Tag Archives: iveco

Tuesday 26th November 2019 – YET ANOTHER EVENING …

… walk missed tonight.

Not through any lack of willingness or through any other distraction. In fact, I did my best and made about 100 metres down the road before the savage winds and torrential rainstorm drove me back and inside again.

Not the kind of weather to even send a dog out.

What with one thing and another, it was a very late night yet again. The problem is that when you start on one thing, you’ll be surprised at just how many other things there are.

Mind you, I still beat the third alarm out of bed. Not by very much, I have to say, but I beat it all the same. Despite having only 405 hours sleep, I have a vague recollection that there was some epitaph for someone who had died and it involved a piece of music. However it wasn’t that piece of music that they were listening to at all but another piece of music completely and I’ve no idea at all why this piece of music was chosen as the title of this obituary

Well, that was what was on the dictaphone and if you can make any sense of it, let me know. There’s a “contact me” button down on the bottom right of your screen.

After the medication and breakfast I attacked the dictaphone notes. And after a good session I’m now down to a mere 76. But there are some pretty big entries left in there, including one of FOUR HOURS and so it’s not going to be plain sailing by any means.

Round about 09:o0 I came to a stop as I needed to sort out some info for the tax Office. This involved printing out some stuff and of course it was at this moment that the printer decided to throw a hissy-fit.

It took me an age to sort out everything, including trying out two different blue ink printer cartridges before I could find one that worked. And I even filed a few papers away, and that’s not like me.

By the time that I was organised it was about 11:15 so I hurried off, not realising that I’d forgotten the most important document of them all.

red iveco daily van abandoned port de granville harbour manche normandy franceThe harbour gates were closed so I went the pretty way over the top.

But at first I couldn’t see the old red Iveco daily that has been parked on the car park by the fish processing plant for quite a while. It wasn’t there

But it’s not gone far. It’s been moved out to the edge of the car park now overlooking the loading and unloading dock, although I’m not sure why.

It was about 11:45 when I reached the Tax Office and although there was just one person ahead of me, I had to wait an age. It was after the place had closed for lunch and i could tell that the guy who saw me wasn’t impressed by that.

Although I was there in the computer, he couldn’t find any details of my visit there last year which was bizarre. There was nothing on record, not even my tax exemption certificate. I just KNEW that I would regret forgetting to take a copy with me.

Anyway, I left him with all of my papers and he can sort them all out himself. If he needs anything else he can write to me.

haystacks war memorial place place general de gaulle granville manche normandy franceThey had to let me out of the back door and I headed off into town. As I expected, the Post Office was closed for lunch, so I needn’t have written those letters.

But I’m glad that I came because I was able to see them doing something completely bizarre in the Place General de Gaulle by the War Memorial. They’ve heaped up a pile of haystacks, for whatever reason I really don’t know.

And anyway, the boulangerie was open so I bought another dejeunette for lunch. This is becoming a habit. And why not? The bread is always fresh, there’s no waste and the walk down to town and back does me good.

Cheese butties for lunch because I’ve finished off one pot of hummus and there was some cheese left over in an opened packet. have to use that up.

After lunch, I still had these carrots to deal with so I sliced them all up, blanched them with some bay leaves and now that they are thoroughly drained and dried they are now in the freezer freezing away to themselves.

I just have to go there every so often to break them up so they don’t congeal in a solid mass.

airbus ec145 helicopter granville manche normandy franceThat was the cue for me to go for another walk this afternoon.

And just as I stepped out of the door a helicopter flashed right past the car park at almost-sea-level. I’m not sure who was more surprised, me or him, but I had the presenc eof mind to snap him as he flew past me.

And it’s come out rather well considering. But I do wonder what is going on with people getting their choppers out all over the place.

trawlers english channel granville manche normandy franceThat wasn’t the only activity out there either.

The tide had turned and was on its way in and so the fishing boats were slowly making their way back to harbour. There were two trawlers out there and as far as I could see, they were painted in the same livery so presumably they belong to the same people.

They were on their way in to port to unload.

boat english channel ile de chausey granville manche normandy franceThere was something else out there too so I took a photo of it to enlarge back in the apartment.

