Dec

21

A Week in Provence - Winter [8&9]

Filed Under Live 

Our weeks have been broken by the visit to London and Yattendon (see London Swings) but now we’re back and preparing for the big festivity: Bon Noel.

Everything was going swimmingly until the snow arrived. We were tapping away contentedly on our laptops when a knock at the door revealed Giles, the gardener screaming ‘robinere’ at the top of his voice. After much gesticulation and laughter we were shown how to turn off the garden taps to stop the pipes from bursting - the forecasters had predicted snow!

And did it snow. Bitterly, and I mean bitterly cold conditions and at least 25mm of snow fell on Friday and Saturday. You’ve probably read about the Eurostar and chaos with all transport. We were no different in the Luberon valley.

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[The back garden at the start of one of the snow storms]

We’re also baby sitting Charlie de la Poste for Alma who has popped over to London for a carol service. He’s loved the snow - our white duvet has not!

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Then, on Sunday morning after a long lunch with the Fox-Duncans and a fun Carols service with hordes of ex-pats (all looking like they have just left the MCC clubhouse) and locals in Goult, we awoke to find no water.

At first we blamed it on the work being done in Menerbes on the sewerage. No. No, such luck. We phoned SDEI, the water folk, and to our surprise they arrived in half-an-hour (by now it was 5pm and Madame was thirsty). We were down to our last bottle of water and all the loos had been used and flushed!

The water meter had blown up-literally. A new meter later and we were back in business. Then followed a lesson from SDEI - “cut pieces of styrofoam and wedge them all around the two water meters : cover the manhole with a warm cover”.

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[If you look carefully at the end vines, you can see the 'noble rot' grapes still there - it's iced dessert wine]

Earlier in the week, the lightning had smacked our Sky decoder. The technician arrived, fixed it and we’re back in business. Then, to cap off a week of ‘what can go wrong next’, crisis of all crises, Madame’s coffee machine started to play up and she has not been able to get any ‘creme’ on her latter in the morning.

We’ve discovered a technician 30km west of Avignon so its been an early 7.15am start in the rain and dark to have it fixed in a little garage in the village of Valliguieres.

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[Nativity scene at the Goult church]

Over the years Cath and Jonno have given us Swarovski crystals for Christmas. At last, we can make a bit of a show with them - on their house-warming gift of a candelabra -

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The supermarkets at this time of the year groan with seafood. Here’s a display at the Auchan Hypermarket in North Avignon - visited on the way back from the coffee fixing expedition.

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As the fragrant smell of one of the famous fruit cakes drift through from the kitchen, we would like to wish you all a very Happy Christmas and a safe, peaceful and recession-curing 2010.

Au bientot

Lovonne and Simon xx

Comments

One Response to “A Week in Provence - Winter [8&9]”

  1. barbs on December 22nd, 2009 2:45 am

    hi Lovonne, this is Barbs, Bert and Yonanda’s friend…wow, what a week. I don’t think we had snow on the south side of the Luberon..

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