Tag Archives: trawler

Sunday 21st August 2022 – HAVING FINISHED …

… all of my work for the weekend by Saturday afternoon, I did something that I haven’t gone for quite some considerable time, and that was that I spent a few hours doing nothing at all except passing the time on the computer to no good purpose.

It was probably something to do with crashing out during the morning and the strong coffee that I’d had at half-time during the football but it was 04:00 when I finally fell into bed and I wasn’t tired then either. But with no alarm in the morning, I didn’t care either.

No-one went past with a steam engine this morning but even so I awoke a couple of times and at one point I was even planning on leaving the bed. But at … errr … 12:30 I finally saw the light of day.

First thing that I did of course was to go for the medication and then the next thing was to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. We were going for a ride on a fairground attraction but it was at an airport. We were in the queue and people just kept on pushing in front of the queue or pushing in ahead of us. There was no discipline in this queue. I rang up the owner or organiser etc to tell him. Of course while this was happening there were even more people pushing in to the front etc so that was a pointless exercise.

Later on I’d ordered a bank robbery in the style of THE LAVENDER HILL MOB with a few people, someone like Sid James and one of the women out of SAINT TRINIANS films. We had the money and secreted it away waiting for an opportune moment. Someone had come along and recognises Sid James as bandit from in the past, even though he’d been keeping his name quiet. Another member of my team came to hear about this and began to feel really edgy. He came to see me and I explained that this was all part of the plan. Instead of them using me to lay their hands on the money and no-one else I’d been using them to lay hold of their experience to pull the job and that I was well in control of the situation even if I didn’t think that I was.

And then there I was lying in bed until some ridiculous time when I decided eventually to get up. As I was sitting on the edge of the bed my father went past the room and shouted at me “isn’t it about time that I got myself going, something like that?”. So I started to dress. I picked up a few things and went downstairs into the street to walk down to the living room. I suddenly realised that I somehow seemed to have acquired one wellington boot and one cardboard box in which to fit my feet. I couldn’t understand what was happening here so I had to go back to my room and sort out some proper footwear so that I could go back down to the living room.

After brunch I did something even more exciting, which was to transcribe not one but two days’ worth of dictaphone notes from my trip around Europe. If I’m not careful I’ll be catching myself up at this rate and that won’t ever do.

By the time that I’d finished it was time to go out for my afternoon walk.

Not many people down there on the beach today, and there wasn’t anyone sunbathing.

Not that I was surprised because it was quite cool this afternoon. at one stage I was wondering whether to put un a sweater or something. And had I done so, I wouldn’t have been the only one wearing one.

There was someone wrapped in a towel so if he had just come out of the water he’s a better man that I am, Gungha Din.

And as usual while I was here I was having a good look around out to sea.

The first thing that I saw was something fairly large heading out of the bay past the Ile de Chausey and into the English Channel.

It wasn’t easy to identify it so I took a photo with the idea of enlarging and enhancing it when I returned hom later.

And in fact it’s a trawler heading out to sea, something that’s quite unusual for a Sunday. My understanding is that to preserve stocks, commercial fishing is discouraged if not prohibited on a Sunday. So maybe it’s a positioning voyage.

Unfortunately I can’t identify who she is at this distance.

She wasn’t the only boat out there this afternoon.

The tide is well in so I imagined that the harbour gates and the port de plaisance are open. And with it being a weekend, every man and his dog have brought their water craft to the port.

Five or six yachts in this photo along with several other assorted craft, but really I could have taken a dozen photos from here, all in different directions, that would have included as many boats in each one

So on that note I wandered off on my walk. Today I’m going for my post-prandial perambulation around the medieval city walls

Trawlers and yachts aren’t all of the watercraft out there this afternoon either.

As regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I’m always on the lookout for a few oars here and there and I spotted some others out in the bay this afternoon.

Having seen the kayakers practising in the tidal basin next to the Nautical Centre behind the port, it’s no surprise to see a couple of them out here in the bay this afternoon.

The little wheels on the deck of the one in front are quite interesting too. I suppose that they help when you are trying to manoeuvre your kayak around on dry land. I remember the fun that I used to have trying to do that when I was kayaking at school.

Anyway off I went around the walls and found myself along the little path at the foot thereof that leads to the Plat Gousset.

There was something flailing around out at sea and I wondered if it might be a dolphin or a whale or something like that. After all, there have sightings of all kinds of strange beasts in and around Normandy just recently.

But it is in fact a swimmer and he seemed to be making good and steady progress. And in this weather he deserves a medal.

There have already been REPORTS OF SHARKS IN THE ENGLISH CHANNEL. I’m not too sure if any are man-eating sharks but to be on the safe side I’d only swim far out if you are a woman or a child.

“And would a shark swallow me whole?”
“No. He’d spit that bit out.”

I’ll get my coat.

The path leads on round to the viewpoint that overlooks the Plat Gousset and I always stop there when I’m round this way.

Down below there aren’t the crowds that we have been having over the last few weekends. The cooler weather today is keeping them off the beaches which is just as well as sometimes just recently it’s been overwhelming down there.

There was a line of people sitting on the concrete wall at the edge of the slipway down to the beach.

Don’t ask me why because there was no entertainment down there today. Some weekends, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, there has been street theatre, musicians, all that kind of thing down on the Plat Gousset.

No policemen causing a road block this afternoon down on the corner of the Place Marechal Foch.

There were thousands of people milling about in the streets of the centre of the town though.

There’s another braderie taking place at the town-centre shops today. All of the streets are closed to traffic and the shopkeepers have set out their stalls for all of the passers-by.

It’s all surplus stock, last years unsellable items, this years end-of-summer-season sales with the aim of emptying the shops so that they have room for all of the autumn and winter stock that will be arriving soon.

In the past I’ve been for a wander down there but there never was anything that particularly caught my eye at a price that I could afford.

So resisting the temptation to go down the steps into the town, I carried on with my walk around the walls.

In the Square Maurice Marland there seems to be something rather bizarre happening.

While the square itself is descending into something of a less-than-genteel shabbiness we suddenly seem to have acquired a handful of plant troughs.

They are labelled with the names of individual “gardeners” who have presumably adopted the troughs and there are all kinds of things growing in them.

In this one for example, there’s what looks like a beetroot and some kind of strange plant with fruit that bear more than just a passing relationship to a tomato. Whatever the third plant it, I really have no idea.

A little further on down the path in the square there was something quite interesting to see.

This is something about which I’ve heard so much said just recently. The drought is causing all kinds of problems, one of which is that there is no longer enough water to hydrate the leaves of many of the deciduous trees.

The result of that is that many of the leaves are drying out and the tree is obliged to shed them in order to guarantee the survival of the ones less badly affected. That’s clearly quite evident here with dead leaves in the trees and an enormous pile of discarded leaves blown into a corner by the wind.

All of this behaviour in nature is in a sharp contrast with human behaviour. In humans, if one member is weak o unhealthy, the mother sacrifices everything to keep the weakest one alive. In the natural kingdom the weakest are often discarded to aid the survival of the strongest or healthiest.

There was a small sailing ship just outside the harbour heading our way.

And so I waited accordingly until it came into view so that I could photograph it. I have a feeling that I ought to know who she is but no name springs to mind. Regular readers of this rubbish ought to recognise them just as well as I do these days.

With nothing else happening out there this afternoon I came home for a glass of iced coconut milk and then to sort out the photos.

After lunch today I’d taken a lump of frozen dough out of the freezer and it had been defrosting during the course of the afternoon.

When it was ready I kneaded it, rolled it out and put it on the pizza tray where it could sit proofing itself.

When it was ready I assembled it and put it into the oven to bake and once more it looked quite appetising when it came out of the oven.

It tasted delicious too, which it always does these days. I seem to have found the knack of making them now which is no surprise after the number that I’ve baked over the last couple of years.

So having finished my notes, I’m off to bed. Despite the short day I’m exhausted and I’m ready for bed, especially with an 06:00 start in the morning. There’s a radio programme to do tomorrow.

Considering that Sunday is a day of rest, I’ve had a busy day today. In fact, I’ve had a busy weekend and if I manage to keep this up I shan’t know myself.

It’s quite possibly no coincidence that I had my first shot of Aranesp on Monday for over 2 months but I dunno. They say that it’s the injection of last resort and when I read THE SIDE-EFFECTS I can understand why. And now they want to increase the dose.

There’s no way that I would be having that injection if there were any other solution.

Tuesday 9th August 2022 – I’VE HAD ANOTHER …

… really bad day today.

And that’s completely miserable seeing as I forgot to switch on the alarm this morning and as a result ended up having an impromptu lie-in. You would have thought that I would have expected rather better after that.

So while you admire a few photos of the trawler Hermes I and La Granvillaise on a collision course out in the Baie de Granville I’ll tell you all about it.

And rather surprisingly, I didn’t go all that far during the night so that’s even more of a reason not to have had any difficulty today.

In fact, one of the first things that I did after having my medication and checking my mails and messages was to transcribe the dictaphone notes.

I was doing something with my friend from the Wirral and the Ford Cortinas but when I awoke it went almost completely. It was something to do with motorbikes as well and something else to do with lock-ups. I had some lock-ups in Wistaston and I wanted some extra ones particularly as I had acquired an extra car. We’d looked at a few but nothing seemed to be right. One came up in the block where I already had 2 or 3 so I had that but I hadn’t mentioned it to anywone which was why I kept on being reminded about it. I kept on having these reminders about looking for an extra lock-up garage. That’s how I bumped into my friend. He told me about his new car and how he’d come to get that.

And then later on there was an episode of the Clitheroe Kid about the Clitheroes on holiday at the seaside. Jimmy had been up to his usual tricks again and had to write out a apology to his grandfather in so many hundred words. He took a sheet of computer paper and cut off half of it which upset his sister because she was using the other half – using the page for something but now she only had the other half. He was in discussion with Alfie about what it was that he should write to express his apology but as usual Alfie wasn’t very much help at all.

When I’d finished that I had a little play about on the acoustic guitar for half an hour or so. I have to keep in practice although I’m not sure why because I don’t think that I’m ever going to have the chance for a live performance. That ship sailed a long time ago unfortunately.

After my lunchtime fruit I made a start on the arrears of dictaphone stuff from my trip to Leuven

And believe it or not, I actually managed to undo a day’s worth of notes before I found myself crashing out on my chair. I’ve no idea how long I was out of my tree but it felt like an absolute age.

When I finally awoke, I was in no fit state to go out for my afternoon walk at first and I was all ready to postpone my perambulation until another day, that’s how I was feeling this afternoon.

Eventually though, much later than usual, I managed to stagger out into the street to take the air

and as usual the first thing to do is to go and look at what is happening down on the beach.

Consequently I staggered off across the car park and through the crowds to the wall at the end so that I could look down over the top of the cliff.

There wasn’t much beach to be on today, with the tide being well in, but somehow they still managed to fit hordes of people onto whatever beach there was.

Crowds of them taking to the waters too, which isn’t a surprise seeing how warm it was today. Another candidate for the hottest day of the year, I reckon today.

The path around the top of the cliffs was crowded too but I didn’t take much notice, waiting (rather in vain) for another one of Tom Rolt’s “Greek v Greek” moments involving Hermes I and La Granvillaise but they managed to avoid each other.

“No shipwrecks and nobody drownding. In fact nothing to laugh at at all”.

There were cars everywhere at the car park – in the parking spaces and even parked up on the lawn as well.

That will account for the hordes of people being around today. I was even expecting to see some fishermen on the rocks at the end of the Pointe du Roc and I wasn’t disappointed.

But never mind. I didn’t see anyone pull anything out of the water today. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that as far as I can remember, we’ve only ever seen one person actually pull a fish out of the water with rod and line.

We’ve seen a few pull a few out with nets, but that doesn’t really count.

That wasn’t everything out here either this afternoon.

