Taken from a book I bought from Emmaus and gave to Richard one birthday, I think you will find this food for thought.

The book,  ”La classe en Anglais”, from The Green Series by E. Gourio, was written in 1918. It is a french text book for teaching english (written in english), split into different lessons.

This is lesson 57:-

Duties of Children

Treat your parents with respect.There are children who speak to their parents with rudeness, and grow sullen when their parents find fault with them. Beware of such disrespect. You are young, and you should therefore take the lowest place. You have much to learn, and you should therefore hear instead of seeking to be heard.

Be grateful to your parents. When you were sick, how tenderly did they hang over you! When you were in want of anything, how cheerfully did they toil to supply your need! Surely, there cannot be a greater monster than an unthankful child.

Obey your parents. Do not receive their commands with a sour, angry look, which says louder than words that you obey only because you must; but whatever they bid you do, do it cheerfully. Do not wait for them to repeat a command: obey at once. Even when only a look tells you what they want, fly to perform it.

Place confidence in your parents. You should have no secrets which you are unwilling to tell them. If you have done wrong, you should openly confess it, and ask their forgiveness. If you wish to undertake anything, ask their consent. A dissembling child cannot thrive, and is often very miserable.

Children! These are your duties. Love, obey your parents; trust in them. Be to them a comfort and an honour. So live, that they may ever look upon you with delight. So live, that the thought of your virtues may smooth their last hours.

I love this passage and have been known to read it to visiting children! Unfortunately they all know me far to well to take it too seriously.

Why don’t you try to read it to children you know. Let us know how you get on

If you recall, the plan for our December visit to London was:

• We (Lisa and I) travel to London on Thursday for the TweetDeck Christmas party
• Rosie & Molly stay with Claire & Tony in Puy-de-Serre
• Joe stays with Kevin & Amal, also in Puy-de-Serre
• We return to France on the Saturday, collect the kids and go home
• We all return to the UK for Christmas with the family the following Tuesday

And back in A Christmas Party, Some Old Friends and Some Angry Birds, we covered the first couple of days when things were going well. When we were happy. And warm.

So let us continue with our story.

So near, yet so far

We woke on the Saturday after a fantastic few days in London, and headed back to Stansted Airport. There were no problems on the trains, so we arrived in plenty of time. However, given the wintry conditions, we were not surprised to find that our flight was delayed by 30 minutes. Still, this was not a problem. We were heading home to find our kids – we could wait another half an hour. While waiting at the gate, the day’s first few flakes of snow started to fall. Still we remained upbeat, as planes were still taking off and it was really only a few flakes.

Before too long we were boarding the plane and took our seats, excited to be heading home and looking forward to getting back to the children. The snow had started to come down a little faster, but we were moving now, so all was well. We started taxiing down the runway and waited for the pilot to announce “Cabin Crew, seats for takeoff”…. But instead of that announcement followed by the plane shooting off into the sky, we came to a halt. Instantly we knew this was Something Very Bad. The cabin crew started faffing around, while we grew more and more agitated. Then came the announcement we had dreaded. “I’m sorry folks, we have been told by Dublin to return to stand.”

The entire plane groaned in frustration. We had been so close! Just another few seconds and we would have been in the air and on our way back to our kids. But now we were looking at a cancelled flight, and no idea what was going to happen next. This was our worst nightmare.

Having disembarked the plane, we all sadly traipsed back to the airport main concourse, where we joined the queue to speak to the Ryanair sales desk about getting a refund for  our cancelled flight, and rearranging another. When we joined the queue there was already about 300 people waiting in front of us. This was not going to be a quick process.

A long wait and a thoughtless Italian

In the queue directly in front of us was an Italian chap with his young daughter. The man was clearly looking out for his wife, and kept leaving his little girl, no more than 3 or 4 years old, in the queue while he disappeared with his phone clamped to his ear.

