… has certainly changed dramatically over the last week or so and I’m glad that I went to Jersey when I did.
While I was out there this afternoon on my post-prandial crawl, there was another rainstorm out in the bay. It was missing us by quite a few miles and battering the Pointe de Carolles and Jullouville.
But not to worry. We had had a considerable numbers of showers throughout the day. One moment we had bright sunlight and the next moment we were knee-deep in the rain.
What has happened today, if you haven’t guessed it from watching the rain cloud, is that the wind has turned round.
Instead of blowing from the south-east it’s now back in its usual direction of north-west. That has stirred up all of the waves and as you can see, Le Loup, the marker light on the rocks at the entrance to the harbour, is taking something of a battering.
Not as much as it might have done though because the wind has dropped slightly today. Had we had yesterday’s wind, we wouldn’t have seen it for the spray.
but at least the local vegetation is enjoying it.
As we have said before … “and on many occasions too” – ed … the local vegetation is extremely resilient. As you can see, the weeds that grow around here have sprung dramatically into life already.
You would have thought that after 47 days without a drop of rain they would have been dead and buried but that’s far from the case. You can see now how it is that after a rainstorm in the Sahara, animal life suddenly makes a dramatic reappearance after having lain dormant for so long.
Unfortunately, last night I didn’t remain dormant long enough.
While you look at a couple of photos of the waves breaking on the harbour wall I was tossing and turning in bed trying my best to sleep.
The number of times that I awoke for no good reason is something that I can’t understand, but there we are. It’s not as if there were masses of notes on the dictaphone.
And once again, leaving my stinking pit was something of a challenge too, just as it has been for the last few weeks or so. I might be feeling a little better these days and not falling asleep during the afternoon but I’m obviously not that much better.
after the medication I came in here and checked my mails.
And to my surprise there was a message from that garage in British Columbia. But only to say that the VIN that I quoted was wrong.
What I had to do then was to contact Rosemary to ask her to take a photo of her friend’s Carte Grise so that I can forward it on. A photograph can’t lie.
But I seemed to have dropped myself right into the middle of some “events” down there and we’ll have to see how that transpires.
So while you look at few more photos, this time of boats, which in this one might be Spirit of Conrad I put everything behind me and started work.
The morning was spent on my trip to Jersey last week. And despite all the time that I spent on it, I’m still standing at the ferry terminal waiting to board Victor Hugo in order to set off for the Channel Islands.
That’s about photo number 5, and when you realise that there are 94 altogether that need things doing to them, you’ll understand that it’s going to be a very long job. Especially when you consider that I’m not as young, fit and enthusiastic as I used to be.
This afternoon … well, shock! Horror! I’ve cleaned the bathroom.
It goes without saying that I had a shower first so that I wouldn’t dirty it afterwards, and then I stripped out all that I could. The floor has been brushed, vacuumed and mopped, the carpet has been cleaned, and so has absolutely everything else.
What I haven’t done though is to empty and clean the cupboards. There are limits to what I’m prepared to do when I’m not feeling too well. That’s going to be a job for another time.
But really, I’m swamped in unused medicine and so on and I really don’t know what to do with it. The best plan will be to speak to the chemist next time that I’m down there and check with her.
Eventually I could call a temporary halt to the proceedings in the bathroom because it was time for my afternoon stagger outside.
As usual I wandered over to the wall at the end of the car park to see what was happening down there on the beach.
Just a handful of people down there this afternoon wandering about in the sunshine. No-one sunbathing, which is no surprise, and no-one in the water either. It seems that the summer is now over as far as that is concerned.
Mind you, they wouldn’t have far to run each time the weather broke because they couldn’t be any wetter standing in the water than they would be standing in the rain.
“The boy stood on the burning deck
While all around had fled
But for the rain
I’d examine his brain
a passing psychiatrist said”
The weather further out to sea was quite hazy but closer to home there were some surprising views today.
One of the best was the Ile de Chausey. It’s not every day that we see it looking as nice as this. It was quite clear and we could see the colours of the island quite distinctly
Interestingly, you can see some white vertical lines over there on the island. Many of the houses down there are all painted white and what you are actually seeing is the the sun catching the end walls of the houses and the light reflecting therefrom.
And you can see how rough the sea is as well today. That’s probably one of the reasons why there are no swimmers.
Having seen all that there was to see over on this side of the headland I crawled down to the viewpoint on the other side of the headland where I could overlook the port.
Yesterday we saw Le Coelacanthe and le Tiberiade moored down there, but they have cleared off today. In their place, and obviously compting in a new series of “Musical Ships” is La Grande Ancre
She has one of the harbour lighters on board, as well as a pile of fishing equipment.
There’s another boat behind her – a small inshore shell-fishing boat but at this distance I’m not able to see who she might be. Anyway, she didn’t stay long and was soon on her way.
Meanwhile, more excitement in the Chantier Naval.
Trafalgar, the white trawler with blue and pink stripes, has now gone back into the water and her place has been taken by an unidentified shell-fishing boat.
Also back in the water today is Charlevy. She’s been replaced by Le Styx whom we saw moored in the inner harbour for a few days.
There’s another change too. Le Poulbot has moved from her position in front of Le Soupape and she’s now up on blocks in front of Le Styx.
Plenty of people down there working too. It’s quite a hive of activity down there this afternoon.
A little earlier you might have noticed a photo with a yacht and a cabin cruiser in it.
This is a better photo of the cabin cruiser. It looks quite old and I bet that it’s a beast of a thing and just the kind of boat that I would like to own.