There were plenty of people wandering around on the lower path underneath where I was standing and as I watched, a couple of them left the path and wandered over to the bench at the end of the headland by the cabanon vauban.

They didn’t seem to be interested in the fisherman who was on the rocks down below where they were, but something in the Baie de Mont St Michel had clearly caught their eye and all their attention

And I’m not surprised either because this made quite a lovely photograph.

Our trawler Hermes I had rounded the headland and was sailing down the south side of the headland just as one of the Joly France ferries, the newer one by the looks of things judging by its “portrait” format windows was leaving the port.

Once again it looked as if we were going to have a “Greek v Greek” moment but Joly France I gave a touch of the old “left hand down a bit” and the two boats passed by starboard-side on.

Only a handful of people on the ferry so it looks as if she’s going to bring back a group of tourists out on the islands and those on board have just gone out for the ride.

We’ve had another change in the chantier naval today as I found out when I made my way around there.

We have of course Chant des Sirenes, La Soupape I and Cap Lihou in there along with the unidentified trawler, but a new boat has come in to join them, the white one with the red and gold stripe.

Her registration number is CH449345 and according to the trawler database, that tells me that she is called Peccavi and we’ve seen her on a few occasions in and out of the chantier naval

And in the background over at the ferry terminal this afternoon we have the little freighter Chausiaise.

Meanwhile, over at the Fish Processing Plant we have quite a bit of traffic today.

L’Omerta is still over there tied up at the quayside as she was yesterday, but she has now been joined by Gerlean. Those two seem to be regulars over there now and maybe I ought to stop being so surprised by seeing them there.

They have company over there too today. Tied up behind them is the trawler Le Styx. She’s busy unloading over there right now.

Hermes I who came into port a few minutes earlier has gone into the inner harbour and is presumably unloading at the other side of the wharf.

Also back in port today is Victor Hugo.

She apparently came into port late afternoon yesterday after having spent several days either in St Helier or St Peter Port.

Does this mean that the dispute over her operation has been resolved and she’ll be starting up in service, or is this rather wishful thinking? Her colleague Granville is still hanging around out and about in the Channel Islands and it’s been a while since she’s been shuttling back and to from France.

In the foreground is the little trawler Massabielle. I don’t recall having noticed her before today.

Before I went home I had a look at what was going on out in the bay.

It looked as if one of the sailing schools was preparing to go out for a run around. They had brought out all of the yachts and put them in position ready to take off. But the state of the tide means that they won’t be out there for long.

And neither will I.

With my walk almost finished and melting from the heat, I came back home for a coffee and to sort out my photographs from today

Tea tonight was a delicious taco roll with rice and vegetables. And it looks like curry tomorrow, I reckon.

But I’m struggling again for space in the freezer. I’ll have to stock up on frozen veg this weekend but I’m not sure where I’m going to put everything.

But that’s for another time. Right now I’m off to bed. I’ve remembered to switch on the alarm this evening so in theory I should wake up something like on time tomorrow. But whether I’m going to be in any state to do anything remains to be seen

Monday 25th July 2022 – THE WEATHER HAS …

… changed dramatically today, as you can see in this photo.

It’s cooled down dramatically, clouded over and a high wind has sprung up. So much so that we are having some impressive waves slamming into the harbour wall while I was out on my afternoon walk.

Contrast that with the situation over the last couple of weeks or so where the heat has been enough to blister a bunch of barnacles and toast a throng of tourists.

This was much more like the usual weather that we have throughout the year and made it feel so much more like home.

The situation was reflected in what was going on down on the beach this afternoon.

Not too many people down there at all and of those who were, there wasn’t a soul in the water as far as I could see.

Anyway, that’s enough about that. My own day has been slightly better than the last couple of days. I only managed to crash out for about 40 minutes today, and seeing as I was up and about at 06:00 after a night that was rather later than I was hoping, I suppose that it’s not too bad.

Mind you it’s a far cry from the days when I could function properly and thoroughly on only 3 hours sleep, or have a working day of 32.5 hours non-stop on the road.

They were the Good Old Days. As A E Housman once famously wrote, “The happy highways where I went and cannot come again”

After the medication and checking my mails and messages, I sat down to prepare another radio programme. I was doing quite well too for quite a long time but I ended up not finishing until 11:30.

But then that’s the problem with choosing songs by Canadian folk groups, Cheshire-based space rockers and Californian cover artists who are so obscure that they don’t even have a biography listed anywhere on the usual pages.

Interestingly, as an aside I ended up writing a few things about the Mariposa Folk Festival at Orilia, Ontario, in 1968 from out of my head without undertaking any research whatever.

And guess what site my social network provider suggested that I should “like” shortly afterwards? I smell a rat, and I’m not talking about the contents of Baldrick’s apple crumble either.

While I was listening to the finished product I was sorting out my music and then I had a good session on the guitar, punctuated by my lunchtime fruit. It makes me wonder what my current weight may be. I haven’t weighed myself for a week.

Another thing that punctuated my guitar session was, rather regrettably, a crashing-out for about 40 minutes. and how I’m fed up of this. But then I’ve told you that before.

For a change I was out for my afternoon walk at the usual time and after having inspected the beach, I headed off down the path towards the end of the headland.

Out there in the bay this afternoon was a zodiac. At first I thought that it might have been a fisherman or two but closer inspection revealed that it was full of Deep-End Dan and his mates.
“Don’t forget the diver!”
“Going down now, sir!”

No idea what they were after – it certainly wouldn’t be pennies thrown in the Mersey off the ferries – but we’ve seen a few training exercises taking place out there in the past.

Not too many people out there today in the wind so I had the path pretty much to myself this afternoon.

Mind you, there were crowds of people down there on the lower path, as I discovered when I reached the end of the headland. They were all congregating around the cabanon vauban at the end of the headland.

No-one out there fishing this afternoon though. I’m not sure whether that might be due to the notice that has been circulating for much of the day that because of high pollution levels, fishing in certain places is prohibited. I wonder if those “certain places” include the Pointe du Roc.

The people who had actually made it down to the end of the headland had something to admire this afternoon.

Right down at the head of the bay there was a large boat moving around so I took a photo of it with the idea of enlarging and enhancing it when I returned home.

Having messed around with it for a while I could see that it was without any doubt at all Belle France. It looks as if she has taken a party of day-trippers and tourists down to have a gaze at Mont St Michel from the seaward sid.

Under certain circumstances it’s possible to walk out to Mont St Michel from furhter down the coast and it’s one thing that I’ve been intending to do, but not until my knee improves, if it ever will.

On that not I wandered off on the path down the other side of the headland to see what was happening in the port.

First of all though, there was all kinds of things happening in the bay today. We can see that oen of the sailing schools has gone out regardless of the rough weather, and a few private yachts have gone out as well.

What intrigued me though were all of the cars parked down there on the sea wall. It seemed that there were plenty of fishermen out there. If fishing from the beaches or from the rocks is prohibited, then I suppose that fishing from the sea wall is the obvious place to go.

Plenty of other things happening in the harbour this afternoon too.

Although the tide is well in, the harbour gates to the inner harbour are not yet open. However many of the trawlers and other fishing boats have come into port and they are queueing up waiting for the green light.

And it is a green light too. There’s a red light that shines at the harbour gate when the gate is closed and once it’s open, the light turns to green.

Meanwhile, La Confiance II is still on her own in the chantier naval. No change in there.

On my way back home I looked at the quayside at the loading bay o check on the freight.

The freight that we saw a couple of days ago is still there but we have also acquired a swimming pool now. So one of the Jersey freighters will be in quite soon to whisk it away. The swimming pools are quite valuable so they won’t leave them lying around for long.

Back here I made myself a coffee and then had a listen to the dictaphone to see where I’d been during the night. I’d been doing some research into a guy so I’d been to see someone who ran a company that was connected to him. Somehow I found myself inside the build so when I’d made sure that I had my paperwork and a piece of paper with my notes I rang the bell. This guy went to answer the door but he was horrified to find that I was already in there. he went shouting up and down but calmed down when he realised that I was serious and started to answer a couple of my questions. After a few minutes he was more interested in establishing my bona fides so he ended up interrogating me about myself. I was sitting on my windowsill by my kitchen with my mother inside. He was asking questions about my farm and solar energy etc. I wasn’t asking and he was asking “are you sure that that’s correct?”. I replied “yes”. This went on and on and I was wondering when we were going to get round to doing what we were supposed to be doing which was interviewing this particular guy.

And later it was the town fair on a Saturday morning. We’d all gone and ended up enjoying ourselves, sitting down to have a meal. They guy who was organising it was going to bring me home about 13:00 but every time he came near to where I was sitting he was side-tracked off somewhere by something else. he’d have to run away and do something else and then come back, but before he could come back he’d be side-tracked by someone else again and again and again. In no time at all it was 15:20. I was horrified about what people were going to say about me being out so long when I’d promised to be back by 13:00 but there was absolutely nothing that I could do except sit there and wait for this guy to come along and take me home. He was being continually swept away by everyone and everything and had no idea about making sure that I arrived home at the correct time when I’d promised to my parents that I would.

When I sit down and transcribe my notes they usually ring some kind of bell with me. I’m asleep when I dictate them but nevertheless transcribing them triggers off something in my subconscious. But for the last few days I have absolutely no recollection whatever of anything that has gone through my mind about what happened during the night.

And that’s bizarre.

Tea tonight was quite a delicious stuffed pepper. There’s plenty of stuffing left over so I imagine that there will be a taco roll tomorrow if they are still edible and then a good curry on Wednesday.

The food that I eat here is simple but it’s pretty tasty and pretty good. I do look after myself from that point of view. It will be nice when I can bring up those cupboards and install my new oven. But I’ve no idea when that might be

Sunday 24th July 2022 – HOW LONG IS IT …

… since we’ve featured an old car on these pages?

This afternoon when I went out for my walk there was this rather nice Lancia Fulvia Sport 1600cc parked outside by the new bicycle rack.

If I’ve identified this correctly this is one of the “Zagato” models designed by Ercole Spada and built in the early 1970s.

Beautiful cars but if I were spending the kind of money that I’d need to spend to buy one of these, I would have gone for the “Spider” with the roll-down soft top.

But anyway, be that as it may, while you admire a few photos of the local kids throwing themselves off the diving platform at the Plat Gousset, I’ll tell you about my miserable day.

And it’s hardly surprising that it went so bady considering how badly it started. It all went wrong last night when after having crashed out for hours last night, I couldn’t sleep.

At one point I thought that there wasn’t much point in going to bed because it was so late. But round about 03:30 I finally bit the bullet and fell into bed.

And surprisingly I didn’t stay awake all that long once I was in bed.

No alarm in the morning of course, with it being a Sunday.

And I was awake a few times here and there during the morning with it was about 11:15 when I finally took the plunge and left the bed.

After the medication I came back in here to have a play about with the music for the radio programme that I’ll be preparing tomorrow and combining the tracks into pairs.

The choice of the music for this week isn’t as exciting as it has been over the last few months and combining them in pairs wasn’t easy as they didn’t gel together at all.

But anyway, I did what I could and it doesn’t sound too bad.

That was the cue to go for lunch. Porridge, toast and strong coffee to try to make me feel better. But unfortunately it didn’t work out because after lunch while I was in the bedroom I drifted off to sleep again. How disappointing is that?

When I awoke I had a play about on the guitar for a while, playing through a few of the songs on my playlist. I have to keep uo on the music otherwise I’ll just slide back into oblivion as I did last winter when I was in a very bad place and stopped practising.

Mind you, I don’t think that I’m in a much better place at all these days seeing how the last couple of days have panned out.

At some point or other during the day I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.