The girl was very sweet, and we kept ushering her along when the queue started moving, but the time between her father’s visits was getting longer and longer. Everyone in the vicinity was amazed that the man could leave such a young girl completely on her own for such long periods of time. In the end, the party in front of the girl stopped a passing policewoman and reported the situation. She took the girl to one side and things could well have escalated if the absent father had not returned at that point. After some very stern words from the policewoman, the girl and her father were reunited. Although he didn’t leave her again, the man was still very distracted, and could very easily have lost his daughter again as the queue moved along without her. We were really quite shocked how much disregard he showed for her safety.

Also in the queue near us were a young couple who were heading in our direction. Quite remarkably, they were heading to Fontenay-le-Comte (the nearest large town to where we live in France)! We had a good chat with them and discovered that they were heading back to see relatives who ran a bar on Rue des Loges – it certainly is a small world.

So, we waited in line for what seemed like an eternity, and got basically nowhere. Through phone calls and internet searches, we established that all Ryanair and Easyjet flights were cancelled, with no prospect of  replacement flights for at least another two days. Word eventually filtered through the queue that we were pretty much wasting our time. The staff at the desk were only handing out a printout from the Ryanair website giving instructions to claim a refund and to rebook online. So, we needed a new plan. There was no way we could just sit and wait for goodness-only-knows-how-long for another flight. The kids were waiting for us at home and we were booked on flights to come back again on Tuesday. This was not in The Plan.

A new plan

We made some calls. When we left the Dixies the night before they had said to get in touch if there were any difficulties with the journey. So we called Kevin, who got straight on the case, finding us details of trains, buses and even booking us a hotel in London for the night. What a superstar! It seemed that trains were going to be no good. Although the Stansted Express was still running at this point, very few trains south of London were still operating, so our chances of getting out that way were minimal. Kevin had offered for us to take their car and drive it home, but the snow was so back near them that we would never have got there, never mind been able to drive it out again. So, with all flights cancelled, we followed the lead of our Fontenay-bound friends and turned to National Express coaches for a solution.

The queue at the National Express booking office at the airport was huge, with everyone having the same idea, so I grabbed the phone number off a leaflet and called them instead. Luckily we managed to book ourselves onto a coach leaving Victoria first thing in the morning and arriving in Paris around 4pm. From there we could catch a train to Poitiers to pick up the car and get home. Apparently they were unaffected by the snow so far, so we kept our fingers crossed that this would remain the case until tomorrow. With a hotel booked for us by our guardian angel in Ware, we headed off to the train to get back into London and find somewhere to eat and sleep for the night.

Back to where we started

Sadly, this too was not destined to go well. Our train was late. But not “It’s going to be REALLY late” late, where we could have gone and got comfortable somewhere while we waited. Oh no, it was just constantly 40 minutes late. Every minute we waited, the expected arrival time progressed by a minute. So we never had a clue quite when it was going to arrive, if at all.

After three hours of standing on a frozen platform, open to the elements, without food and with just one coffee inside us from the passing refreshment trolley, finally a train arrived. I have never been more glad to see a Stansted Express train in my life! Like eager shoppers at the Boxing Day sales, the crowd swelled toward the train and poured inside. I charged on board, dragging Lisa behind me, determined that we were going to get a seat after standing for the last six hours or so.

Our insistence paid off and we were one of the lucky few who got a seat. People were literally crammed into the train like refugees, their suitcases and bags piled high in the gangway. Although we were packed in like sardines, at least we were warmer and more comfortable than before. However, we were not our of the woods just yet. Although we were on the train, we were not actually going anywhere. It was 6.30pm by now, but we were told that our train had just become the 7pm service – so we had to wait another 30 minutes before we could leave. By this point we had just about given up caring.

Eventually, to much cheering, we pulled out of the station and headed back to London, from where we had started our journey that morning. It was certainly an eventful journey (of course, it was never going to be boring!). After a while, a Scottish guy, clearly with a few too many Special Brews inside him, started kicking off. He was yelling at some poor chap who he claimed was Russian – we have no idea if he was or wasn’t, but the drunk guy was pretty insistent. Given the fact that the train was completely overcrowded, this was really very intimidating. Luckily a couple of American guys pinned him into a tight corner of the train and forced him to calm down, but his ongoing outbursts certainly dampened the Dunkirk Spirit that had developed on the train until that point. Fortunately the Scottish man left the train at the next stop and a calm returned to the carriage once more.

