Monday 10th June 2013 – IF YOU PEER …

port joinville ile d'yeu france… through the doom and gloom and the fog and mist you can just about make out the town of Port Joinville on the Ile d’Yeu.

I’ve managed to struggle across the Bay of Biscay. Strawberry Moose was smuggled aboard as a stowaway in a suitcase along with the usual bottle of the hard stuff.

As a result we were treated to strains of “It Was On The Good Ship Venus” all the way across.

After all, you can all remember him rehearsing for the chant de marins competition in Saint-Jean-Port-Joli, Quebec, Canada last year.

caliburn overnight parking fromentine ile d'yeu franceHere’s my spec from last night though. Tucked out of the way down a dead-end road near a sailing school kind of place.

That was another comfortable night spent here – as you know, I’ve stayed here before and I had no complaints that time either.

I was up and about quite early too, and took Caliburn to the garage where he’ll be staying for the next week or two.

The owner is a big fan of old cars and we had quite a chat – so much so that I almost missed the navette that would take me to the ferry.

Luckily though I managed to leap aboard – well, with such leaping as I do these days – I’m not as young as I was and we headed off into the briny.

fort boyard fromentine ile d'yeu franceIt’s been a long time since we’ve had a ship of the day and there isn’t a great deal of choice here in Fromentine.

This little offshore supply vessel will have to do for now. She’s the Fort Boyard, built in 2002 (although you would never think so to look at her) and just 472 tonnes.

She takes her name from the Napoleon-era island fortress just down the coast near Rochefort.

Our boat, which I forgot to photograph by the way, is just a simple jetfoil thing.

It’s the kind of ship that people as old as me would remember that used to do the express connection between Dover and Oostende back in the 1970s and, looking closely at it, it was probably the same boat.

And not a coffee machine in sight. What a waste of time this is.

And so I passed the time on the way across by reading one of the books that I had bought at the bookshop yesterday.

port joinville ile d'yeu france And it wasn’t until I was half-way across that I realised the significance of the book that I had chosen. Walter Lord’s A Night to Remember – probably the most-famous (and most-likely the most accurate) story of the sinking of the Titanic.

How appropriate was that?

Cécile met me at the terminal at Port Joinville and took me for a ride around the island to show me everything.

And one thing that I do like about island life is that the Controle Technique – or MoT regulations to the British – are somewhat relaxed if you have no intention of ever taking your vehicle to the mainland.

plateau peugeot 203 pick-up ile d'yeu franceAnd so here’s a vehicle that I would absolutely die for.

A Peugeot 203 plateau, or pick-up. I would pay a King’s ramsom to have one of these, that’s for sure.

It’s been my dream to own one of these for almost 40 years, ever since I first encountered one on my walking tour of Finisterre in the mid-70s

plateau peugeot 203 pick-up ile d'yeu franceI’ve seen a few since then, and more than just the odd one for sale, but none that was worth having.

They had rather the unfortunate habit of bending in the middle due to rot round about where the rear of the cab joined up with the pick-up bed and that’s not a do-it-yourself repair by any means.

But this one looks pretty sound underneath, due not least to the amount of oil that has been thrown up out of the rear seal of the gearbox

Apart from that, I’ve had the guided tour of the cote sauvage – the wild part of the island, and it really does live up to everything that I was told that it would.

Mind you, it’s only early June and the tourists haven’t yet arrived.

I bet that it will be nothing like this in August.

-2

Sunday 9th June 2013 – HERE’S MY SPEC ….

caliburn autoroute rouen france… from Saturday night’s sleepover.

Leaving Calais I drove for a couple of hours and parked up at about 03:00 just short of Rouen on a motorway rest area.

And probably one of the best nights’ sleeps I have ever had. Totally painless and I’ll stop here again!

From here it was straight down the motorway through the depressing weather all the way to near Nantes and from there down to Fromentine.

Not a hiccup along the way (I hope that I was sticking to the limit when I drove past the Kojak with a Kodak) except at Rouen where I ended up in some kind of mayhem around the old harbour

We had marching bands, tall ships and all that kind of rubbish and it took hours to extract myself from the chaos.

When are they going to build a flaming by-pass around that blasted place?

At Frometine I arrived, would you believe, in the middle of a brocante.

And what a brocante it was – there wasn’t anything for sale under about €100. I really do think that some people have taken leave of their senses when it comes to valuing their possessions.

A bit of good luck, though – the second-hand bookshop was open so I bought a few more history books.