I’d been in digs with some woman in some small town in Scotland. I’d been telling this woman that I was planning on settling in the area so she was trying to give me loads of stuff. I said that that was far too early yet because I don’t know what I had and where I was going etc. I was trying to find the bus timetable. In the end I did and there was one bus in the day and one bus in the evening to Inverness. I was interested in the evening bus to Inverness on Sunday evening so a local bus driver took me to find out about it. We spoke to some kind of strange Mennonite or Amish family who told me the correct answer. As I was leaving some other woman and her child told me the answer as well. The bus was at 22:55 which meant that it didn’t arrive in Inverness until the small hours of the morning which meant that I was going to have to keep my room here in this town. I couldn’t give it up and take a room in Inverness because everything would be closed when I arrived. I was sitting down there working out the differences, if I stayed for a week for example where I was it would cost me more than £1:00 in difference compared to staying as an ordinary bugler boy with the Salvation Army or something. I was performing all these calculations in my head as well to have it all organised here but it wasn’t organised the way that I wanted.

As it happens, I’ve actually been in a similar place to this in the Highlands of Scotland in the past during one of my nocturnal rambles.

And as usual I went out for my afternoon walk.

Today I chose to go around the medieval city walls so the view that I had of the people on the beach is quite different from how it usually is.

Not much beach right now but that didn’t seem to matter because most people who were down there this afternoon had made it into the water.

That’s no surprise because today was another candidate for one of the hottest days of the year.

And there were tons of stuff happening out zt sea today.

The first thing that I noticed as I walked around the corner was that Marité had finally made it out into the bay to take the locals for a ride – in more senses than one.

She was originally a fishing boat that went out to the Grand Banks of Labrador with a load of dories that were used for fishing for cod. She is apparently the last of the wooden-built Newfoundlanders that set sail from the ports of Western France.

There were plenty of of other boats out there too.

It took me a minute to work out who this one might be because I’ve never before seen her with all of her sail unfurled and set. But she is in fact La Granvillaise.

Once she turned to run with the wind I could see the familiar “G90” on her sails.

The Ile de Chausey in the background is looking magnificent too today.

It wasn’t just the Ile de Chausey that was looking nice today.

The view out to Jersey this afternoon was magnificent and you could see everything on the island with the naked eye even though it’s 58kms away from where I was standing. I’ve not enhanced this photo at all.

There are even a couple of speedboats right out there in the bay just off the Channel Islands and the camera has picked them up really well today.

We could do with a few more days like this.

Retuning to our moutons as they say around here, the new Belle France is having another run-out this afternoon.

She’s taking a boat-load of tourists for a quick lap around the bay while the tide is in the correct position.

As for why all of these boats are out and about this afternoon, this morning has been what they call the Grand Pardon, the religious procession when they bless all of the boats and the seafarers.

Last year we were there taking a few photos but today I was in bed while all of this was going on.

There are still more interesting boats out there in the English Channel behind the Ile de Chausey. I haven’t finished yet.

This one isn’t one of our local boats and it’s too far away for me to be able to identify it correctly.

However, a glance at the radar when I returned home showed me that somewhere over there at the time that I took the photo was a 33-metre sailing boat called Le Renard that resembled that boat.

She left St Malo at 13:52 and returned to port at 17:59 so the timing would seem to be correct anyway

Before I left the area I had a look at the repointing of the medieval city walls to see what was happening down there.

Not that I can see everything everything from here, but by the looks of things they seem to be on the point of finishing. So where will they be going next?

Having shown a few tourists where the steps down to the beach were situated, I walked off across the Place du Marché aux Chevaux and through the arch to walk along the path underneath the city walls.

Having taken a pile of photos of the kids leaping off the diving platform, I carried on to the viewpoint overlooking the Plat Gousset.

There were crowds of people down there this afternoon. Imagine being sandwiched somewhere in that lot while confronting the issues presented by some of the highest tides in Europe.

It’s not really the place to be if you aren’t of a sociable turn of mind so it wouldn’t be doing me any good at all. I’m not even tempted by an ice-cream these days, due to a “certain photograph” that was published by someone looking down on a delivery vehicle.

Instead I wandered off around into the Square Maurice Marland.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that over the last few weeks we have been keeping an eye out on three young seagull chicks. They weren’t there this afternoon but what we did have was a mother seagull teaching her chick to fly.

If her chick had already made it this far, then it’s doing pretty well and won’t need a great deal more teaching. But it was crying for its mother in that weird little chirping noise that baby seagulls make although its mother wasn’t taking much notice and was busy chirping away to herself.

She was probably trying to warn us that there were something else going past us in the air.

This aeroplane is F-GTJC and that tells me that she’s a Cessna 172S. My photo was taken at 16:36 (adjusted) but she wasn’t picked up on radar until 16:51. She was obviously keeping a low profile.

She was near Avranches when she was first observed, and from there she flew westwards along the coast for a while until turning round and flying back diagonally across the bay towards Granville when she disappeared off the radar again at 17:17, presumably going in to land.

And while all of this was going on, there was a hooting from the ferry terminal.

All of the boats there hoot away when they start to reverse out of their berth, just in case they might collide with something coming into port. But today I was lucky to see Belle France, who had presumably been into the ferry terminal to drop off the passengers who had been around the bay with her just now, reverse out.

She then pulled forward to pull into the inner harbour but was obliged to give way to a trawler that was on its way out to the fishing grounds this afternoon.

There were plenty of trawlers out at sea this afternoon, fishing in and out of the paths of the pleasure boats.

One of them was La Bavolette II. She was in the bay not too far offshore having a good fish around.

Back here I had a cold drink with ice and then went through to catalogue today’s photos. and to try to find the name of that sailing boat that we had seen out off the coast in the English Channel near St Malo.

And then I had to think about tea tonight. As usual, Sunday night is pizza night and I’d taken a lump of dough out of the freezer earlier this afternoon.

When I came back from my afternoon walk I gave it a good kneading and then rolled it out and put it on my pizza tray to proof.

When it was ready and had risen quite nicely I assembled the pizza and had it ready to bake.

After it had cooked I sat down to eat it for tea and it really was delicious. After the one last week that didn’t turn out too well, this one was back where it ought to be.

Slightly overcooked but there’s not a lot that I can do about that right now until I can have some help to bring up those kitchen units. Those people who were going to help me never turned up, so no surprise there.

Off to bed early now. I have an early start in the morning and a radio programme to prepare, and I would like it to be finished before it’s too hot to work.

Thursday 14th July 2022 – WHILE I WAS …

… writing up my notes for yesterday I was still talking to Liz.

She was telling me that tonight’s full moon was going to be excellent so I decided that before I nipped off to bed I would go off and have a quick look.

There had been a firework display over at Sp Pair sur Mer and there were still crowds of people milling around who had been watching from the clifftop here, including one of my neighbours and we had an intersting chat for quite a while.

And then I wandered off to take a few photos of the moon.

There was quite a lot of cloud out there so I took a comfortable seat on the wall overlooking the harbour and waited for it to rise up through the clouds.

So while I’m waiting for the moon to rise, I can tell you about the rest of my night last night once I’d gone to bed.

I had a really long dream but when I awoke I forgot most of it immediately. I was with Nerina last night at some kind of wedding. There were lots of people around there and gradually they started to go. Most of them were going by some means and I don’t know what it was but there were still people there and all the children were dancing etc. It was really sad to see the people disappearing one by one and even Nerina was quite disappointed when some people whom she knew started to leave. In the end someoe came over to me and said “there are all these cars here. You can take whichever one you like”. I thought “I have all my stuff in Caliburn so I don’t want to start taking it out at this time of night and changing it over so I reckon that we’ll go in Caliburn anyway”. There was much more to it than this but I really can’t remember any more.

Later on there was another dream as well involving a few kids being totally obnoxious. We had a lot of things to do and not much time to do it so we were doing things on the sly like when we were trying to deal with this party of people even though we weren’t allowed to use the kitchen we were still doing it all the same so everyone had to keep really quiet but that was absolutely impossible. Everyone was coming and going. There was no control whatsoever over anything. I had some food to make for a little boy. In the end I made him a sausage sandwich. Cooking the sausages was exciting. Half the bread fell into a wash bucket so I had to use a different kind of bread for half of it. All in all it was just absolute total chaos. It ended by some young boy in his early teens having to ring his girlfriend to tell her something important and all he got was her on an answerphone message so that didn’t work out particularly well. Again, there was much more than this that I can’t remember.

I was having a really happy time with my little girlfriend who worked on Saturdays at the library in Nantwich. I was round at her house with her parents talking about all kinds of things including alarm clocks. Of course I have the alarm on the phone that wakes me. Then we went out for a walk around the village laughing and joking. There had been some kind of story where a family who were extremely religious had gone for a pizza on Sunday which of course is not the done thing in religion so we all laughed about that “if we aren’t careful we’ll end up with a pizza”. We ended up looking around in a shop full of surplus clothing, catalogue returns etc. I don’t know what she was looking for but she had a really good look round. Then she saw some radios of the type that she had to awaken her so she wanted me to go to look at them. I did out of politeness. I was looking at the range of Mhz that the radios covered and the bands. If I could find a short-wave one with a decent coverage I might think about it but there wasn’t anything. I couldn’t even pick up my niece’s husband’s private radio station on medium wave on it, his was set so low. The salesman was extremely pushy etc. In the end we walked away hand-in-hand and skipped off down the road again. It was all very nice and very pleasant.

The idea that I would be talking to her parents is unfortunately rather amusing.

They hated me with a passion which is not a surprise because I was a different person as a teenager or a young adult … “not THAT much different” – ed.

But she was lovely. She worked in the library on Saturdays and she would go through the new arrival LPs. Any that she knew that I would like she would smuggle out and I would tape them, for her to return the following Saturday.

Christmas 1977 when we were totally broke and had no money, we devised a cunning plan. Audlem, the village where she lived, was a strange village of two halves, the rustics and the well-to-dos. We made up a pile of expensive-looking Christmas cards out of bits and pieces and then took them round to deliver to the well-to-dos.
“Oh, how nice. Thank you very much. Do come in and have a drink and a mince pie”
We were totally gone with the wind by the end of the evening and it didn’t cost us a penny. That was a really good night.

However, her parents took an extremely dim view of the proceedings and that was the final nail in the coffin of our relationship.

We did go out (as friends) to a few rock concerts later but that didn’t reignite our relationship.

A few years later I was driving a coach through Shropshire and stopped to go to the bank for some cash.

And who should be serving behind the counter?

We had a brief exchange of pleasantries because I was in a rush but I went back a few months later only to find that she wasn’t there. She was training at that branch when I met her and no-one would tell me where she had gone.

Yes, she’s another one who had a lucky escape from my evil clutches and I’ll give all that I own to speak to her again if she ever were to surface. She had rather an unusual name but it never came up on the internet. I tried.

She’s not the only one to have been on the end of a broken relationship due to alcohol.

When I was 17 and my girlfriend at the time was almost 14 (and that’s a long story too) Lindisfarne were playing at a private members’ club in Crewe. Too young to be a member myself, I borrowed the membership cards of my older sister and her husband and we both went to see them.

She hadn’t ever drunk alcohol before, as I found out far too late to do any good, and you can’t take it out once it’s gone in.

So that, dear reader, was that once her mother came to pick her up.

I was round at my niece and her husband’s house last night. It was somewhere nothing like their place at all. A whole group of us was on holiday. I was talking about work again saying that I’m over the retirement age now so if they annoy me which they had done during that week I’d turn round and not go in at all on Monday. I was outside the shop working. What I’d done was to draw a picture of what I had seen outside their shop and was busy trying to paint it. Things weren’t going too well and I’d made a big mess of the rear of a car. I was in all kinds of messes with that. Just then a couple of girls came over and started to ask me questions about myself and to chat to me. I had a little chat with them. Suddenly I looked at my watch and saw that it was 08:55. I thought “God! I have to be at work shortly!” so I had to get myself ready, grab my things and go. This picture only undeleted part of the mess that I’d done. I hoped that the rest of the undelete etc would still be in there when I came back this evening otherwise this picture is totally ruined and I’d have to start again

So when I’d finished photographong the moon, I came back home.