Despite my best efforts, it’s not improved the situation very much. There’s a smallish boat coming over from the Ile de Chausey and it’s going at quite a rapid rate of knots.

So we’ll have to pass on that one for now and try again some other time.

storm high winds port de granville harbour manche normandy franceAlthough the tide was quite some way out right now, the storm that we were having and the high winds were pushing the waves along quite dramatically.

Down here they were pummelling their way into the sea wall with quite a considerable amount of force.

It would have been nice to have been out there and to see what was going on at high tide.

spirit of conrad omerta aztec lady chantier navale port de granville harbour manche normandy franceWe’ve had another change in the composition of the visitors to the chantier navale.

We can see the usual suspects. Spirit of Conrad is there, and so are Omerta and Aztec Lady. But where has the fishing boat gone – the modern one that was over to the right behind the others?

It looks as if it’s gone back into the water again. Presumably they’ve finished what it was that they were doing.

fishing boats port de granville harbour manche normandy franceAs I aid just now, the tide is on the turn and so the fishing boats are on their way back to port.

And as you can see, there’s already quite a large queue of boats down there underneath the fish processing plant busily unloading what they have caught today.

The cranes are working hard pulling up some of the containers, but there’s also one boat unloading its catch into the white van parked underneath.

rainstorm baie de mont st michel granville manche normandy franceWe haven’t finished the photos either.

You probably noticed in the photo of the Ile de Chausey just now that there seemed to be a rainstorm out to sea. But by the time that I had worked my way around my circuit it had now advanced into the Baie de Mont St Michel.

And as I said at the start, we got the lot down our necks later.

Back here I amended a few web pages, worked on the Christmas presents that I needed to order (and that took some ordering too, I’ll tell you, and a big pile of work to go with it) and then stopped for tea. There was half a pepper and a few mushrooms that needed eating so I added a potato to it and made a curry. The fennel and fenugreek that I had bought gave it all a beautiful kick, and the coconut milk left over from the carrot soup added something to it too.

And even better, there’s some left over for later in the week.

No walk because of the weather, so i was chatting on the internet for a while and then writing my notes. But you’ve no idea how quickly the time passes and I’m late for bed.

Let’s hope that I have a good sleep.

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Thursday 29th June 2017 – I’VE JUST DROPPED …

… half of my tea all over the floor.

Well, half of the curry anyway. So never mind – I have a couple of small tins of mushrooms and so one of them went into what was left and it didn’t end up too bad.

Mind you – I’m not surprised that that happened. I’ve been half-asleep all afternoon what with one thing and another.

Sleeping on the sofa might be comfortable, but it’s regrettably not as comfortable as my big new bed and while Rosemary said that she had the best sleep that she’s had for ages (so much so that she’s going to buy a new bed as soon as she returns home) I was tossing and turning for much of the night.

The alarm was programmed to go off at 06:00 and I was up and about long before then. But women take their time of course and it was 06:55 before we hit the road. Rosemary has a long way yet to go and not much time to do it either, and this wasn’t really the time to be hanging about.

I led her out to the edge of town and from there she was off on her own. I stopped to pick up a baguette and then came back for breakfast.

For most of the morning I was working on the blog. I’m into March 2012 right now, and the modernisations to the earlier modernisations are proceeding apace too. But the more that I do, the harder it’s going to become because I’ve been doing the easy stuff first.

After lunch on my wall, I went into town again. The Bank had told me that my bank cards are ready to be picked up and so I went to fetch them. I need them for shopping tomorrow.

I went to look at the Marité (she’s back) and to make a few enquiries about potential voyages. The girl at the reception desk didn’t know too much about the voyages so she referred me to the website.

One thing is for sure, though. And that is that they don’t go to anywhere exciting. I was hoping for a trip to the Roaring Forties and maybe a lap o two around Cape Horn. But I’m told that I would be lucky if I had a trip around the bay here.

Somehow it’s not the same.

One thing that did catch my eye on the quayside was a huge pile of scrap metal. All old cookers, fridges, a few engines and – an Iveco lorry that had been cut into bits.