It’s quite a shame really but had things been very different, I might have ended up living on a boat in a harbour. But then again, had things really been different, I would still be living in the Auvergne. sigh
Still, this isn’t the time to be all broody
Just in case you are wondering where Trafalgar is, she’s over there just about to tie up in front of Les Bouchots de Chausey
There’s a large pile of fishing net just there where she’s about to tie up, so I imagine that’s her net and they’ll be fixing it back on this evening ready to go out fishing tomorrow.
From there I headed back home where I had an “unusual” encounter with a rather inebriated motorist who wanted to engage me in conversation
This afternoon I walked quite far considering everything. But it showed that I’m still far from having recovered from the events of last week. And even if I were to be moving around easier, I’d still be quite wary about trusting this right leg in the future.
Back here I had some more ginger beer and then listened to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. I was taking an exam for the Open University. There was one subject with 3 parts to this question, each of which was an essay all done under the heading of one question. It was quite complicated. The first part I did without too many problems whatsoever. The second part was much more difficult but the third part seemed to be straightforward so I simply dictated that answer then went back to do the second part. At one point I stood up to walk around and stretch my legs just as one of the main invigilators came into the room. He was astonished to see people up and about walking around. He ordered us to sit down and carry on. It was 20 past something already and we only had 10 more minutes. I was suddenly in a panic then. Not only had I to dash down the rest of the answers to this second part, I realised that the third part being dictated won’t fetch any marks. I’d have to write that out again. Then my handwriting had disintegrated and became more like a doctor’s handwriting. I thought to myself that really this is going to be an absolute and total fail before I even started anything. I could see that happening here..
Later on I was working for the Resistance. It was being completely shaken up by the French government. Ally my hippie friends were being pursued. I was trying to keep out of the way but at the same time give them what support I could. There was a group of them fleeing down Crewe Road towards Goodall’s Corner in Shavington. I followed them down there at a safe distance. Most of them had been dispersed. There was just a couple there. They’d gone on a flight in a light aircraft. I joined the flight and it went to Paris. We all piled out at Paris in the suburbs and the plane went off to land somewhere for the night. We would make our way on foot to that place so as not to attract attention by arriving by plane. We started to walk. This young girl who was in charge was extremely nervous. An older person was rather more steady so I found myself walking with him or her for much of the time. I noticed that the lens hood of my camera had gone. It must have fallen off either in the plane or when we were running around. We came to near the Gare du Nord to catch our train. There were three statues at the side of the road. The other guy went to take a photo of them so I did too but my camera decided not to work for some reason no matter how much I tried (and that’s a recurring theme during my dreams, isn’t it?). By now this girl was in a real state because there had been €1400 taken from her bank account “to pay crash fees”. There had been another deduction for crash fees that she’d not seen how much it was yet in respect of this light aeroplane. apparently when it landed it was detained for e few minutes and the pilot questioned before he could go on his way again. They linked it to this girl and somehow with having access to her bank account they’d debited her with crash fees, which were the fees for the officials to turn up at the site. I was thinking jamais deux sans trois but I hope that this aeroplane will be OK when we meet it and that it hasn’t really crashed because she’d really have something about which to complain if they take away the money from her account for the real crash of an aeroplane.
There was some curry left over after yesterday’s tea and I wanted to do something different with it.
Consequently I made some pastry with the aim of making something like a Cornish pasty with it. But my pastry didn’t turn out too well, there wasn’t enough filling and generally speaking it wasn’t a great success from the making point of view.
But from the eating point if view, it was everything that you would want from an impromptu meal, along with baked potatoes and veg cooked in a really thick gravy.
There were really no words to describe how nice this was. It made quite a pleasant change from the usual diet.
So bedtime now. Not much to clean now and I’ll finish that tomorrow with a bit of luck. And then I can speak to the woman who I’ve lined up to come and clean for me.
It was a step that I thought that I would never take but it’s taken me almost 3 weeks to clean this place and it’s still not very good. But I can’t keep on going like this. Something needs to change, although I’m not quite sure what.
But I’ll worry about that another time. Right now I’m off to bed.
On the way up to the physiotherapist I’d noticed that the decorations in the Rue Couraye have … errr … evolved.
or 
last night with 2 men and a woman escaping from the Germans. They ended up hiding in a forest and next morning they set out again. I remembered this film in my dreams – a film that inspired me about the Auvergne (although how I ended up in the Auvergne is nothing to do with any film at all) because the forest where they had been hiding was just like what I thought the forest in the Auvergne would be. It’s all very confusing. So they set off. The woman and a man set off together and another man walked on his own. he must have found a lift because he disappeared off the scene. The man and a woman went on walking and an old grey Albion lorry went past, one from the late 60s with an early Mandator TG4 cab actually and nothing to do with World War II, a left-hand drive one as well. Eventually they were picked up by some old woman who led them into town. They walked past a café and there sitting in the window was their friend who bore a very strong resemblance to Michel de Berg (and what’s he doing putting in an appearance here?). He left the café and followed them into the town centre. They went into a place and a fight broke out, I’m not quite sure why. The old woman was immediately suspicious of the two people whom she had brought in but anyway she went downstairs and the two people, the man and the girl whom he’d taken with her, they were already downstairs with the 3rd guy and were sitting at some tiny table tucked into the corner somewhere right by the toilet. When the girl came out of the toilet there was a whole rush of people trying to go in. The 3 people sat down and tried to order something. They had ordered a coffee but they were trying to order something to eat as well.