On the way I looked behind me and saw the moonlight reflecting on the water in the harbour. It looked quite picturesque so I took a photo, although it’s rather a shame that it’s over-exposed.

Back here I finally went to bed and ended up in the arms of Morpheus and wandered off into the dark recesses of my mind. It was quite a mobile night as you can tell, and I was quite exhausted when the alarm went off.

It was a struggle to leave my bed when the alarm went off but nevertheless I managed to go for my medication without too much trouble, even working out that I was a medication short in my pile.

Back here I transcribed the notes for my nocturnal voyages and then rather regrettably I fell asleep. And not just for five minutes either.

When I finally recovered I’ve been bashing out the rest of the photos from June. It took much longer than I expected too because I had to research one or two locations as I had written them incorrectly in my notes.

Soon enough, it was time for me to go off for my afternoon walk. Not that I went very far though at first.

As regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I have commented in the past that I won’t go on quite so much about bad parking but sometimes it just can’t be helped.

It’s not actually the fact that this person has taken up two parking spaces that is so annoying. It’s the fact that this is a private car park and whoever is the driver of this vehicle isn’t a resident of the block.

This is just plain ignorant.

But as an aside, just WHEN are they going to come and repair our entrance barrier?

In rather a foul mood after that, I wandered off towards the wall at the end of the car park.

Down below, there was plenty of beach this afternoon. The tide was quite far out today.

Surprisingly there weren’t all that many people down there enjoying it. Despite the wind, which was quite strong this afternoon as you can tell from the whitecaps, it really was a nice afternoon and I’d expected to see many more people down there.

No-one in the water as far as I can see either. In fact, I’m surprised that surfing hasn’t become a major pastime here.

Despite the high winds and rough seas, there were several trawlers out there this afternoon.

This one looks as if it might be fishing because although it was too far out for me to see if it had its nets out, it was travelling quite slowly with its stern to the French shore.

As I’ve said before … “and on many occasions too” – ed … since the recent fishing disputes flared up, they seem to be trying new fishing grounds much closer to home.

There were quite a few people wandering around on the path today. They were making the most of the warm weather. I joined them on their trek down to the lighthouse.

There was nothing going on down at the end of the headland this afternoon.

No-one on the bench at the cabanon vauban but there were several people down there on the rocks. We have a fisherman with rod and line and also a couple of dozen people at the pèche à pied.

From here I wandered off down the path on the other side of the headland and, surprisingly, there was nothing going on at the port.

Just Monaco du Nord II in the chantier naval and no-one at the ferry terminal or playing “Musical Ships” at the Fish Processing Plant.

In the inner harbour we saw Victor Hugo moored at the quayside.

We saw her yesterday out at sea off the Pointe du Roc but she has eventually made it into port. And it doesn’t look as if she’s going back out this afternoon.

Back here I had the last of my banana drink and then spent a couple of hours with the guitar that would take me up to teatime. And the timing of “Born to Run” is very difficult to grasp.

Tea tonight was veggie balls with pasta and vegetables, mixed with a nice spicy tomato sauce. That was really nice.

It’s cloudy tonight, otherwise I might have been tempted to go out and look at the moon. Instead I’ll have an early night ready for tomorrow.

It was a Bank Holiday today of course, Bastille Day. And we all know why the French stormed the Bastille on the 14th July. That ws because with it being a Bank Holiday all of the shops were closed and they had nothing else to do.

Monday 11th July 2022 – LAST NIGHT WAS …

… another extremely mobile night.

So while you admire a few nautical photographs featuring some of the dozens of watercraft that were out there today, I’ll tell you all about it.

I started off out with my mother last night. We were delivering beer to various pubs all round a town somewhere. She was driving this artic. at one point we came to a pub on a corner and we took stuff in. I was back sitting inside the passenger seat which was on the right on this lorry. Then she started throwing bottles of wine to me to stack inside the cab. I caught most of them but there were 3 that I dropped. 2 of them I was able to pick up because they had dropped inside the cab but the 3rd one fell on the street. Just then an artic appeared coming from our right and tried to turn into the junction where we were parked. Of course it was practicaly impossible. They widened this road junction by demolishing the pub and a few other places that were on the corner so that he could turn in but when we looked around he had driven away. He hadn’t actually come back now that they had made these major adjustments to this road junction. I was outside picking up this bottle then I had to climb aboard the lorry. The only way to do this was round by the left-hand side of the lorry. I could walk so far but then I had to drop down into a stream and walk along it somehow reach up and open the door hoping that it wasn’t locked and haul myself up and in. I dropped myself into the stream, the water was wetting my feet as I walked. I reached right up and this door was open, unlocked which was a real piece of luck so I started to haul myself up. But I didn’t have the strength to haul myself right up and go in. I was dangling from this door, not able to haul myself up that final few inches so that I could get into the cab.

We were in Germany, walking our way all across Europe, in Germany and still had 1000 or so km to go and only a couple of days. We were pressing on quite rapidly and I was certainly at the point of exhaustion but carried on. We came to a supermarket in a small village. The sign said “you are halfway” which meant halfway across Germany but we saw it and of course laughed thinking that if we’re only halfway on our journey now what’s the other half going to be like. We carried on and one of my party said that we need to stop and take a break. There were some bollards in the road a couple of kilometres further on so we can stop and rest on those and take a break before carrying on

In that dream there was something about us sitting at a table and the waiter brought over a carton with all different kinds of milk. He went around the table asking what people wanted to drink. I said that I wanted plantaardige melk which of course is Flemish. It took him a minute to understand what I was saying – for some reason he thought that I’d said “Scottish milk” at first and was going on about how milk was milk. When he suddenly realised what I’d said he said that that kind of stuff was disgusting. I said that it makes no difference. He asked me what kind of milk I want and that’s what I want.

And then I had my big Opel Senator and I was down the lanes between Shavington and Weston. It wouldn’t start for some unknown reason so I rolled it but it slipped out of my hands and rolled off down the road and disappeared into the hedge. I ran after it but when I reached where I thought that it had rolled into the hedge it wasn’t there. I had a look all the way along the hedge in the area for probably an hour but I couldn’t see it at all. It was quite dark and everything. I wasn’t making very much headway at all so in the end I ran back home to round up my mother and brothers and sisters to come and help me look.They wouldn’t come and my mother said that she had better things to do. I wondered what could be better than giving me a hand for half an hour in an emergency but she didn’t say anything. In the end I went to fetch my motorbike and go to look for my car. The motorbike hadn’t run for ages so I had to start it with fresh petrol from a ladle. As I was going away from the house my mother was upstairs. She opened the door and made some kind of disparaging comment to me so I tuned to her and let loose a volley of rather offensive abuse. She asked “what do you mean by calling me that?”. I replied “don’t worry. If Mrs Chesters (our neighbour in Shavington) hadn’t been at her window I would have called you something else as well. I started my motorbike and rode it up towards Weston but then I realised that I hadn’t a clue how much petrol was in it. I thought that if I run out of petrol now on the motorbike I’d be in a real pickle. I reached Dodd’s Bank and took the new road around the corner where I met someone from the Welsh football supporters who had just moved into Shavington. We said hello and one or two things. A little further on I met someone else. We mentioned this guy who I’d just seen but I couldn’t stop to talk. I had to go off down the lanes and start to look for my car again before someone found it and had it towed away. Then I’d have no idea what would become of it.

Finally I’d gone to Blackpool in Caliburn. I was driving down the road into town when there were these red flashing lights so I stopped. Caliburn rolled a little so I put on the handbrake. Suddenly I noticed that I was on tramlines and a tram was coming so I had to reverse a little. The tram passed so close to Caliburn that it shook the vehicle. Someone said “that’s close” and someone else replied “when you’ve had your vehicle a long time you know its exact length”. I drove into Blackpool and found a place to park, went and brought some sticks of rock for my family and friends then went off for a wander around. I’m not sure what happened next after that but I ended up in a house in London. The ground floor of it was a flat where someone who lived had gone to live in the Auvergne or somewhere similar, emigrated. The flat was dark and not in very good condition. There was a lot of furniture about. I was with this person’s daughter. We were talking about the flat and a neighbour was there talking about the rock that I’d bought in Blackpool. After the neighbour had left I was looking around thinking “how on earth did they fit all of the furniture that they have taken to the Auvergne in here? It looks cluttered in the Auvergne. Here with all of the stuff that’s left there wouldn’t have been room for any of it”. The girl replied “yes I was wondering that”. When we looked at the condition of some of the furniture and condition of the flat I couldn’t understand why they wanted all of their stuff in the Auvergne to be treated like Royalty. It certainly wasn’t the case here in Blackpool. Her father lived somewhere in the neighbourhood before he was married but her mother had lived in the flat in the basement of this building. She asked me if I would like to go to see it. I said “yes, but is it vacant?”. She replied “no, there are people living in there “. I asked “do they mind?”. She replied “I told them that there was someone coming to look at the bed that they have for sale so you can go in and have a look around”.

So as Cap Lihou goes sailing past the end of the headland, I’m wondering why it is that the last few nights have been so animated.

Some nights have been positively peaceful with nothing going on at all whereas others have been non-stop from start to finish. I’m intrigued to see whether it’s something to do with the full moon, the state of the tide or the conjunction of the planets

And I shall refrain from making any remark at all about Uranus.

But seriously, just why oh why do members of my family keep sticking their oars in?

As I have said before … “and on many occasions too” – ed … I’ve no real objection to Nerina wandering around with me in the depths of night. After all, regardless of anything else I did actually invite her to share my life for better or for worse. But even so, she’s not been around for a while.

As for my family, I fled across the sea in order to leave them far behind me yet they keep on creeping into my night-time activities. Whatever happened to Castor, TOTGA and Zero? And the Vanilla Queen? And Percy Penguin? It’s rather sad when I can’t actually choose my own companions but have to make do with people whom I kicked out of my life 30 years ago?

Anyway, when the alarm went off at 06:00 I was out of bed quite quickly and after the medication and so on I sat down to work on the radio programme that I wanted to prepare today. It took me about 4 hours to complete it which, although not particularly fast, was still faster than a few of them have been of late.

While I was listening to it afterwards, I had several tasks to perform.

Firstly I had to send to the owners of this building a copy of my home insurance. And that’s not as easy as it might have been because the way that my French bank’s website and client page is configured, you have to be something of a detective and a mind-reader to track it down.

The next problem was much more complicated.

Someone whom I know had imported into Europe from Canada a vehicle that is not sold over here. And now they need some parts for it. Do I know anyone?

As it happens, my niece’s husband is in the motor trade so after contacting the “client” and obtaining all of the details about the car and its VIN I’ve been liaising with “Canada” about sourcing the parts, arranging shipping, dealing with issues like payment and so on.

Luckily one daughter of my niece works for one of Canada’s largest transport companies so this might actually happen, but it’s not easy and it’s not straightforward.

Once I’d finished with all of that (for now) I had a go at my mailbox. You have no idea how many mails there are in there that arrived while I was away. And I reckon that about 80% of them are junk. I’d had a quick scan through over the weekend and replied to the ones that seemed to be urgent so if you are still awaiting a reply from me, let me know.

As a result of the foregoing I ended up rather later than usual going for my afternoon walk.

As usual I went over to the wall at the end of the car park to see what was happening down on the beach

And as you might expect, there were crowds of people down there this afternoon, and the water was heaving with people.

That’s no surprise because I think that it’s just about the warmest day of the year today. I’ve had all of the windows open in my apartment and doors propped open in order to have a nice through draught of cool air

The holiday season is really in full swing right now and it’ll be like this until the beginning of September. I hope that they fix the barrier on our private car park.

The next couple of photos are pretty miserable but what is important about them is not so evident at first.

The sky was really clear today and you could see for miles, right out as far as St Helier on Jersey, which you could see with the naked eye.

But there was a weird effect of haze going on out there that was obscuring part of the island several feet above sea level. I could see the island itself quite clearly, except for the part that had disappeared in the mist.