The writing on the fridges was in English – and then I noticed that the lorry was a right-hand drive vehicle. So this pile of scrap has come in from a British possession somewhere, and I seemed to have missed the ship that brought it in.

That is, unless it was the load brought in by the Whatsit the other week and has yet to be moved.

Armed with the bank cards – and a citron sorbet fom the ice-cream shop I walked back up here for a rest – and, as I said earlier, a kind-of drift in between sleeping and waking.

And then I dropped my curry.

So a good sleep tonight (I hope) back in my bed and then shopping tomorrow. Now that I have access to my cash I’m going to buy a little hi-fi. I know that I said that I wouldn’t spend very much before I went to Canada, but I’m missing my music.

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Saturday 4th July 2015 – NOW THAT WAS A REALLY NICE …

swimming baths piscine commentry allier france… afternoon at the swimming baths in Commentry. Glorious hot weather, I was all sweaty, what more could I say?

The sides of the pool were open and people were disporting themselves on the terrace and on the lawn (picnicking allowed) and the pool was packed out. So much so that I was going up and down the pool in one of the swimming lanes.

I was there for well over two hours too which is something of a record. But then again, there was so much to see. Ohh yes – I can still chase after the women at my age. I just wish that I could remember why.

tiles for shower room les guis virlet puy de dome franceAnd why was I all hot and sweaty? That was because I’d been mauling about half a tonne of tiles and cement about.

Caliburn is now loaded up with tiles for the shower room. You can see in the photo what I’m having. I’m not having those joining pieces though. I’ve bought some “different shades of grey” mosaic tiles, the type where you can cut the string with scissors. That way, if I start from the bottom with the darker tiles and start from the top with the lighter tiles, the gap in the middle can be filled quite easily without the aid of a tile cutter.

Quite astonishingly, I’d been around all of the usual places, done two laps around Brico Depot and loaded up Caliburn by just 11:45. Having the Dawn Chorus wake me up in the morning is an excellent idea. I even had time to go and buy the glass for the window above the shower room door before they closed for lunch.

A trip around LeClerc (where I remembered to change the empty gas cylinder for a new one) and round the Auchan, and I was away from there by 13:45 and in the pool at Commentry by 14:30.

old cars unic pick up montlucon allier franceI’d seen a few old cars on my travels too. This is a Unic pick-up that I saw at a tyre-fitting place in Montlucon on my way around.

Unic was a popular French car-maker before World War II, and many of the taxis that took the French troops to fight at the Marne were Unics. After the war, the company was taken over by Simca, for whom it was the commercial vehicle arm.

old cars unic pick up montlucon allier franceIn 1968 the marque was sold to FIAT and in 1975 was incorporated into the IVECO mark.

You can tell by the FIAT- like badge that This pick-up is from the period 1968-75 and so it’s doing really well to be still on the road and working. and I do have to say that I was impressed by the bodywork repairs on the cab corners, but you have to resort to tricks like this with such a vehicle, as I imagine that body panels are almost non-existent.

Chenard et Walcker peugeot D4 durdat larequille allier franceThe second interesting vehicle that I saw today is almost certainly older. This is one of the Chenard et Walcker vans that were sold by Peugeot as the D3 and D4 series from 1950 to 1965 when the model was replaced by the J7.

This os one of the later ones, as you can tell by the snout at the front. The very first models were powered by a 2-cylinder flat-twin two-stroke motor but that quickly gave was to the 4-cylinder four-stroke engine out of the Peugeot 203 and later the Peugeot 403. The 4-cylinder engines were too long to fit in the body, hence the snout.

It is possible to tell whether this is a D3A, a D3B, a D4A or a D4B, but not by me at this distance. Still, it’s pretty old and quite an interesting curio.

market hall commentry allier franceAll of the roads around Commentry were closed for repair and so I had to come back through the town. This took me past the Market Hall, the first time for ages.

I remember the market hall as being a dreary, dingy place when I first came past here years ago, but they seem to have done it proud with a programme of modernisation. It looks so much better now that ever it did before.

So that was my day – another expensive one, but loads of interesting vehicles and a lovely day at the baths. i’m off for an early night now to make the most of it.

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