Meanwhile, we were being entertained by a young brother and sister who were travelling with their french grandparents. We started speaking in french, but then realised the kids spoke english, which made life a lot easier. They were both very sweet and the girl didn’t stop talking all through the journey. I think talking to us helped all of us to take out minds off the situation and it was some welcome light relief after a very stressful few hours.

Tom to the rescue

It was while were on this journey that we finally had a stroke of good luck. I had a call from Tom, a colleague from work and a good friend, offering us a place to stay for the night. We didn’t need asking twice. Given the day we were having, the chance of a warm house, a glass of wine, a nice meal and some top company was very welcome. So we jumped off the train at the next stop and made our way to Tom’s house. I say that like it was an easy process – of course it wasn’t. It involved lugging our bags through the snowy London streets and navigating the brand-new East London line, a stretch of the rail network I had never used before. But made it we did, and good old Tom was there at the station to meet us. To say that we were thankful for the hospitality that he and Jessie showed us, would be like saying the Pope is a bit religious. We were so delighted to be safe and actually feeling relaxed for the first time that day. It was a brief few hours of chilled out, relaxing chat, with a big glass of wine and a great homemade curry. Just what we needed and a total lifesaver.

While enjoying our respite with Tom and Jessie, we decided to book our train from Paris to Poitiers, as there were likely to be thousands of stranded people pouring into Paris the next day and we didn’t want to get stuck there too. So, after some wrangling with an uncooperative printer, we managed to book our ticket and print off the required e-voucher. At least that was sorted, we just needed to get to Paris.

Paris, here we come

At 5.30am we were whisked by taxi off to Victoria station to locate our coach. Having clambered over the scattered bodies of people who had clearly slept the night in the coach station, we checked in successfully and waited for our coach. However the first worry of the day came soon after when there was an announcement that all National Express coaches were cancelled. Our hearts sank and we thought that we were going to face another day stuck in London, unable to get back to the kids (who were, incidentally, being very well looked after by our friends, thank goodness. This knowledge, however, didn’t stop us being desperate to get back to them…).  We soon realised that actually we were going to be travelling under the Eurolines banner, which was a slightly different thing and was therefore not affected by the cancellation. Panic over!

While waiting for the coach to arrive, who should we see but the couple from the airport who were trying to get back to Fontenay! They had booked on the same coach as us and had the same plan – get to Paris and then take a train. We offered them a lift with us if they wanted to get the same train from Paris to Poitiers, but they had already booked accommodation in Paris for the night. It was good to see them again though and made it feel a little less painful seeing some familiar faces.

The journey to Folkestone was largely uneventful, thank goodness. The roads were mainly clear, though there was a lot of snow on the verges, and we arrived at the tunnel in good time. We were delayed for an hour, but took this opportunity to stretch our legs and grab some reading material and food from the shops. Before long we were on our way and heading to the tunnel. Just as we thought we were finally going to get out of England, we were pulled in by French customs who boarded the coach and took all our passports. Half an hour later they returned and handed back the passports. Quite what they were doing with them all this time we do not know.

What we do know is that while we were sitting there waiting, about 10 eastern european coaches breezed past unhindered. Something not right there.
Anyway, we eventually made it onto the Eurotunnel train and finally felt like we were getting somewhere. Once we got into France, surely everything would be fine and we could get home to our kids. Of course, that would have been too easy.

Welcome to Calais

The weather in Calais wasn’t great, with a fair bit of snow around, but no worse than we had experienced in England. We left the tunnel behind and were looking forward to a nice easy drive down to Paris, when suddenly we pulled into a petrol station just before joining the autoroute to Calais. Utter, utter disaster. Because of the supposedly-dangerous weather, the police were not allowing us to continue on our journey. We would be taken to a local sports hall where we would spend the night and we could possibly try again in the morning.