What was interesting about that is that the tower that we can see from here is quite clear just to the left of centre in the photo but it’s part of the island that is right behind it that is lost in the haze. And that’s weird. I would have expected to have not seen the tower either

It’s a phenomenon about which I know very little.

Something else that was quite clear with the naked eye was the lighthouse at Cap Fréhel.

According to my calculations, that’s about 70 kms away from here so it’s not every day that we can see it, even with the 70-300mm LENS. Only 14 times in the last 12 months in fact, one of which was exactly a year ago today.

It’s a really good idea to have an indexable and searchable on-line journal.

So fighting the crowds that were milling around here, I wandered off across the car park down to the end of the headland. But today we have no fishermen on the rocks and no-one on the bench by the cabanon vauban.

From the end of the headland I wandered off down the path on the other side of the headland.

Nothing new at the chantier naval today but it looks as if we’re back to playing “Musical Ships” again. L’Omerta and Gerlean were actually moored there together at the fish processing plant.

There were several other boats moored there too. One of the lighters that chugs around the port and also a couple of trawlers – Yann Frederic and over there on the right, La Bavolette II.

There were other trawlers that were on their way into port as well. We saw a couple of them earlier and there were a few more out in the bay heading our way, but I wasn’t going to wait around.

Meantime, my attention was diverted elsewhere.

A little earlier we had seen some yachts from one of the sailing schools out there in the bay but there is also a windsurfing school too, by the looks of things. They seem to have plenty of clients this afternoon, with several zodiacs standing by for when someone falls in

They seem to have erected some kind of barrage of small boats out there too, presumably to stop people going beyond a certain area, but the surfers will know al about it if the wind takes them headlong into the boats.

And from there I headed off home.

There were crowds of people back at the wall overlooking the beach again so I wondered what was happening.

As I watched, a couple of hang-gliders took off from the field next to the cemetery so I waited for them to come my way. But in fact, they just stayed around there and didn’t go far at all.

Back here I had a coffee and then had a good session on the guitar. And that reminded me that I’d still left the bass in Caliburn so I went down there to rescue it and bring it back up here with the Roland bass cube.

Tomorrow I’m going to make a start on this music song-book. You never know when it might come in useful.

Tea tonight was a stuffed pepper with rice and it was actually quite delicious. One of my better attempts, I reckon.

Tomorrow I have a Welsh conversation class on Zoom. I have to keep in practice. And I need to hunt down a summer school as I did last year. I had plenty of success with that

So I hope that I’ll have a good sleep tonight – and I also hope that one of my preferred companions will come with me for a good roam around tonight instead of the ones who have accompanied me just recently.

Wednesday 15th June 2022 – I’VE HAD ANOTHER …

… slight improvement today. and that was even though I had something of a very late night last night as well.

So while you admire a few photos of various aerial activity like for example F-GSBV, a Robin DR400 180, flying by overhead, I’ll tell you all about it.

This morning I was actually awake at 06:15 which considering that I didn’t go to bed until 00:15 this morning, that’s quite good going.

When the alarm went off at 07:30 I struggled to my feet and after the medication and checking my mails and messages I made a start on organising my revision papers for my Welsh exam on Friday. In the confusion and fast pace of the revision lesson yesterday evening everything had become mixed up.

So while you admire F-GHPJ, a Robin DR400-140B that had just taken off from the airfield on her way to Chavenay Villepreux, I was fighting off wave after wave of sleep.

Not too successfully in the end unfortunately. I drifted off for 15 minutes round about midday. And even though it was a crash-out, the fact that it was only 15 minutes is a big improvement on how things were this time last week.

When I recovered, I made a start on reading through all of the notes that I had made about the subjects that we are expected to know. There are 28 subjects, and we will be given 5 by the examiner and expected to talk for a minute on those five and answer several questions.

And then we have to pick one of those five and ask the examiner questions for a minute on each.

Finally, and where I’m expecting it all to go pear-shaped, we are given several adverts with important sections blanked out and we have to ask the examiner questions so that we can fill in the gaps.

Where the difficulty lies with this is that the “5 W-words”, who, when, where, what, why (and how) take different verbs depending on whether it’s a noun or a verb or a proper noun that follows them and what tense it is, and that’s already confusing.

So while you admire the sparrowhawk that was flying around above the cliffs, I was having lunch.

And then I went back to carry on with my revision. And I managed to finish off going right through it again before I succumbed to another wave of sleep.

Once again, it was only about 15 minutes again and once I pulled myself together I had a listen to the dictaphone to see where I’d been during the night. I was in the army. There was something going on. There had been an attack ordered and for some unknown reason I was given something different to do. It annoyed a lot of people that I wasn’t joining in with the attack, some people far more than others, and it even reached the stage where some of our own soldiers were throwing hand grenades at me and I was having either to move out of the way or throw them back. It was all a very unhealthy situation that no-one could understand why things were working out the way that they were and I wasn’t going on this attack etc. And there was this particular group of people fording this passage in couples and throwing hand grenades at me at every conceivable opportunity. In the end it reached the stage where I had to abandon my post because it was far too dangerous for me to be out there with all these hand grenades coming at me from all directions.

Later on I’d been in a factory dismantling one or two pieces of equipment. There had been some people hanging around who were doing some work there as well Who were as usual getting in my way. There was a digger that needed dismantling so I went back to do that today. There were hordes of people, probably 50, around there watching someone move some parts around on the car park. They were all wearing scarves with blue and cream (I think), the colours of some company or other that was also doing some work there. I had to go to find the foreman to tell him that I was going to start work dismantling this digger that was nearby. Luckily they weren’t in my way at the moment but they might be if they came any closer. I’d seen him once at the very beginning. As I was fighting my way through these throngs I suddenly realised that I couldn’t see him at all. I was wondering where he’d gone. I didn’t want to start dismantling this digger without making him understand exactly what it was that I was doing and how I wanted some space around me where I could work without being confined and pushed around

By now it was time for me to go out for my afternoon walk.

First stop was the wall at the end of the car park where I could look down onto the beach to see what was happening down there.

It was a nice sunny day and there was plenty of beach for people to be on, so it was no surprise to see a lot of people down there this afternoon. There was even the dog down there that may well have been the dog that we saw there yesterday

There weren’t any painters up here on the path this afternoon so I wandered off down the path on top of the cliffs towards the end of the headland

We’ve seen the sparrowhawk that was busily engaged in hunting along the top of the cliffs so I was looking out at sea to see what was going on.

There were a couple of things moving around right out in the bay over by the Ile de Chausey so I took a photo of one of them with the aim of enhancing it when I returned home to see what it might be.

What was going through my mind was that I was hoping that I’d see one of the Ile de Chausey ferries or maybe even Victor Hugo on her way out to Jersey but in actual fact it was a speedboat or cabin cruiser having a run out to the islands.

It doesn’t seem that I’m having any luck at all with the ferries.

No’one loitering around by the car park this afternoon, which was just as well because there was rather a strange phenomenon.

Way across down towards the foot of the bay on the Brittany side, the sun was shining off a window or something like that and reflecting back, and I could see it quite clearly even if it was about 20 miles away.

Years ago I read an ancient book from the 19th Century called ON THE BORDER WITH CROOK, the story of General Crook’s campaign against the Native Americans written by his Aide de Camp.

It’s one of the books that travels with me when I go to the “Wild West” and what’s interesting about it is that Bourke describes at great length the use of mirrors as heliographs for sending messages between advancing columns of infantry and cavalry and how in the right conditions the flashes of reflection could carry for as much as 50 miles.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I’ve been up on the dry, arid plains of Wyoming, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico and I can easily believe it. And even in the kind of weather conditions that we have here, a flash of light transmitted through serendipitous means will carry over 20 miles.

There wasn’t anyone down on the bench by the cabanon vauban looking at the reflected light so I wandered off down the path on the other side of the headland.

There were crowds of people out there this afternoon having a go at the pèche à pied. The tide is well out and the areas where the public can fish for shellfish are now out of the water allowing the harvest to begin

At first I thought that they were carrying fishing rods but they are in fact raker, gratters, nets and all that kind of thing that the serious pecheur à pied will carry with him to prize the shellfish off the rocks.

From there I wandered off down the path towards the port.

We’ve had another change of occupant in the chantier naval since we were last here.

Wavecat Express is still here and so is the catamaran. But the expensive cabin cruiser and Pescadore have gone back into the water.

In their place we have acquired another trawler. This one is L’Alize III, a trawler that we have seen before on several occasions.

Still, it’s all good as long as there is a healthy turnover of boats down there. As I have said before … “and on many occasions too” – ed … a healthy, thriving boat repair yard is good news as it encourages owners to moor their boats here.

Before I went back home I had a look in the inner harbour.

Hauts de France seems to have gone definitively but Victor Hugo is still in there. But Marité is back again from her nautical perambulations of the last couple of days, tied up down at the bottom of the harbour having a rest.

Back here I had a coffee and carried on with my Welsh revision until teatime.

There was some stuffing left over from Monday so I had a taco roll with rice and vegetables and it was even nicer having been left for a couple of days.

Right now though I’m off to bed. I’m going to keep on with this having a good night’s sleep and hoping that I can keep this little improvement in my health going.

If it is something that is going to continue, it won’t be before time.

Tuesday 14th June 2022 – AFTER YESTERDAY’S …

… slight improvement in my health, I was quite surprised that it seemed to continue today.

There were only a couple of short moments of crashing out today, just 10 or 15 minutes here and there, nothing like the couple of hours that we’ve been having just recently. And that’s despite a mammoth 5.5 hours of Welsh lessons. I surely can’t keep this up.

In actual fact I was awake – wide awake too – at 06:50 when I awoke and I couldn’t go back to sleep again either. But that’s not to say that leaving the bed at the sound of the alarm at 07:30 was particularly easy. However I managed it just the same.

After the medication and checking my mails and messages I drifted off for the first of my two trips into the unknown and when I awoke and finally came to my senses (such as they are these days) I spend a pleasant hour or two preparing for my Welsh lesson today.

The lesson passed quite well, even though there weren’t all that many of us again. This revision that I’m doing seems to be paying off although nothing much of it seems to stick.

After lunch I had a listen to the dictaphone to see where I’d been during the night. There were a couple of hotels in Crewe and there was a vet’s somewhere in the town centre. He was advertising rooms to let like a hotel. He wasn’t paying any taxes or anything on his rooms so everyone else considered that it was unfair competition. They were collecting evidence against him and someone came in and said that he would cram as many people as he could into his rooms when there’s an event on and on one occasion he had seven people sleeping in there. One of these small hotel proprietors said that they would never do that in their hotel. Someone reminded him that he’d done it once but he said “yes but there’s no room for anyone to go in once they had two beds in”. They wondered when someone was actually going to come along to inspect anything and find out what exactly was going to be happening about all of this.

There was much more to it than this but as you are probably eating your meal right now you really don’t want to know about it, trust me

As usual there was the afternoon trip around the headland.

First stop was of course the wall at the end of the car park where I could look down onto the beach to see what was happening down there.

To my surprise, there weren’t all that many people down there at all today. In fact there were probably more dogs than people.

It was actually quite a nice, warm day today without very much wind, just the kind of weather to bring people out in their droves and there was plenty of beach to be on too but for some reason people had decided to stay in.

Meanwhile up here on the path on top there were a few more people than normal.

My attention had been caught by this couple of guys doing some painting. I know that photos of people taking photos of people taking photos is a regular feature of these pages, but photos of people painting pictures is a new departures.

What I thought was rather strange was the fact that they were wearing some traditional artists’ smocks and the phrase l’habit ne fait pas le moine – “the habit doesn’t make the monk” or “just because you have the clothes doesn’t mean that you can do the job” came immediately to my mind.

It takes more than a smock, a palette, an easel, a canvas and a couple of brushes to make a painter, as many of the “exhibits” on sale at the Artists’ Fair on Sunday will testify.