That’s one thing that I’m finding with raiding a few of these bookshops – that there are huge gaps in the British version of European history that can only be filled by a French perspective on things.

So far, I’ve bought a huge volume on the Hundred Years War, a couple of books on The Battle of the Rail – the fight of the French cheminots against the SS during the crucial 10 days after D-Day and today, a book on the Allied invasion of Provence.

These are all events that British historians simply gloss over, and it’s nice to read about these events from another point of view.

There’s a pizza place in Fromentine, run by a woman who comes from Morlaix, a town in Finisterre where I spent a few relaxing weeks back in 1976 or something.

She made me a nice vegan pizza (good job that I was prepared with my vegan cheese) – after all, it is Sunday – and then I went off to my spec from the other week to pass the night.

I’ve an early sail in the morning.

-2

Saturday 8th June 2013 – IT’S NOT EVERY DAY …

steam locomotive romney hythe dymchurch railway dungeness kent uk;.. that you are woken up by a steam locomotive these days.

But it does happen every now and again if you play your cards right. and so here I am down on the beach at Dungeness and, true to form, rattling past Caliburn in his nice little spec underneath the old lighthouse went one of the locomotives of the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Railway.

“Romney Marsh” I hear you say. That’s right. He played on the wing for Queens Park Rangers and later for Manchester City.

But anyway that was where I spent the night of Friday and Saturday although it was really Saturday morning when I arrived.

And I also told you a little fib about being awoken by a steam locomotive, because about 10 minutes earlier I had been burnt out of the van by the heat and that’s the first time that that has happened this year.

So Dymchurch and Romney Marsh – I was here for a variety of reasons.

dymchurch abandoned railway station kent uk

  1. it’s by the sea
  2. it’s the furthest south-east point of the UK, closest point to the Real World
    3. it’s something like “home from home” because keen readers of this rubbish will know that I’ve stayed here before
  3. I wanted to look for the remains of the old standard-gauge railway that ran down to here (and indeed I found plenty, including the remains of the platform and the base of the station buildings)
  4. Most importantly, though, it was only a short drive from where these famous roofing tiles were awaiting collection.


    5. On the way to the tiles I made a detour to the old Lydd-Ferryfield airport, the home of the service that used to fly you and your car across the Channel in a fleet of weird converted Bombay bombers to Le Touquet and now the home of a flying school and a few private planes.

    supermarine spitfire lydd ferryfield airport kent ukand once again, if your luck is in it’s really in becuse what should arrive at the same time that I did but a Mark XIX Spitfire, ex photo-reconnaissance, making an emergency landing with an overheating engine, according to one of the mechanics who had been called out.

    Having blagged my way out onto the tarmac for a closer look, even I was able to diagnose the fault – clogged radiators.

    Maybe a bird strike or maybe simple lack of basic maintenance, but there you are. No-one these days seems to be able to understand the principles of basic maintenance unless they have a computer handy.

    The pilot was quite garrulous though, and we spent most of the time chatting about the Lancaster bomber that I’m trying to save from disaster, with me trying to enlist his support.

    Afer picking up the tiles I went to do the rounds of the supermarkets and tool shops, being entertained by a Red Arrows just off the coast of Folkestone on the way. Pretty disappointing, because no-one crashed or landed in the sea, and we didn’t have a mid-air collision either. Not much point in having the Red Arrows if you ask me if they can’t entertain the crowds properly.

    In one of the supermarkets though, passing through the checkouts, I was asked if I had a bag. I replied that I did, but that she was outside in the car. And seeing as how it was Saturday night, while waiting on the ferry terminal I guzzled down the take-away curry that I had bought from an Indian in Folkestone.

    “Pushing the boat out” in many senses of the word.

    -6

Friday 7th June 2013 – WELL, I’M OFF.

But then you all knew that already.

The Postie delivered my monster CD order and now I’m free to leave at any time I like for a couple of weeks. Liz found me a cheapo ferry on the site that she uses – it’s at 04:00 so I’ll be leaving in a bit for the UK.

That’s really all that I’ve done today apart from clearing up and dealing with this load of web stuff that I mentioned the other day. The apartment here is still a mess and I’m not really making much progress but I will have a couple of months when I come back to deal with it all and isn’t that famous last words?

I’m not sure when I’ll have internet access again. After the UK I’ll be off to Fromentine and the Ile d’Yeu to do the two weeks’ work that I promised Cécile in exchange for her two weeks here back in April and there won’t be any internet access there, that’s for sure.

after that, it’s back to Pooh Corner, the radio, and two weeks working on the bathroom here as when I return to Brussels at the beginning of July I want to buy all the tiles from that guy who did us so handsomely when we were working on Expo in early 2011.