This news nearly sparked a riot on the coach. The weather was nothing worse than we had seen on the road to Folkestone, but the police weren’t budging. They had even parked their car across the front of the coach to ensure we couldn’t leave. An air of total depression fell over everyone on board. I pulled out the iPhone and started looking at options. If only we could get to the station at Calais, we could catch a train from there to Paris. Or even to Lille, then on to Nantes from there. We just had to keep moving, to get closer to the children, there was no way we wanted to just stop and wait.

But sadly the police were not going to be swayed. We were to be escorted to the sports hall and that was that. The fact that dozens of other vehicles were zooming past while we were stuck at the side o the road was seemingly immaterial to them, unfortunately. So eventually we pulled out behind our police escort and headed to the sports hall feeling totally dejected. Our low spirits were not raised at all by us being able to see the train station as we drove away from our parking spot. If only we could divert there, we could all get on our way, but it was not to be.

The Red Cross? Really?

On arrival at the sports hall, we started to feel like we were unwitting victims of a terrible disaster. A man climbed aboard the coach and declared, “Welcome to Calais. You are now under the control of the French Red Cross. We have food, drink and blankets for you and beds for the night. We will look after you…”. Now you might think we would be relieved at this, and indeed we would have been if we had not been desperate to get back to our kids. Such great care would have been very welcome if we were just travelling for fun and not on a race against time. As it was, this was the last thing we wanted. But, not really knowing at this point what was going to happen, we disembarked the coach and shuffled into the sports hall rather dazed and confused.

Once inside, the stresses of the day started to take their toll. We both started to break down a little and making the phone call to the kids to tell then what had happened was a very difficult thing to do. When speaking to Rosie I told her that we were being treated like we had been in an earthquake. She hadn’t heard me properly and proceeded to tell everyone that we had been in an earthquake. After some very worried phone calls, we managed to persuade everyone that we were safe and well and hadn’t actually been victims of a natural disaster, just the over-efficiency o the French authorities!

Seeing Lisa in some distress, one of the Red Cross people came over and offered us somewhere quiet to go and lie down. They were very considerate and we couldn’t have asked for better treatment, but we explained that we really only wanted to get home to our kids. He said he understood and that he would see what he could do to help. a short while later he returned to explain that he had spoken to a man with a taxi firm and he would take us to the station at Calais, from where we could catch a train into Paris and from there to home. We were delighted to be offered a way out. There had been a couple of shuttle buses going to the station earlier on, but the weather was now very bad and our man told us that ours would be the last taxi to leave before the weather closed in.

So we were suddenly feeling a lot more positive, but we now had a different problem. We had, as instructed, left our suitcases on the coach. Having been out into the car park I could find neither our coach nor our driver anywhere. After some 15 minutes of searching, I finally tracked him down. Luckily he was already on his way to find the coach and retrieve a bag for another man, so I tagged along too. The coach was inexplicably parked about 25 minutes up the road, so the walk there through the snow was far from ideal. But we made it through and I dragged our bags back. Good job I did as well, as the driver then refused to go and fetch any more bags after that, so everyone else was definitely stranded.

Time for a new plan

Given the delays on trains heading into Paris, we changed our plan of attack. We would try to get from Calais to Lille, then from Lille we could catch a train to Nantes. We rang our good friend Curtis, who had offered his assistance, and he was an absolute hero. He said that of course he would pick us up from Nantes and take us home, no matter what time of the day or night, and then would take us back to Poitiers in the morning to retrieve the car. We were so, so grateful, and this wonderful news really lifted our spirits – we could finally see an end in sight.

After a while our taxi came and we escaped our well-meaning imprisonment. Upon arrival at the station, we were quite surprised not to see huge crowds of people. One of the reasons we were given for not being allowed to go to the station in the first place was that apparently there were huge crowds there, and all the trains were cancelled. No such crowds at Calais Ville station. It was about 5pm when we arrived and had to wait about 2 hours, but eventually a train came and took us to Lille. After facing the prospect of spending maybe the next two days in Calais only just a few hours ago, the sense of relief to be leaving was immense even more so as the weather was now really closing in around us.