So while I was brooding on the infinite, I was overflown by a light aeroplane.

It’s not one that we’ve seen before, as it happens. She’s F-BRAG and that tells me that she’s a MBB Bo 208C built by Messerschmitt-Bolkow-Blohm in Germany and had at one time some connection with the Waggon Und Mashinenbau company.

She hasn’t filed a flight plan and wasn’t picked up on radar either and isn’t recorded as having been at the airfield here but she’s actually based at Dinan near St Malo so it’s possible that she’s taken off from there and been for a flight around the bay before going home again.

Apart from the painters there weren’t all that many other people on the path up here this afternoon.

There wasn’t anyone down on the bench by the cabanon vauban either this afternoon which was a shame because they would have had something to watch.

Nothing in the way of pleasure craft but there was a trawler out there over towards the Brittany coast with its equipment out. We’ve been seeing fishing boats in all kinds of strange places since all of the shenanigans out on the Baie de Granville.

So I left the trawler to it and carried on around the path on the other side of the headland.

And there’s no real change in the occupants of the chantier naval

We still have Pescadore in there along with the strange Wavecat Express and the catamaran and the cabin cruiser that have been there for a while.

But what I was hoping to see was the yacht that we noticed yesterday. While we were on our way to the physiotherapist we saw that the portable boat lift had hauled a yacht out of the water but by the looks of things it wasn’t out of the water for long.

On the way back towards home I stopped for a look at what was happening in the inner harbour.

Victor Hugo is still there. I din’t think she’s ever going to put to sea at this rate, but the ship that is here to install the new buoys, Hauts De France, has gone! And never called me “mother”! I was rather hoping that I’d get to see her in action too.

Most of the fishing boats are out at sea too. No peace for the wicked.

Back here I made myself a smoothie and then crashed out for a short while after the exertions of the afternoon walking around the headland.

Later on I did some more revision of my Welsh and then went for my three-hour Welsh revision session. And that meant that I haven’t had any tea tonight – just a bag of crisps. Now that my notes are finished I’m off to bed. I intend to make the most of my 8 hours sleep and hope that I can keep the momentum going for tomorrow. I’m not quite used to this at all.

Monday 13th June 2022 – NOW HERE’S A THING!

While you admire a couple of photos of various sea-going craft, including what looks like Marité out there in the bay, I’ll tell you about my rather surprising day.

In fact, I seemed to be rather better today. The walk up to the physiotherapist and back again wasn’t quite as bad as it has been of late, and I only crashed out for about 15 minutes today, and that’s rather surprising considering the way that things have been.

Especially when I was up and out of bed this morning at 06:00 ready to work on my radio programme.

Once again today I wasn’t particularly rushed to complete it and it was about 11:30 when I finally finished it. And that was despite stopping for a coffee and also for breakfast sometime later

Although it’s not one of the better programmes from a music point of view, it’s a good one from a technical point of view with some of the nicest joins that I’ve made for a while.

What slowed me down somewhat as well was that for part of the time I was having a chat with Alison on the internet. She had a few exciting pieces of news to impart.

When I’d finished preparing the radio programme i had a listen to one that I’d made several weeks ago that will be broadcast this coming weekend, to make sure that it’s all correct

And while I was listening to it, I was tidying up and sorting out a few files on the computer freeing up a little more space.

There was time for me to have a shower before going to lunnch, to make sure that I was nice and clean and presentable ready to go to the physiotherapist’s.

After lunch I had a listen to the programme that I’d prepared this morning while I was still doing some housekeeping on the computer, and then it was time for me to go out for my appointment.

As usual, the first thing that I needed to do was to go to make sure that the NIKON 1 J5 was working properly.

That means going to the corner of the Boulevard Vaufleury and the Boulevard des 2E et 202E de Ligne and the viewpoint overlooking the outer harbour to see what was happening there and take a photograph of it.

As it happens, there was nothing to see today. The tide is quite far out and there is no-one playing “Musical Ships” this afternoon.

But the tractor and trailer are down there on the lower level waiting for the boats to come in later on this afternoon. They will take away the boxes of shellfish although to where I don’t know. I’m not quick enough on my pins these days to break into a run to follow it.

Meanwhile I’d heard a racket coming from over in the chantier naval.

It looks as if the portable boat lift has just a yacht out of the harbour earlier today and is presumably waiting for the tide to come in so that they can lower it back in.

And apart from that, there’s no other change in the occupants of the chantier naval. We still have Pescadore and Wavecat Express in there today along with the cabin cruiser and the catamaran that have been in there for a while now.

So with nothing else going on I wandered off down the hill towards the town.

A little further on I came to the viewpoint overlooking the inner harbour where I stopped to see what was happening there.

Marité, the large sailing boat, wasn’t there. We saw her in an earlier photo out there in the Baie de Granville, but there was a pile of freight waiting on the quayside.

That means that we will be going to be having a visit from one of the little Jersey freighters some time soon.

And it might even be Normandy Trader because I saw a photo this morning to suggest that her overhaul is complete and she’s gone back into the water ready to carry on where she left off.

There weren’t too many people in the town today – there never are on a Monday as many places are closed.

But what there was was a cherry picker in one of the side streets with a guy in the nacelle doing some maintenance work on one of the buildings.

He had the street coned off to traffic and as I watched, a motorist reversed out of a parking place, flattened a couple of the cones and then drove away. It’s not just pathetic parking that’s an issue around here.

And gritting my teeth, I prepared myself for the long, weary climb up the hill towards the physiotherapist’s.

And here’s something that I’ve not seen before in France.

We’ve seen plenty of them in Belgium though, haven’t we? A furniture lift being used to help someone move from one of the apartments in the Rue Couraye.

One thing that I have noticed is that many of the stairs in the buildings here are steep and narrow and I must admit that I wouldn’t feel safe, even if I was feeling fit and healthy, carrying heavy loads down the kind of stairs that you find in some of the buildings here.

At the physiotherapist’s she had me doing a few exercises and then 10 minutes on the exercise bike. And things seemed to be a little easier today.

When the session was finished I staggered out into the daylight and down the hill towards the town centre, and then back up to the other side of the hill towards my building.

By now all of the boats are coming into the port one by one to unload their catch.

We can identify several of them – Gerlean, Rocalamauve, L’Omerta, La Grande Ancre and Le Styx are the ones that we can recognise at a glance.

Round about here I bumped into one of my neighbours. She’s the nurse and home help who lives on the floor above and, biting the bullet, I told her that I’m intending to engage her services when I come back from my travels.

Cleaning my apartment is now quite beyond my capabilities and if I don’t do something about it soon, it’ll be too late and I’ll end up living in some kind of squalid circumstances and I need to avoid that at all costs.

Now here’s something else worthy of note.

Just now I mentioned a motorist squidging a couple of cones down in the Rue Paul Poirier. But up here outside my apartment we have something even more interesting.

You can see quite clearly the “no entry” sign by the gate. This street here is a one-way street but this motorist doesn’t seem to care less about any of that. He’s pushing on regardless.

There’s definitely something wrong with a lot of people when they don’t care less about the rules of the road.

It’s not just cars coming the other way but there are loads of pedestrians around here who are used to cars only coming one way with the flow of traffic and won’t be looking out for vehicles coming in the opposite direction.

Before I went in I went across the car park to have a look down on the beach to see what was happening there.

There weren’t all that many people down there this afternoon. Only a couple of people. There wasn’t anyone else taking advantage of such a nice day which was a surprise.

On the way back here there was another neighbour loitering around so I had a chat with her as well. She’s not doing very well at the moment either. It seems to be quite an epidemic of illness in the building.

Back here I made a strawberry smoothie and came in here to transcribe the dictaphone notes.

I was working behind the bar in this night club. Someone came in asking for a packet of cigarettes. They gave me the little square card with the barcode on and I had to go to the machine. It was hung from the ceiling so I had to climb up onto a couple of tables and 1 or 2 other things and then I’d be lucky if I could reach it. At one of the tables was a girl called Alison whom I knew from school whose surname ought to have been “Raleigh”. She was there with a guy so I was talking to her. The guy was looking at me rather strangely so I said that we knew each other from school and didn’t say too much. She made a few remarks about one or two people whom we knew and she knew in particular. Then I had to reach for this cigarette machine but I couldn’t reach it. It was one of those things that you were only ever going to have one go at reaching because if you overbalance you’ll fall. If you fell you’d need to grab hold of the cigarette machine to stop you falling into a void. I was there tottering away on the edge of this table thinking that I’m never going to reach this machine and get this pack of cigarettes. I had absolutely no confidence that I was ever going to do so. It seemed a strange place for this machine anyway. Everyone was urging me on to go and get this packet of cigarettes but I just couldn’t see how I was going to do it without it all ending in tears. It was all extremely confusing and extremely bad for the morale this kind of dream where I couldn’t even think about getting this pack of cigarettes. All I could think about was stopping myself from falling into the void.

Then there were a few of us walking through this shipyard when all of a sudden we were pounced upon by a group of people. They started to attack and torture us, asking us questions about the ships that we’d seen being built. Wr hadn’t taken very much notice so we weren’t able to say very much. They started to become even more aggressive and the attackes became even more painful as they tried to make us tell them things but we couldn’t really tell them anything because we hadn’t noticed anything while we were walking through the shipyard

I had a cheque for £347 that I had to take to the bank. I handed it over the counter to the cashier but she credited it straight away into my bank account without asking me what I wanted to do with it. A little later in the day I’d run out of money. I realised that I’d only wanted to pay £200 into the account and I wanted the rest as cash so I had to go back to the bank and argue about that they had done with this cheque. Eventually I managed to find the woman whom I’d seen earlier (at least I thought that it was her) and discuss the situation with her before she would then return some of the money that was paid into my account from this cheque

It was while I was finishing it off that I fell asleep but surprisingly it was only for a few minutes.

Tea was a stuffed pepper with rice and veg and now that I’ve typed my notes I’m off to bed. I have a Welsh lesson tomorrow so I need to be on form.

And who knows? I might have a better day tomorrow too but one swallow doesn’t make a summer, does it?

Monday 6th June 2022 – MUCH TO MY OWN …

… surprise I managed to fall out of bed at 06:00 as soon as the alarm went off. I don’t think that anyone was expecting that – I know that I wasn’t.

So after the medication and checking my mails and messages I sat down to work at the radio programme that I wanted to prepare.

And for some reason or other I’ve no idea where the time goes because even though I didn’t stop except for a coffee and for breakfast, it was 11:40 when I finished. Gone are the days when I could bang them out by 10:30 or even earlier. I’ve no idea why it’s taking so long these days.

However regardless of all that, it did all fit together quite nicely with some really good joins.

When I’d finished it, I had a listen to the one that I’d be sending off later this afternoon. And while I did so I wrote a pile of stuff about “Next Year” as preparation for my Welsh exam

When it finished, I sent it off and went to listen to the one that I’d just prepared. However, before I even started, I crashed out on my chair and that was that. Interestingly, I went off on a little voyage while I was crashed out.

Well, actually, I didn’t. I stayed here sitting on my seat at my desk. From a distance I stood and watched myself sleeping. And then to my surprise Zero came to see me sleeping. She didn’t actually say anything though, I could see her simply standing there watching me sleep. She certainly saw me asleep in my chair, but she didn’t see me watching events unfold from where I was standing. It was a really strange, eerie situation and I’m not sure whether it was unsettling or relaxing, watching her watching me.

Lunch was rather late and then afterwards I finally managed to listen to this morning’s radio programme. And at the same time I wrote some stuff about “Work” as preparation for my Welsh exam

There was time for me to have a run through my acoustic set again before I went out for my afternoon walk.

As usual I wandered off across the car park to have a look over the wall down onto the beach to see what was happening there.

It’s a Bank Holiday here again so all of the schools and offices are closed And with it being a reasonably nice afternoon there were crowds of people down there on the beach.

