A date with Sam and Roxy 3 comments

So yesterday we tried once more to reach the Vendée Globe village. And this time we made it!

Well done Sam!

Sam Davies, the first British competitor had arrived back earlier in the morning, after more than 95 days at sea – an amazing achievement for the 34-year old from Portsmouth. So obviously we wanted to go along to celebrate the return of her and boat “Roxy”.

Lisa and Joe had visited the village with Joe’s school before the start of the race and had thoroughly enjoyed it. With all the boats there, it was a great experience. The children at school have been following the round-the-world race ever since and closely monitoring all the progress as the boats navigate their way south, round the south-pole and back up to Les Sables d’Olonne.

We managed to find the village fairly easily, after some initial worries that we may be driving round Les Sables for hours due to the usual lack of any signs. But find it we did, and luckily it wasn’t too busy. While we waited for Nathalie and Thierry and the boys to arrive, we picked up some Vendée Globe goodie bags for Joe and Molly, who were both mightily impressed with the selection of books, magazines, posters, hats etc that were inside. A nice memento for them.

Once our friends had arrived we went down the ramp to the jetty to go and get acquainted with Roxy. She was not a boat you could easily miss, with her bright-pink flag and multi-coloured paint-job. It certainly made a change from the usual dull white affairs.

To be in the presence of a boat that had just sailed around the world was quite humbling. The pretty colours and flowers festooned across the bows disguised the 95 days of hell that the Sam had no doubt been through as she was tossed around in this carbon-fibre shell in some of the worst conditions possible. Although the boats are all decked out with the latest technology, when it comes down to it the challenge is really between one skipper and mother nature and I, for one, am completely in awe of anyone who can win that battle.

The boat of second-placed Armel Le Cléac’h was also still at the port, and, having surveyed both of them we wandered back up to the village to check out the exhibition.

A huge TV screen was at the top of the steps, showing clips from the video diaries of the skippers. It was amazing to see how remarkably high-spirited some of them were, even in the most harrowing of circumstances.

In a huge marquee was the exhibition, that Lisa said was sadly only half the size that it had been when they visited last time. Still, it was an interesting area with lots of details of the skippers and the boats, as well as computer screens showing live progress of the boats and access to the statistics for the race. We could see that Dee Caffari, the next brit to return, was due in within the next 48 hours – a shame that it is just too far for us to pop over and see her return too.

Time to eat…eventually

After exploring the exhibition, everyone was getting hungry, so we decided to drive to the sea-front and find a restaurant. We followed Nathalie and Thierry as they knew (“allegedly”!) of a nice restaurant. However, we hadn’t bargained on the sea-front being blocked off by roadworks. Round and round we drove trying to find a way down to the front, but failing miserably. At one point we found ourselves on a diversion that took us down the narrowest backstreet possible – I was seriously considering folding in the wing-mirrors to make sure we could sneak in between the parked cars and the drain-pipes either side!

Eventually we found our way to an underground car-park and set off to walk the length of the sea-front in search of the mythical “nice restaurant”. When we finally arrived at what Nathalie and Thierry thought was the place, they didn’t seem too sure. But by this time it was 2pm and we were all starving so we stayed and gave it a go.

It was all a little surreal.

We sat. We waited. For 15  minutes. Then a “lady”, looking like some relative of Lily Savage, came to take our order.

“What would you like?” said she, oblivious to the fact that she hadn’t yet given us a menu…

“Have you got a menu?” I asked. “Oh,” said she, “didn’t you look at the menu outside?”

Well no, we didn’t, as in any normal restaurant you get given them at your table. But never mind…”Moules et frites pour les adultes et steak hache pour les enfants s’il vous plait”. And off she went.

Hunger was, by this time, driving the kids to start fighting. Soon this would lead to them gnawing on each others limbs in sheer desperation.

The “lady” came out and we all looked up expectantly…..then sighed as she was just bringing food to another table.

Minutes later she returned again…only to bring the bill to someone else.

The clock ticked on…and she appeared again. This must be us! Well, it was, but just paper table-mats. Bah!

A very tanned chap dashed out and jumped in his car, and still the “lady” came and went

This charade continued for an hour. Yes, ONE HOUR! She would come out, we would get excited, only to find she was bringing the forks or napkins or such like.

Eventually, the kids meals arrived, which kept them happy for a while. But still we waited.

Then the chap came back in his car, carrying 2 big bags of frozen chips. Clearly our wait was due to a lack of chips!

Funnily enough, after another 10 minutes, our meals arrived. Lovely freshly cooked piping hot chips, with several very small and rather cold mussels. But by this time we were past caring and just wolfed down the whole lot.

“Du café?” asked the “lady” at the end of our meal. Not on your nelly, we suggested, and payed the bill (no tip, of course).

That had to go down on out Top 10 Restaurants To Avoid At All Costs. Somewhere near the top.