A long time in Lille

Having arrived in Lille, we discovered that our connecting train departed from the other station in Lille. It wasn’t too far to walk, only 10 minutes, but the weather was terrible, with temperatures of about -10 and a strong icy wind stinging our faces. Although that 10-minute walk nearly gave us frostbite, we kept moving, confident that we were getting closer and closer to home. The departure board at Lille Europe station was a sea of delays and cancellations, though the Nantes train wasn’t yet being displayed, so we had no idea of it’s status. When eventually it appeared on the board, our positive attitude took another knock – delayed by three hours.

Ah well, we thought, at least we’re near civilisation. This is a station, there are cafés and bars. We can sit and have a meal while we’re waiting…

If only it were so simple! Everything was closing. We found a bar that was packed – so many people were stranded this night and the station, like most I would imagine, was full of travellers all just trying to keep warm while they waited for a way home. So did this result in longer opening or “special measures’? Not on your nelly. We had just managed to buy a glass of wine each and a small tub of Pringles, the only food they had in the entire bar, when the staff started closing up around us. That was that, we were thrown back out onto the frozen platform to wait for the next two hours.The only consolation was the vertical patio heaters they had on the platform, which provided a tiny amount of heat to help keep the cold from totally killing us off.

In the end, after much shivering and “never again”ing, our train arrived at around 11pm. Poor Curtis, it would be about 3am when we arrived in Nantes, but he was an absolute star. The journey to Nantes passed without any real problems. We slept a lot of the way, totally exhausted, frozen to the core and just aching to be back in our own bed.

Curtis, our saviour

True to his word, Curtis was there at Nantes waiting for us with hot tea, blankets and food. We really are so indebted to him for his assistance, which was way beyond the call of duty. In fact all our friends had been outstanding in their support. Kevin and Amal and Claire and Tony had been superb in looking after the kids for us and the extended stay was no bother to them at all. Everyone on Facebook and Twitter were pouring out their best wishes or us as we kept everyone updated on our progress. It was a very humbling experience for us all to see the reaction to our plight, and we felt very, very lucky to have such amazing friends.

And so, eventually, after having left our London hotel almost 48 hours earlier, we finally arrived home safe and sound at 5am and collapsed into bed.  The journey, like this post, had been truly epic. So many ups and downs, twists and turns, that we had lost track of where we were and what we were doing. But one instinct kept pulling us through, and that was the need to get home to be with our kids. And the reunion with them the next morning was very special indeed.

The end…almost

As a postscript to all this, you will recall that our car was still parked at Poitiers. So, as promised, Curtis came by later on to take me back to the airport to retrieve it. The only difficulty being that I couldn’t find the car park ticket. This was very unlike me, as I am normally very organised about such things and store all tickets and receipts safely in my wallet. but this one ticket was definitely not there. I eventually managed to recall that for some reason I had left it in the back pocket of my jeans. The very jeans that Claire had taken earlier that day, along with a load more dirty clothes from our trip, to help us get caught up on the washing. So yes, you guessed it. The ticket had been though the washing machine.

“It’s ok,” said Claire, “the magnetic strip is still on one piece.”

I assumed this meant that it was still attached to a piece o the ticket. I was wrong! On the way to the airport we called at Claire’s and she handed me an envelope containing what can only be described as a few flakes of card, plus the magnetic strip. this was going to be fun…

Anyway, we took the pieces along to the airport and the man there listened to my sob story about what had happened. Luckily he took pity on me and issued a new ticket, allowing me to take the car and head home again.

And so ends the tale of our nightmare journey home. Our French Odyssey.

Thanks once again to our guardian angels who helped us along the way –  Kevin, Tom, Jessie, Curtis, Kevin, Amal, Claire, Tony and everyone else who helped guide us home to safety. We couldn’t have done it without them all and we will always be grateful or what they did for us.