There were even a few people who had taken the plunge and gone into the water as well. That’s what I call “brave” because although the weather was nice, it wasn’t that nice.

You wouldn’t have caught me in the water on a day like this, but as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I’m notoriously nesh at moments like this. Not even Castor could drag me into the sea when we were up in the High Arctic in 2019.

And as usual, while I’m here I’m having a good look around out at sea to see what was happening there.

The Ile de Chausey was looking really nice this afternoon. The weather is quite overcast but even so the colours are quite clear this afternoon.

And while there aren’t any pleasure boats of any description out there this afternoon, there is what looks like a trawler working away out there just offshore.

As for what was happening further out at sea, it wasn’t possible to see anything. There was quite a haze out there this afternoon that was hiding just about everything that might have been further out in the bay.

There weren’t too many people on the path up here this afternoon so I had it pretty much to myself this afternoon.

The car park was fairly deserted too so I walked down to the end of the headland to see what was happening out there.

We had a couple of people sitting on the bench by the cabanon vauban but there wasn’t really anything for them to see. There weren’t any boats out there this afternoon and there wasn’t anyone fishing from the rocks this afternoon either.

And so I wandered off down the path on the other side of the headland.

a href=”https://www.erichall.eu/images/2206/22060044.html”> trawler baie de mont st michel Granville Manche Normandy France Eric Hall photo June 2022 There was a trawler out there in the Baie de Mont St Michel heading down towards the end of the bay.

She was making quite an interesting wake and that was what caught my eye.

It’s not possible to identify her from this distance of course but judging by what I can see of the colour of her paintwork she could well be either Coelacanthe or Tiberiade.

There’s another trawler that has a similar shade of green paintwork too but I can’t recall her name for the moment.

That was really everything that was out there at sea this afternoon so I headed off for home and my coffee.

There was no change in occupancy in the xhantier naval this afternoon. The cabin cruiser and the catamaran were still in there and that was about it.

Over at the ferry terminal though, we had the new Belle France and one of the Joly France ferries, the older one of the two. Presumably they’ll be going back out to the island later this afternoon to bring back the passengers who might be out there.

And while we’re on the subject of the port, what’s happening with the marquee is that there’s a maritime market where all kinds of seagoing accessories are on sale, aimed at all of the boat owners who operate out of the port. It’s the last day today.

While I was walking along the top of the cliffs, a couple of zodiacs came into port.

It’s easy to see what they have been up to this afternoon. They are both festooned with piles of fishing rods so it looks as if they’ve been having a really good time.

What’s interesting though is that there are only two people on board each zodiac and yet there are at least four, and maybe more, fishing rods on each boat.

Maybe they have a fishing rod for each hand, unless they have hit a couple of rogue waves and dropped off half of the passengers somewhere out in the bay.

That’s the thing with white-water raft racing. It’s not the first raft over the line that wins, it’s the one that crosses the line with the most people still on board it. “Rapids” have a whole new meaning.

While I’d been wandering around in the ether at some point during the day I’d seen a photo of Victor Hugo running somewhere between Guernsey and Sark.

And so I was rather surprised to see her back in the inner harbour when I was wandering around there this afternoon. She can’t have been back all that long and I must have missed her return. I’ve given up all hope of ever seeing her out with passengers. I can’t see that I’ll ever manage to catch her for my own trip out to Jersey.

The trawler there is one that we have seen before. She’s called Hera.

And there are several marker buoys on the quayside there. I wonder where they are going to be putting those.

But that’s for another time. I was heading for home.

Here’s someone whom we’ve seen quite frequently, and as recently as yesterday too.

She’s 35MA, one of the light aeroplanes that fly from the airfield up the coast, on her way out for an afternoon’s flight around the bay.

Back here I had a coffee and then I transcribed the dictaphone notes. Yesterday’s notes are now on line and then I turned my attention to the ones from last night. I was talking on a bulletin board about living in Virlet in my house with alternative energy and water resources etc. It was a bulletin type of thing and we were having an exchange of information. I was typing on there about how a lot of so-called modern groups would maybe be interested in one thing like maybe photovoltaic and know absolutely nothing about anything else. You would join a group to have a good background of all kinds of things and end up trying to teach them something about wind or hydro power etc from what you know because they knew nothing about it at all. You were on there to find as much information as possible about everything. That seemed to be the case with a lot of these societies – a bee in their bonnet about one thing and wouldn’t be concerned with anything else. We had an extremely lively discussion and debate about all of this.

And then I was round at a former friend’s in Stoke on Trent last night, although it was not his house that I ever knew. We were talking a lot about different things, then I had to go out for something. On the way back I couldn’t remember which house his was so I had to look at them all until I saw the one that had the advert for his wife’s business in the window until I finally arrived. He was quite upset because he’d laid out some food and cheese spread etc. Of course it had all gone cold and set etc. I had to get into the house because the driveway was so steep. I was climbing up the side of the house and clinging on to the window with your fingernails, dangling there underneath rying to open this door. It was a nightmare and gave me the chills trying to enter. In the end he said “I’ve made it better. There’s a handle for you to grab”. You could grab it with a couple of ends of your fingers and it wasn’t any better at all. I was having nightmares. He was explaining how you cook your food and how one of Zero’s friends had messed it up and messed that up so it wasn’t like before when you had to do this and do that. All the time you were hanging on to this thing with the end of your fingers dangling over this void. This was the most uncomfortable horrible thing I’ve ever been in. Zero never put in an appearance, which made things even worse. There I was with him going on about this and that and how he needs to do this and that. I was sweating away with fright dangling over this void trying to enter this house and cook this meal and use this thing to light the gas while I was hanging on

Later on I was round at his house again. This time it was someone joining the Army. They were having to cling onto this thing at the side of his house with their hands while they were up there and we were back in this nightmare situation again, clinging onto this side of this house while we talked about this person going to join the army etc. It was all extremely uncomfortable and very difficult.

Finally there was a miserable old woman spying on what was going on in someone’s hotel room who had gone to a meeting with the company where she works but I can’t remember very much about this.

There was time left for me to run through some of the songs on this playlist that I’ve been sent. I need to spend more time working on this but I have so much going on right now and I’m lacking a great deal of motivation too. I wish I could sort myself out.

Tea was a stuffed pepper and then I came back in here to write up my notes before going to bed.

But I’m really bewildered about that visit that I had at lunchtime from Zero when I was asleep. She was just standing there watching me asleep, not saying and not doing anything, and not realising that I was standing behind her watching her watching me. It’s definitely something bizarre that’s happening here and I’m intrigued to know what it might be and what it’s supposed to signify.

It’s all very well having these really bizarre moments when I’m asleep but not knowing their significance is actually quite disturbing.

Tuesday 31st May 2022 – I’VE HAD A …

… really miserable day today and I’ve absolutely no idea why. I thought that having stopped taking that medication 10 days or so ago would have seen an end to days like I had today, but aparently not..

During the night I had a visitor. Zero came to see me but you really don’t want to know about it, especially if you are eating your evening meal right now.

But I reckon that it was her visit that set me off because I couldn’t go back to sleep after her visit and that was hardly surprising. It’s been a good while since I’ve had such a disturbing experience.

When the alarm went off at 07:30 I fell out of bed and went off to have my medication. and then I came back in here and … errr … fell asleep.

And fell asleep in spades too. I couldn’t even make it to my feet for breakfast this morning. I was out like a light for well over two hours and it’s a good job that I didn’t have a Welsh lesson today.

Instead I had a listen to the dictaphone because there was something else on there. There was a hotel in Sandbach and we had to go there to find some oil. It was very late at night so we had to be quiet. A wedding had taken place and they were still celebrating. They had the bride and groom’s room all done out and a Vietnam minefield sign written on the door etc. There were drunk people everywhere. We were on the 3rd floor of this hotel and this was the way out to Bayley Close which is actually in Nantwich but let’s not go letting facts get in the way of a good nocturnal ramble. We were wandering around this hotel trying to find what we were looking for. It was just like one great big maze although it was a small provincial hotel. We were quite lost in it trying to find whatever it was that we wanted. We couldn’t make a noise because of the time and no-one seemed to be in any kind of fit state to ask. We were just going round in circles.

It hadn’t escaped my notice that the details of Zero’s visit weren’t on the dictaphone. It’s hardly surprising that I couldn’t bring myself to dictate them, even when I’m in the arms of Morpheus. That’s not something that happens very often.

And so for the rest of the morning I’ve been writing notes about “my favourite place” for my Welsh exam. And that includes topics that can be covered in “my last holiday”, “celebration”, “family and friends”. It’s all interlinked and the deeper into things I go, the clearer it will all become.

It ended up being a late lunch and then I came back in here and fell asleep again for an hour or so. And it’s really getting on my wick now.

Just for a change, I managed to do something on time this afternoon.

Yes, I staggered off outside for my afternoon walk bang on time to see what was happening around the headland. But first I went to look at what they had been doing with this kerbstone that they had been laying just outside the door here.

By the looks of things, they have just been straightening out the road layout and the junction of the driveway that leads into the car park. And I can’t think why because while it was a bit untidy here, it wasn’t actually anything that was in desperate need of attention.

Having resolved that issue I wandered off across the car park to have a look at what was happening down on the beach.

It was quite a nice clear day so I was expecting to see a few people down there this afternoon but surprisingly there can’t have been more than three or four people down there this afternoon that I could see.

The tide was quite a way out so they had plenty of beach to be on as well. But there wasn’t anyone brave enough this afternoon to be in the water.

And no Birdmen of Alcatraz out there this afternoon on their Nazguls.

One thing that I do have to say is that the air was one of the clearest that I have ever seen.

We’ve seen a few photos of that white building in St Helier in the past but what was surprising about today was that I could actually see it with the naked eye even though it is 58 kilometres away.

Although the ferry service is said to have started up again and I’ve seen photos of Granville arriving in St Helier, her older sister Victor Hugo is still tied up here in port where she has been for the last couple of weeks so I’m beginning to wonder what the situation might be with regard to the services to Jersey from here.

It’s one of the things that has quite a high priority on my bucket list and yet I haven’t seen a single advert about the operation as yet.

So while I was up here on the wall I had a good look around out at sea as well.

There was something way out in the bay over by the Ile de Chausey so I took a photograph of it with the aim of having a closer look when I returned home.

And having enlarged and enhanced it back here, I could see that it was a trawler busily working away. Unfortunately, at this distance I’m not able to identify it

But you can see how clear the skies are today, just by looking at the colours in this photograph. It’s not often that the come out so clearly and so vividly as they have done today.

There weren’t very many people wandering around on the path so I headed off down towards the end of the headland.

You saw the Cap Fréhel the other day so you don’t really want to see it again so soon. Instead, you can see one of the beaches that are over on the Brittany coast near St Malo.

There are four or five of them over there and it’s difficult to say which one this is. But I think that it may well be the Plage De La Touesse. It’s the only one whose orientation matches the orientation of the beach over there and isn’t hidden behind a headland of rocks

A little earlier I mentioned that there were no Birdmen of Alcatraz out there this afternoon.

What we did have though is a light aeroplane flying by overhead. This one is F-GIFN, a Piper PA-28-161 Cadet. She’s actually appeared in our pages before, back in February when she flew into the bay from an unknown direction , flew around and then disappeared.

Today, she did exactly the same. She didn’t come in to land at the airfield here, she didn’t appear on radar and she hasn’t filed a flight plan and so I can’t tell you any more at all about her.

There weren’t very many peole on the car park this afternoon so I wandered off down tot he end of the headland.

There wasn’t anyone sitting on the bench by the cabanon vauban this afternoon, but we did actually have a fisherman down there on the rocks with his rod and line.

Not that he actually caught anything while I was watching but I didn’t really expect him to.

So after a wait of a couple of minutes I wandered off along the path down the other side of the headland to see what was happening down in the port

And we have a new occupant in the chantier naval this afternoon.

