight.

Delia writes: On Saturday I fetched the pain aux cereales ordered yesterday, when I wanted one and none left so the lady suggested I order.  It cost €2.10!  Had extra breakfast and went to Pézenas at about midday.  Enjoyed looking for presents, including something  for us from church (maybe a painting from the Marché de Createurs).  Didn't buy anything.  Went to Lidl – not worth the effort.  Went to the Intermarché.  Had cassoulet for lunch at about 3 pm.  Froze the rest.  Read book.  Talked to Roger.  Glad I didn't have to go to Nîmes today: radio reported 500 km of jams, on this the 3rd wave of holiday departures, mentioning especially jams round Nîmes, Montpellier and Sète.  Had cereal, fruit and yogurt at about 7 pm and intended then to go walking.  John rang at about 7.30. We talked for about 45 minutes.  They had a lovely holiday and had just ordered carpet for their 2 renovated bedrooms.  I finally went out at about 9 pm: skirted the edge of the lotissement down towards the water plant, along the Caux road, turned left at the big house that seems to be being extended, left again, etc, back via the fig tree (picked a bag of ripe figs), past the mill, up the pine smelling path, etc.  Took about 50 minutes.  The temperature was just right.