Although we always know we had the best family and friends, it is often only when you are really at your lowest that you realise it.

And for us now, there is no doubt.

The location: Île de Ré. The company: perfect. The weather: beautiful.

The children played all day with buckets, spades, body-boards and lightsabers.

We relaxed, chatted and just soaked up up the sun as it continued to bake the west coast of France.

We introduced the Dixies to the game of Kubb [website].

And,  most excitingly, our resident hunter-gatherer prised us some oysters off the rocks and both Lisa and I ate one for the first time ever!

The verdict? Not actually as bad as we had anticipated. And these were lacking in any lemon juice, or white wine to wash them down. I think we were both rather chuffed that we had managed to crack another culinary fear.

Now, as for snails and frogs legs, that is definitely a different matter…

See the full set of photos from the day [here]

Crocodiles?…in France?

We started the evening with a stroll through the park near their house. La Rochelle is somewhere we have passed around and through in the car, but have never had chance to explore, so it was really good to see some of the parts of the city that attract thousands of people here every week. It was a very picturesque park, with the path leading us through the trees, alongside a river, over bridges, and finally delivering us to the beach. All very nice indeed – we can certainly see the benefits of living here.

On the beach there was an amazing sand-sculpture of a crocodile (dragon?) which even had real fire in his nose! Apparently it was made by a guy who sleeps on the beach in a tent. He is certainly very talented.

Having walked along the walls of the old port, we spotted some empty places on the other side, our intended viewing position for the night’s entertainment. So we hopped on the little boat-bus that whizzed us across the water to the other side, where we found a good place to sit, right on the edge of the wall. No-one was going to come and stand in front of us!

Its Pineau time!

So we were settled in our spot with about 3 hours before the show was due to start, so what were we to do? Eat and drink of course! Out came the Pineau (naturally) and the snacks and we kept ourselves entertained by trying to pour the drink into the tiniest of glasses in a strong wind and watching the boys demonstrating their jedi skills to the passing french…

While we waited, the boats that were going to take part in the show drifted past us into the port, and shortly after we were entertained (slightly) by some waveriders (like water-skiers but on a single ski) going up and down down the odd trick.  Rather strangely there was also a barge going up and down the water containing some Irish dancers, although there didn’t seem to be much dancing going on which was a bit disappointing.

Anyway, as the sun slowly dipped down behind the La Rochelle skyline, the time for the start of the show approached.

Into the west

As darkness finally enveloped the port-side, it began. Firstly, all the boats, lit by simple torches, floated slowly from the port and out to sea accompanied by some beautifully haunting music and some lovely “gentle” fireworks. It was a really moving start and reminded me (geek that I am) of the ending of “The Return of the King” when the elves sail off into the west… anyway, don’t get me started on that!

After the parade of  boats, the fireworks started in earnest, with an incredible display. The walls of the port and the buildings facing us were all lit in a variety of colours to tie in with the fireworks and there was music piped across the port. I know we say it every time we have been to a fireworks display, but we all thought that this one was simply the best one yet. I think the combination of the location, the music, the lights, the fireworks, and sharing it with great friends, made it such a breathtaking end to the day.

We were all very numb after sitting on the port-side for so long, but the wine and the pineau helped out there, and it was all worth it in the end.

First on the agenda was an evening out at Nathalie and Thierry’s house. They had invited us round for a meal, along with Christophe and Gwénaelle, and we were really looking forward to it. This was to be a big test of our language skills, it being the first real evening with only french people and us. Unfortunatley I was full of cold, and not totally on the ball anyway, so we really had to get our brains into gear.

But we needn’t have worried as the evening went really well. The food was wonderful – Nathalie had clearly been extremely busy baking and preparing – and everyone had fun. The language barrier was well and truly broken down for most of the evening, and we all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. A very successful night, thank you Nathalie & Thierry!

It was around 2am when we got home from our evening out so on Sunday we were all pretty tired. However, we had lined up a potential day out mushroom-hunting with Sylvie & Kevin and it looked like conditions were right for our expedition. So, at 11am Sylvie gave us the nod and we roused ourselves from our bleary-eyed trances, packed up a picnic and headed off to the forest at Benon [map].