So, see you soon. Don’t wander away in my absence.

-3

Thursday 6th June 2013 – I MIGHT HAVE BROKEN …

… the back of all of this paperwork. I think that I’ve found it all and I’ve sorted it into at least things that need to be taken home for a further sorting or things that I can simply throw away. A mere 14 sacks there are – and that’s just the stuff for throwing.

Anyway, I’ve started emptying the sideboard in the living room now and that’s exciting too. I opened one of the doors and a couple of bats flew out – it’s that kind of sideboard. I’ll be here for a bit yet.

That was this afternoon though. This morning I made a rather startling discovery – or, rather, rediscovery. I went to Labrador in 2010 as you ll know by now and I wrote all of the web pages to cover the journey from Baie Comeau in Quebec all the way round to getting on the boat at Channel-Port-aux-Basques in Newfoundland that was going to take me across the Gulf of St Lawrence to Cape Breton Island.

But while I was ferreting about looking for something else, I came across a huge file that was in fact a large part of the journey, all properly written up as far as New Glasgow, and I can’t think why I never finished it all off. Anyway, I reckon that now I’ve done all of the radio stuff for the next while I deserve some time to myself so for a couple of hours each morning I’ll be doing that.

And pet hate of the day? When someone asks for my advice and I give it, and they go off and do something else completely, and when that all goes pear-shaped they spend half an hour ranting at me. Agatha Christie wrote in the Sleeping Murder, “Good advice is almost certain to be ignored, but that’s no reason for not giving it” – I’m not convinced of that if I’m going to be getting a pile of earache. I have better things to do with my time.

-5

Wednesday 5th June 2013 – HELLO AGAIN.

I thought that I would have a nice interesting introduction this evening, because in all probability it will be more exciting that the rest of the post.

Basically, nothing much has changed since yesterday. I’m still up to my ears in papers. Mind you, the wardrobes and wall unit in the main bedroom have been emptied and most of the stuff has been packed away.

I suppose that that is progress.

There are three large sacks full of clothes and one of shoes (Marianne seemed to like shoes) and they will all be headed for a clothing bank next time I take Caliburn for a joy ride. Someone else may as well have use of it all.

So apart from that, what else?

Ahhh yes – Julie went into St Eloy-les-Mines today which was quite lucky because today was the day that the compost bins that we ordered from the VALTOM were to be collected. So thanks for that, Julie.

And in other news, I’m going to the UK – to Dymchurch in fact – for a day quite soon.

Just as I was wondering where I can get boxes and packing tape from in bulk and regretting that there was no Screwfix nearer than Dover, and how I was feeling like a day out by the seaside, Terry rang me up. He’s just won a job lot of 400 slates on eBay and they are in Dymchurch, down on the edge of Romney March about 10 miles from Dover. Fuel and ferry fare offered, and you can’t say fairer than that.

It’s a region that I know quite well of course, and if you were following my adventures in March 2009 you will know that I spent a pleasant few days just down the road at Dungeness.

Yes, a nice day out this weekend would just suit me fine. I hope that the weather stays fine.

-2

Tuesday 4th June 2013 – I’M UP TO MY KNEES …

… in papers right now, trying to start the packing. But somehow it’s just not happening.

Someone once saif of Ford Madox Ford that they could put him in a totally empty room and come back later and find the place in total chaos. Anyone who comes here right now will understand exactly what they meant by now.

But never mind. Nietzsche famously said “out of chaos comes order”, but that was many years before I was born.

It depresses me, though. I’m not sure why it is but when God or whoever it was was handing out the tidying-up gene, I dunno where I was. I somehow make the place even more untidy until it looks like a total tip and then I lose interest or something and it’s always the same. The road to hell really is paved with good intentions.

I’ve been going round finding all of the DC appliances in the apartment, and believe me, ther are tons of them. But not a charger or transformer in sight. Anyway, today, I came across a drawer full of DC chargers and transformers, And not one of them labelled either. This is going to be fun, mating them all up.

And apart from that? Nothing at all. But then, that’s quite enough to be going on with, I reckon

0

I’m exhausted

I had another difficult night as far as sleep went, and it wasn’t half a struggle to crawl out of bed this morning, but after breakfast and a shower (I have one once a year whether I need it or not) by 10:00 I was at my (or rather, Marianne’s) desk ready to work.