Cakes and coffee

Anyway, the walk back to the car was very pleasant, eating our dessert (donuts from Roger Sicard – no waiting ) as we strolled along the beach. Nathalie suggested we visit the Museum de Coquillage – a seashell museum. So we drove along the front and found another parking place (easily this time!) but the museum was closed. Just our luck! Never mind that it wasn’t due to close until 6pm when it was only 5pm. This is France and people do whatever they like here!  So to finish off our day we headed back to the Vendée Globe village for a coffee.

Back at the village we finished our rather protracted meal with a coffee in the cafe area, then us boys went back out to have another look at the boats. I could have stayed for hours taking photos as the light was just lovely in the evening, with the sun dipping behind the masts, creating some lovely silhouettes.

It had been another wonderful day out, giving us some great memories. We really do feel lucky to be living here with so many wonderful places around us. We have experienced so much since we arrived, things that we had never seen before. It’s all part of the dream that we are living here, and we love it.

Check out all my photos from our day on Flickr here

Dinner without dictionaries 6 comments

We were recently invited for dinner with the family of one of Molly’s school friends. They are a lovely family and we are really thrilled that Molly and Jeanne are friends. Jeanne’s mother had suggested that the two girls go to their house and spend the afternoon preparing a meal for the two families, which was a very sweet idea.

So Molly and Jeanne spent the day slaving in the kitchen (with a bit of playing thrown in as well I imagine ) and the rest of us turned up in the evening. It was a wonderful evening – the girls had prepared a starter of goats cheese on toasted baguette, followed by baked fish with rice, all topped off with some delicious apple tarts.

Jeanne’s dad makes his own wine from the grapes at one of the Vendee vinyards, so the vins de la maison were flowing freely all night. Lisa kindly offered to drive home as it would have been way too rude for me to refuse the top-ups to my glass

All-in-all the meal was beautiful and the company thoroughly enjoyable. Jeanne’s family speak no english at all, so this was a night of us speaking 100% french all night. Quite a big challenge for us, but we rose to the occasion and the conversation never dried up.

I think we are all starting to realise just how far we have come over the last year in terms of the language. This time last year we could never have even considered having a dinner party with only french being spoken but now we are quite happy in that situation, and the kids even more so. They are all doing so well now that I think they have well and truly overtaken Lisa and I in their ability to communicate.

This is great news to us, as giving the kids a second language was one of the big reasons for coming here and we can already see how glad they are to have it. Now, if only they could start giving us lessons so we can keep up with them, that would be even better!

From doors to paws – Its our weekly roundup! 10 comments

Here’s another round-up of what’s been going on with us just recently.

More fun with friends and families

Last weekend was another throroughly enjoyable one.

Saturday was spent entertaining some friends who have a holiday home near Cognac. It was a beautiful day so we erected our big old makeshift table alongside the normal one to make a long surface for Lisa to fill with a wonderful French-style feast.  When we discovered the old wooden door we envisaged it being used as a table for such an occasion and it was nice to finally make the most of it.

We had a really excellent day with great company, lovely food and brilliant Vendéen sunshine.

Then on Sunday we took my parents, who were staying for the week, across to Ile de Re for the first time. As chance would have it the Dixies were also entertaining parents at the time and we ended up meeting them on the beach and having a great day together. The respective grandparents got on just as well as the parents and children do, which was really good to see. The kids were especially impressed with Kevin’s dad, who showed great creative flair in building a landspeeder and a pony out of sand. Very impressive and far more than Kevin or I could be bothered to do could hope to achieve

Our favourite felines…

Charlie and Lola continue to entertain us. In the last week or so they have been exploring the great outdoors, having finally had their injections (thus leaving us another €100 worse off!). They are thoroughly enjoying themselves chasing around the garden, climbing the trees and hiding under the cars. We do really need to get a cat-flap though. The days are still pretty sunny but the autumn winds are getting chillier and having the door open half the day is making the house feel like an ice-box! I feel a trip to the pet shop coming on.

A room with a view

This week I decided to rearrange my “office” (I like to call it that but really its nothing quite so grand). Some friends very kindly gave us a corner desk that they no longer needed and very nice it is too. However, this has meant that I have spent the last 6 months facing the corner of the room, which is not particuarly interesting or inspiring and made me feel rather like a naughty schoolboy! So now I have taken command of the room by rearranging things so my desk looks out of the window and I have the whole room in front of me. A much nicer arrangement which allows me the chance to appreciate the fine view out of the window and down the lane to the lake.

The only downside is that now I look rather like a receptionist. Not physically of course, but the arrangement of the desk is such that Lisa feels like she has come to make an appointment when she comes in the room!

Preparing for Paella

Tomorrow night is paella night – a big social event in the village organised by the school. Everyone will gather in the salle polyvalente for paella (or chicken if you prefer) and a disco afterwards. This marks quite an occasion for us as it was on the eve of the paella night last year that we first came over to see the house with the kids. We met Marion, our estate agent, the morning after and it sounds like it was a pretty wild affair. This will be 2 new firsts for us – our first French disco and our first taste of paella.  Fear not, I will be posting a full account of the evening in due course!

Get in touch

Finally, you may have noticed I have added a “Contact Us” tab to the top of the site. Here you will find details of the various ways in which you can get in touch with us. Feel free to connect with us using any of these methods and say bonjour!