We had never met Kevin [link] or Sylvie [link] before. You may recognise their names, as they are regular commentors here and together run the “FuelMyBlog” community site for bloggers [link]. I had “met” them through this channel and spoken on Twitter [link], but this was the first meeting in “real-life”!  Well, we got on like a house on fire. They are a great family, so friendly and good fun to be with. The kids soon got over the initial embarrassment of meeting new people and were off tramping through the woods and playing games like they had been friends for years. MSN ids have been swapped and I’m sure they will be keeping in touch.

As for the mushrooms, although we found lots about 4, most were unfortunately deadly. Luckily we didn’t have to rely on Kevin’s memory to tell us this, as he couldn’t quite remember what Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall [link] had said… was it bitter tasting ones are good, or are they the ones that kil you…?  Thanks Kevin, very reassuring!  Fortunately the well-prepared Sylvie had a book which confirmed the sad truth that none of the ones we found were eatable.   We had brought along a couple of carrier bags, expecting, in our naievity that we would just be scooping them up and stuffing our bags full. Oh how wrong we were! Clearly the french experts had already been up at the crack of dawn and snaffled all the good ones while we were still snoring.

Ah well, c’est la vie. The thrill, as they say, is in the chase, not the capture, and we all certainly enjoyed a good wander through the forest, fruitless though it may have been. 

We ended the day with a picnic in the woods while the children played and had a good chin-wag about our respective lives in France. A most enjoyable day for everyone. Here’s hoping for many more…

On Saturday we entertained Nathalie (Joe’s teacher and the one who Lisa goes in to help with the English lessons) and her family. What a lovely family they are, and we had a really good time. We were a little concerned at our first major “night in” where we would only speak french, but I think we managed it pretty well. The dictionary was out, but we only referred to it on a couple of occasions and made ourselves understood for the rest of the night. Lisa made us all a beautiful meal and we finished the evening playing guitars and singing – something we haven’t done for ages, and we never thought we’d get chance to do again.

The kids meanwhile were off entertaining themselves with playstations and DVDs, breaking down the language barriers in the way that only kids can do. We had a wonderful night and hope to have many more. We are so lucky to count them as our friends after such a short time in the country, and especially sharing a love of music – something that has been sadly missing from our lives since we moved here.

So then we barely had had time to wash up from one evening’s entertainment (oh, to have a dishwasher) and we were preparing for our next guests on Sunday. This time it was an ex-work-colleague of Lisa’s. Helen and her family come to France every year and this year they were coming to Les Sables d’Olonne. As this is only just over an hour from us, it was great that they could come over and see us.

Once again, we had a lovely day. They have two lovely daughters who got on really well with our three – amazing as this was the first time they had met. By the end of the day they were trading MSN addresses and promising to keep in touch. I had finally got some legs for the old door that we salvaged in order to construct a big rustic table, so we set this up on the field, under the gazebo, and ate another lovely meal our there. We ended up all playing cards and taught each other new games to play – great fun.  Sadly the €3 trestle legs the table was resting on started collapsing as the games got more vigorous, so it’s back to the drawing board on that one, but luckily we had another more substantial table to work with.

It was another fantastic day, just the kind of weekend we love, surrounded by great friends. Its funny how you really get to know people so much better when you see them out of their normal environment. We have noticed this with the friends and family that have visited us here previously, but it was especially evident yesterday. Helen had worked in the same school as Lisa, but they had never really socialised before. And the rest of us barely knew the rest of the family. But by the end of the day we felt like we were old friends and hoping to meet up again soon.

And of course, we ourselves have been entertained by our two new additions. Charlie and Lola have settled in well to their new home and are really starting to feel like part of the family. Charlie is clearly the biggest trouble-maker, finding the best places to explore and hide, then calling Lola over to join in. As I write this, they have managed to find the shelf under my desk and are both asleep there cuddled up together. I have the feeling that I may have this kind of company whenever I work from now on, which is really rather nice.