There’s the third part of the radio programmes to do and I was planning on doing something on “who can check your identity”. For once though, the thoughts ran freely (not quite sure why) and by 14:00 I’d done a mere 3000 words on the subject.

That was the cue for shopping. First port of call was at the bank where I handed over Marianne’s death certificate and they promptly closed her account. and it is indeed as I feared – no life assurance policies, no burial policies, not a trace of anything else. Ahhh well – you live and learn. And I thought that I had learned enough by now, but you would never have guessed.

After the food shopping I called again at this electronics shop in the neighbourhood. Here I had another lucky find – two packs of 2×12-volt MR16 LD light bulbs – reduced for quick sale at €10 the pack. I know that I can but them at €3:99 each but the ones I get are rated at 1.2 watts – these are rated at 2.4 watts.

You might be thinking that that’s not very bright, but you wuld be surprised. The “watts” is quite a misleading measurement as it relates to the amount of current consumed. And in a traditional light bulb, much, if not most, of the energy is wasted as heat, as anyone who has touched an incandescent, or a halogen, light bulb will tell you. LEDs are quite cool even when they are lit, indicating that almost nothing is wasted. LEDs generally give out about 5 times the lumens per watt that an incandescent gives out, and while that might sound not an awful lot more (2.4 watts x 5 compared to, say 40 watts) the light from an LED is much more focused.

Anyway, I digress. Back here I carried on with my magnum opus and by the time I’d finished it (23:00 with an hour out for tea) I’d done over 3700 words on indentity checks, followed by over 2700 on “who can enter your house”. I really was having a good day today.

1306001As for tea, it was gorgeous. I might have mentioned that I made a potato pie last night while the pizza was cooking, and there’s half of the aforementioned. Add to that a heap of peas and carrots in butter and mint and it really was the most delightful meal that I’ve had for quite a while (excepting anything that Liz has cooked, of course). I’m going to have to watch myself here – I’m becoming far too civilised. At this rate I shan’t want to go home.

In other news, I’ve been invited by the Scientologists to go to watch a film at their headquarters. All to do with self-assertiveness and taking control. Hardly the sort of thing that Scientologists are famous for, of course. I wonder if there’s anything in this film about the use of pick-axe handles? They are always good for self-assertiveness and taking control.

And finally – “hooray” … ed – they say that retail therapy is always good for the soul when one is suffering from a little depression. For me, music is the key to my state of mind (provided that it isn’t The Thieving Magpie (La Gazza Ladra) by Marillion of course) and I have been feeling considerably depressed just recently, as you know. Consequently when Amazon announced a special promotion of 2 CDs for £9:00, over 1000 albums on offer, many of which I owned on plastic and haven’t yet replaced, well, I rather pushed the boat out a little and now I’m … errr …£63:00 (plus postage to Belgium) lighter.

But there’s some cracking stuff in there and I don’t consider it money wasted at all. I need cheering up right now. I’ve had a difficult Spring.

 

 

-5

I finally managed …

… a decent night’s sleep and had yet another weird dream. This time I was in the USA and, driving along a road, a came to a modern concrete bow-arch bridge. But it was so steep that the car wouldn’t climb up the road, so I had to leave the car at the bottom and climb up myself – and I DO mean climb, as if I were mountaineering up the roadway, and it wasn’t ‘arf difficult seeing as I was carrying my laptop with me.

On the other side of the bridge was a queue of traffic waiting to cross to the side from which I had come, and when the traffic lights turned green (which took an hour, so I l learned), they all streamed off over the bridge. I wasn’t sure what to do but in the end, seeing a lorry hesitate about at the lights, I flagged him down and climbed in to take me back to my car. And the driver gave some grief to his passenger, sitting in the back of the cab, about “see what happens when you mess me around when I’m trying to driv”. From then on, I met two girls that I knew, a short one with short black hair and a thinner, slightly taller one with long mousy blond hair in a pony tail, whose birthday it was that day.

Yes, a long time since I’ve had a dream like that. I must be starting to feel better.

So after a leisurely breakfast I had a morning off, not doing very much, and then went off to pick up the boxes that I won on Freecycle. From there I went to pay my respects to Marianne, but there I met with something of a disappointment. There seems to be a burial planned for the plot next to hers for tomorrow and they’ve been digging it out with a mini-digger. As a result, they’ve moved the temporary cross from over Marianne’s grave, all of the flowers and wreaths are disturbed, and the soil has subsided from over the top. It wasn’t very agreeable, I can tell you, and I wish that I had never been.