Thankfully our friends went and brought us back all the news.

Once we have got medical certificates for the kids (everyone needs one from the doctor if you are going to play in a proper team) then the kids can join the club properly. Previously Molly was playing with the under-12s and Rosie was with the under 16s. There is now a proposition that, due to the way the numbers have worked out, that there should be an under-14s team, made up of some of the girls from the under-12s and Rosie. This sounds fine with us – only 1 set of training sessions, one set of tournaments. Nice and easy!

[OuestFrance.fr - Handball : un club en progression , Foussais-Payré 08/07/2008 (ouest-france.fr)]

We arrived way too early, of course. One day we will get it right and arrive with everyone else….  It was another beautiful day, which was fortunate as the night before we had had the most enormous thunderstorm. It had apparently been rumbling around for a while, but when it landed on top of our house at 3am I thought the roof was going to cave in. Thankfully we survived the onslaught and the morning was fresher, but still nice and warm.

The lunch was served in the Salle Polyvalente near the church and the Hotel de Ville. We queued for our meal and spotted our dear old neighbours at a table. It was so nice to see them there and most unexpected – we have never seen them anywhere other than round the houses.

The meal was great value – €10 got us a a large punnet of moules, and one full of gorgeous chips (you can’t beat deep-fried chips…), as well as a slice of bread, some cheese, a big slice of tarte aux pommes and a glass of rosé . The moules were the best we had tasted and the adults polished them all off. The kids filled up mainly on chips, as they do, so I ended up finishing their moules off, but nothing went to waste. They had clearly over-catered as well as they were coming round offering second-helpings to anyone who wanted them. By the end of the meal, topped off with a coffee, we were all pretty well stuffed and ready for a siesta!

Sadly a siesta was not on the menu as the kids had all headed off to the school to prepare for the “Spectacle“. When they returned they all looked so sweet dressed in their costumes. The school takes children from as young as 3, so there were all ages there, right up to Molly, who will be 11 this week (although she is in a year below her age in order to catch up on her french). Each class did a number of songs and dances on the theme of the environment. It was a wonderful show and, once again, we were so proud to see our two taking full part in it. Joe even had to say a line of a poem on his own and I’m sure no-one would have known he wasn’t french just by listening to him.  Interestingly, Molly looked really pretty in her “designer” dress made from recycled tin cans!

After the show, the stalls were opened and it was time to spend money     It was a good arrangement whereby the children could buy tickets on a piece of string and would trade the tickets for turns on the different stalls. There was a bouncy-castle, a football shoot-out, a fishing lucky dip, a wheel of fortune and a cake stall. Of course this was supplemented by a well-frequented bar as well…   We had turns on pretty much everything, winning various hats, t-shirts and other random prizes. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves and as usual the atmosphere was so relaxed and friendly.

After a while it was time to draw the raffle. We had our eye on the gas barbecue – ours is still at my parents’ house as we didn’t have room to bring it when we moved over. If we could win one here it would save them having to bring it in the car next time they drove over. But sadly it was not to be. At school the next day they dished out the “lesser” prizes and we won a bowl and some salad servers – a nice accompaniment to a barbecue…if we had one.

The night was going to continue for a long time to come, but our gang were again getting a little restless by now, having spent all their money and bounced themselves silly, so we headed home.

It had been a really wonderful weekend and we really got the feeling that we were part of a great community, something we have never truly felt before. Here’s to many more weekends like this!

This is us, the Barley family.

For years we have harboured a dream to move from our home on the east coast of England to a new life in France. In December 2007 we made that dream a reality.

This blog will be a collection of our thoughts, experiences and other random items that we hope you will find mildly interesting.

But first, some introductions…

I’m Richard, 36 and I’m a consultant for an IT company. I’m married to Lisa (age undisclosed!), who, up until the move, was a teaching assistant at the local school. We have 3 children: Rosie (12), Molly (10) and Joe (8). And together we are finding our way through the maze of new experiences that make up the process of settling in a new country