Back here, I’ve now started boxing things up, seeing as how I have boxes to put things in. That makes a difference. I’va also found another cheapo video camera here – on that works off AA batteries and SD cards. It doesn’t look like much in the way of quality but the AA batteries and SD card give it the versatility that I would like. I maight have a play with this.

It’s Sunday, of course, and so it’s pizza and garlic bread night. But I’ve also had a go at making a tarte aux patates – a potato pie. One of those roll-up pie bases with thinly-sliced potatoes, onions, garlic, black ground pepper and soya cream. I’ll let you know tomorrow night how it turns out.

As for posting comments, I’ve relaxed the restrictions a little so (hopefully) you can comment on the most recent postings. Give it a try and let me know how it works out.

-3

We had our first …

… letter today addressed to “les héritiers de Mme Orban Marianne”. It was from her Insurance Company – the “Mutualité Chrètienne”.

“We have heard about the death of Mme Orban and we would like to express our sincere condoleances. Mme Orban reeived payments from us due to her incapacity to work, and was paid for the fortnight 1st May – 14th May before we learnt of her death. We would therefore be obliged if you could refund the overpayment before the 27th June next”

That is the “Mutualité Chrètienne” – the Christian Mutual Insurance Company. It totally beggars belief. I’m convinced that Marianne would have been far better off with the heathens for all the good that the Christians did her. What happened to the “forgiveness of sins” and “turn the other cheek”? Poor Marianne must be turning in her grave.

Apart from that, what else have I done? Yes, I’ve updated  few web pages that I had rather let go for a while. Most of them concerned the administration of the site but one of them had a rather large role to play in my visit to Labrador in 2010 and I had never brought it up to date. It was high time that I did something about that, seeing as how I wrote it a mere 8 years ago.

I also finished the writing for the next rock programme and formatted it. That’s one more thing out of the way. And then I made a start on the next lot of additional notes, but I haven’t gone all too far with that right now.

Apart from going out for my baguette at lunchtime, that’s really about it, so exciting is my life. Tomorrow is shopping day so bring on the excitement!

-5

BY THE WAY …

… if you would like to comment on any of these articles (which I sincerely hope that you do – I love the interaction with my audience) but you are having difficulty doing so, please let me know using the Facebook link on the sidebar on the right.

I’ve had to change the “comments” settings to cut down on the absurd amounts of spam that I was receiving, and there’s a possibility that I might have overdone it.

Any feedback in that respect will be much appreciated.

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Thursday 30 May 2013 – IT’S BEEN ANOTHER …

… one of those depressing dismal days where it has rained almost non-stop from start to finish. It started off badly when I had another one of those dramatic awakenings, where I find myself sitting bolt upright and wide awake. I was having some kind of vivid dream (and I’ve been having a few of those just recently), and although I don’t remember anything about it, I had the uneasy feeling that there was a catastrophe occurring somewhere – and it was that thought that caused me to awaken so dramatically.

Anyway, after breakfast I made a start on writing the text for my next rock radio programme for Radio Anglais but by 13:00 I abandoned it to go and pick up Marianne’s death certificates from the funeral director. I stopped off at the fritkot at the Place Flagey for some frites on the way – after all, I’m in Belgium now.

From the funeral director’s, I went to the local nick to enquire after these allegations that have been made against me and, as I had no doubt whatsoever, they have been classées sans suite. I can’t have a copy of the complaint though – I need to ask an avocat to ask the Procureur du Roi for a copy. The coppers don’t think that it’s worth the effort though. According to them, they never took them seriously, even for a moment but had to go through the motions.

From there I walked through the torrential rain across the city to my notaire to let him have one of the copies of the certificate, passing by the grounds of the European Parliament on my way

European Parliament building paul-henri spaak brussels belgiumThere was a meeting taking place and I was tempted to go in and spectate as I have done in the past, but I had other things to do. But I couldn’t resist taking a photo of the sign outside the Paul-Henri Spaak Building.

It’s true that they have extraordinary meetings there – I’ve sat through a few – but if this notice proves anything at all, it is that as long as the UK sits on its haunches and refuses to push for additional staff to deal with the increased pressure of additional translations and leaves it all up to the local Flemish-speaking Belgians whose “English doesn’t need any supervision – it’s totally perfect”, we’ll have a few more extraordinary translations too.

From the notaire’s, it was back to the bank at the Rond-point Schuman to check that nothing unusual was happening to Marianne’s bank account, and then I gave up. My knees were hurting a bit after yesterday’s marathon, I wasn’t comfortable, I was soaking wet and so I took the metro and then the tram back home where I crashed out for a couple of hours. All this walking is certainly doing me good.

Tomorrow I’m having a day off and then I’ll attack the next stage of the clearing up on Monday.

-3

Wednesday 29th May 2013 – When was the last time that you saw …

Autobianchi Bianchi Chaussee de Charleroi Brussels… one of these? I couldn’t work out what it was at first. Either a Gogomobil or a Frisky was what was going through my head at first, but it is in fact an Autobianchi, a microcar from Italy and so rare that I haven’t even seen one in Italy. But here it was, sitting by the side of the road in the Chaussee de Charleroi in Brussels.

Anyway, after my lost day yesterday where I spent some of it in bed and the rest of it wishing that I was back in bed, I went out and about. And wasn’t that a waste of time?

Firstly to the Maison Communale for a copy of Marianne’s death certificate, and after much ado about nothing I eventually found the correct person. €8:50 they wanted – per copy – and after picking myself up off the floor and asking for two copies, I was told that I couldn’t have them as Marianne and I weren’t married. A notaire needs to apply, so it seems.

Not to be out-done, I went to the undertaker’s. Now I don’t know what he spends his extortionate fees on, but it’s not on his premises, I’ll tell you that. Art-deco 1920s is my guess and it hasn’t been cleaned since then. The kind of place where, if you give the curtains a good shake, a couple of bats would come flying out.

It seems that I’ve paid (well, I haven’t, but I’ve been booked down to pay for) 3 copies of the death certificate. So the secretary asked me “haven’t you had them yet?”, which elicited the obvious response of “why else would I be here if I had?”. anyway, she rang up the commune to enquire and she was told, and I heard it clearly from where I was sitting “but you never asked for them”. So someone else trying to stick me for dosh on false pretences. Anyway, after a lengthy discussion and “frank exchange of views”, I can go to pick them up tomorrow.

From there I went to have lunch and had the estate agents on the phone. They are extremely worried that I’m trying to deal them out of their commission and are thus keeping close tabs on me. But two can play at that game as well – I was not really in the mood for conciliation today.

After lunch I went for a good walk and found a CD sale. I’m €46 lighter but my CD collection is now considerably heavier and it’s all good stuff too. High time I took more care of myself and my well-being. As long as I can still hear the music I’m okay.

But apart from getting myself soaking wet, that was that. Highlight was, of course, the music. And also the Autobianchi.

 

 

-2

I was going to change Caliburn’s tyres yesterday …

… but we had a slight change of plan.

Cécile had a ‘phone call from her mother’s neighbour or someone on the island on Sunday – apparently Mother has had another funny turn and so Cécile’s presence was required.

After working on Ice Station Zebra to fit a few extra locks and so on, we went round to see Rosemary to pick up our shopping from the UK and to leave her a bicycle that one of her visitors wants to borrow. And then we headed off to Liz and Terry’s for tea (and gorgeous it was too) before going back to Ice Station Zebra for an early night.

Next morning, wide awake at 06:00, we loaded up Caliburn with a pile of stuff and after his Controle Technique (passed, of course), we got our motor running and headed for the highway, in the best Mars Bonfire tradition, and the general direction of Fromentine.

1305021That’s Fromentine there, looking from under the new bridge that links the isle of Noirmoutier to the mainland, but Cécile’s mother’s island is a little too far out for a bridge (like one hour’s sailing time) and so, having arrived nice and early, it left us the time to go for a wander and a little bit of looting and pillaging in a second-hand bookshop.

Once Cécile was safely installed upon her ferry I hit the high road and the 880-odd kilometres to Brussels. It is in fact more than 880-odd because the sat-nav, that works these things out, wants to send me around the Boulevard Peripherique in Paris, but even though that might be 60kms or so shorter, the hassle of getting around Paris, even after midnight, is simply not worth the effort and I always take the Francilienne, the N104 that does some kind of tortuous circular route around the city but far enough out so as not to ne encumbered by traffic at that time of night.

I was back in Brussels after my 1500km drive at 04:00, having stopped off at Ancénis for a pizza (thanks for the cheese, Rosemary) and by the time I had finished unloding Caliburn and parking him up in an uncontrolled parking zone 10 minutes walk away from here, it was 06:15.

Yes, yet another working day of over 24 hours. Brings back the good old days, doesn’t it? It must be all of, ohh, I dunno, three months, since my last over-24-hour working day.

-2