L’Ecume II is still there today. It looks as if work on her has slowed down just now. But my eye was caught by the boat that is in there with her.

That’s a serious piece of kit, whatever it is. It really looks the business and it’s the type of machine that any one of us is likely to be able to afford, although I’m sure that we all would love to.

It seems to be quite new as well so it’s a surprise to see it in here in the chantier naval. I’ll have to go down there and find out who owns it and see if I can’t blag myself a trip out on it.

But at the moment this is more like what I’m able to afford right now.

Over there at the ferry terminal is the new Belle France and one of the Joly France boats, presuably going to go out to the island on the evening tide to bring back to holidaymakers who are out there.

Back here I made myself a coffee and came in here to drink it. Instead I fell asleep again and ended up once more with a mug of cold coffee. This is really awful and I can’t be doing with this. Obviously this medication isn’t the secret.

And after my cold coffee I spent an hour or so writing notes about “sports”, another subject for my Welsh exam.

Tea was a taco roll with rice and veg, and now I’m off to bed. I’ve had enough for today. It really was awful, especially having a nightmare about Zero. I really can’t keep going on like this. Let’s see what this sports doctor person has to say for himself tomorrow morning.

Saturday 28th May 2022 – I’VE BEEN RATHER DISAPPOINTED …

… with Noz just recently.

It’s twice now in succession that I’ve been in there and not found anything at all worth buying, not even anything to vary my diet.

A few weeks ago they re-arranged all of the shelves and racks to make it even more difficult for people to find their way around the maze, and since then the place has gone downhill rather rapidly. It’s getting to the stage where I’m wondering whether it’s worth my while still going there.

But all of that is for another time.

This morning I fell out of bed as the first alarm went off – but not without difficulty, I have to say. I really could do with getting more of this poison out of my body. This medication is said to take a month in order to be effective. I imagine that withdrawing from it will take just as long.

Having had the medication I went for a shower and a good clean-up. And then I headed off for the shops.

Noz was a complete waste of time, as I said, and LeClerc didn’t come up with anything special either. I didn’t hang around, and was back here by 10:25. Plenty of time for a strong coffee and a home-made fruit bun.

For the rest of the morning I was working out the music to GRASSHOPPER. I’ve been determined, for personal reasons of my own, to crack this song and after several hours on it today I can play the chords and also a reasonable approximation of the bass line.

Furthermore, I can actually sing it too, which is definitely progress.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that this song has a special significance and refers to one night and a following morning about which I’ll write one of these days when I’ve found out about how the Statute of Limitations works in Canada.

But if I’m assembling some kind of ad-hoc acoustic set for my own amusement, I may as well choose songs that tell little stories. After all, the more I have to say, the less I have to sing and that’s good news from everyone’s point of view.

After lunch I had a little chat with Liz. She was on her way to a wedding and wanted to show me her new frock. It was quite nice, one of these earthy pastel designs that look so much nicer than these formal dress designs.

We talked about quite a few things, and it turns out that, quite surprisingly, she was having the same chat with Terry that I was having with Alison, and at exactly the same time too. Great minds think alike.

Another thing that i’ve been doing is to carry on with my Welsh revision. Today I’ve been doing “If I were 18 years old again” and “Animals”.

With the “if I were 18” etc, I can talk about “family and friends” which is another subject, and with “animals” I can talk about polar bears which comes up in “last holiday”, “celebrations”, “favourite places” etc so you can see how they are all interconnected.

And as usual, there was the afternoon walk around the headland to keep me occupied too.

And as usual I went over to the wall at the end of the car park to have a look over the wall down onto the beach to see what was happening there.

As I mentioned the other day, with it having been a Bank Holiday and people having fait le pont to extend it into the weekend I was expecting to see the crowds. And I wasn’t disappointed either.

There were even a few of them taking to the water too. That was courageous because although it was sunny, it wasn’t that warm today.

And as usual, while I was here I had a good look round out to sea to see what I could see out there as well.

There were plenty of water craft offshore too. Most of them were quite a distance out to sea but this cabin cruiser was a lot closer inshore.

He can’t be a fisherman because he’s travelling far too fast, as you can tell by his wake. And I doubt that he’s on his way back to the harbour because the tide still has a good few hours yet to ebb before the gate to the port de plaisance is closed.

Of the other water craft that was out there this afternoon, there wasn’t anything of any interest.

When we went out for our afternoon walk yesterday we were overflown by a couple of Birdmen of Alcatraz and their Nazguls.

Today it’s the turn of the red powered hang-glider to go flying by overhead as we wandered off down the path towards the end of the headland.

There are two people on board, so it looks as if the pilot has taken a passenger out for a run around Mont St Michel for an afternoon’s sightseeing.

There were also a couple of aeroplanes out there as well this afternoon but they were too far out in the bay for me to be able to identify them. All in all, it was quite a busy day out there.

And not just in the air and in the water either.

The path down to the end of the headland was heaving with people this afternoon too. All of the car parks were full and there were even people parking on the grass by the bunkers.

It looks as if the summer season has started in earnest so I hope that they repair the barrier at the entrance to our private car park otherwise we’ll end up with all of our parking spaces usurped by tourists.

Having a private parking was one of the main reasons why I chose the apartment that I did when I came to live here.

Fighting my way through the crowds, I walked across the car park and down to the end of the headland.

You can tell how busy it is here today. usually there are two and maybe three people sitting on the bench by the cabanon vauban. Today, we have no fewer than eight people taking it easy out there.

Plenty of stuff going on down there today as well, but no fishermen on the rocks. Obviously, the idea that one fisherman has actually managed to catch something has caused all of the others to go and lie down in a darkened room.

Anyway, I headed off along the path on the other side of the headland towards the port.

At the viewpoint overlooking the chantier naval I stopped to see how they were progressing with L’Ecume II.

By the looks of things, her paintwork is almost finished. Even down to the anti-fouling paint below the waterline. That’s what stops barnacles clinging to the hull of the boat.

Once upon a time I spoke to a trawler and asked her how she felt about barnacles. She told me that at first she didn’t like them but after a while she found that they began to grow on her.

I’ll get my coat.

That’s probably a good point for me to go off and head for home. I have plenty of things that I ought to be doing this afternoon.

But not before I’m overflown yet again.

From this range I can’t read her serial number but she’s very likely to be F-ZBQA, the Eurocopter EC 145 that is based at Donville les Bains and used by the local air-sea rescue service. that’s the one we saw when we had that rather sad encounter last November.

Back here I made a coffee and then cleaned, diced and blanched a kilo of carrots. They had them on special offer at leClerc this afternoon so I bought some more to freeze.

And then I went to have a listen to the dictaphone. I was in Crewe in that flat from the other night off Nantwich Road. There was something about bicycles. They had battery packs made up out of small C-cell batteries that were rechargeable. I went to change them over out of one bike to put in another one that had been standing for quite some time. For some unknown reason, instead of taking off the top of the battery container I unscrewed the battery container from the bottom and the container came apart in my hands. I had a look at the mess and had to think about how I was actually going to rebuild all of this and have it ready for going back on the road again.

Later on we were in Crewe in a field near Pym’s Lane. It was going to be the live broadcast of one of my radio programmes about cooking a Mexican meal. Hordes of people had turned up with their bags and recipes and ingredients etc. There was someone there to interview everyone but they started to interview all kinds of different people and never interviewed me at all. They never came near me to ask me a single question about what was happening. I felt really out on a limb about this. Then I found out that they didn’t broadcast the cookery programme anyway. All these people had turned up for nothing. I was extremely disappointed by all of this. There were all kinds of things going through my head at this particular moment about this cookery programme etc. I was preparing to wander off and leave them all to it and just go back home. Yes, it’s definitely getting to me, isn’t it?

Having done that, I rather regrettably fell asleep again and only just managed to rouse myself in time for tea. A burger on a bap with baked potato and vegetables.

So now I’m off to bed. And a good lie-in because I have another busy day tomorrow. And if you want to hear the concert that you should have heard on Friday, IT’S HERE

Friday 27th May 2022 – IT’S NOT BEEN A …

… very good day at all today, which has been rather disappointing.

So while you admire a few photos of all of the various types of water craft that were out and about this afternoon while I was out on my afternoon walk, I’ll tell you all about what went wrong.

And it was in fact when I came back from my afternoon walk, poured myself out a coffee and then came in here to sit down and drink it.

Instead, I crashed out. And crashed out completely too into one of the deepest sleeps that I’ve had for quite some considerable time.

And it wasn’t just for five or ten minutes either.

It was for a whole two hours that I was away with the fairies. So much so that I couldn’t move at all. And this is pretty bad news because if I’m thinking of going off on my travels for a little while at the end of next month, I can’t do with falling asleep in the middle of the afternoon.

That was what put me off going anywhere last year. Imagine me farh’n fahr’n fahr’n up the autobahn in Calburn at 120kph and then suddenly dropping off to sleep without any warning.

It wouldn’t be too bad if I knew that I was going and had time to pull over and stop but how things are at the moment, it’s just as if someone flicks a switch and I go out like a light.

But anyway, I knew it was going to be a difficult day when I had such a struggle to leave my bed this morning.

I actually made it quite comfortably straight after the first alarm but it took an enormous amount of willpower and I would have given everything I owned to have been able to have crawled back underneath the covers

Mind you, after what I’d said yesterday, Zero put in an appearance last night – the first one of my three female friends to do so for quite some considerable time. So who would actually want to leave the bed when she is wandering around somewhere in the ether? Certainly not me.

So after the medication I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out what had been happening during the night.

We were all round at my eldest sister’s last night. There were a few people there, Her daughter was there, and so was Zero. The conversation was becoming rather risqué and I noticed that my sister was keeping a tight rein on things making sure that it didn’t get out of hand. While we were clearing up the mess because they had all made quite a mess eating their tea I said to my sister “you were letting it go a bit beyond the pale just now weren’t you?” rather ironically. She asked me about Zero, what was she like. I replied that she’s no shrinking violet to which my sister’s ears pricked up. I said “I don’t mean it quite like that but you know what I mean. Kids are all a lot older than their years these days”. I was putting all this food in the fridge, all half-eaten stuff, a real mess and I can’t think why my sister was wanting to keep it all. It should all have been in the bin but it was all going in this fridge to be kept which I thought was really strange.

Today I’ve been working on “Neighbours” and “Celebrations”, two of these 28 topics that might appear during the exam. We have 28 subjects and our interviewer chooses 5. We have to speak for at least a minute on each of the 5 subjects and he asks a few questions.

It’s not as complicated as it sounds because things like , for example “Celebrations” and “Your Last Holiday” I can talk pretty much about the same thing – that trip I did in 2018 to CLEBERATE THE 200th ANNIVERSARY OF THE VOYAGE OF JAMES ROSS which one day I’ll finish off.

There are quite a few where there is a considerable overlap of subjects.

But then we have to pick a subject and spend a minute asking the interviewer questions about it. And that’s not as easy as it sounds either.

Rosemary rang me up as well. There was something that she forgot to tell me so that led to another long conversation that went on for ages and ages.

This afternoon, as usual I went out for my afternoon walk around the headland.

But I’d hardly put my sooty foot outside the building before I felt the cold hand of doom fall upon me.

In actual fact it was a pair of bird-men of Alcatraz going fluttering by on their Nazguls, making the most of the windy weather. In fact, there must have been at least half a dozen or so of them up in the air here and there dotted along the coastline.

A couple of them were two-seaters, and that reminded me that one of these days I’m intending to go for a run around with one of them, just for the hell of it.

With the amount of wind that we were having this afternoon I wasn’t expecting to see all that many people down there on the beach this afternoon.

Consequently when I stuck my head over the wall to see what was happening down there, I was surprised to see the crowds. They were certainly out there in numbers this afternoon, although I did notice that no-one was brave enough to go into the water.

And while we are on the subject of crowds, there were crowds on the path up here this afternoon. Whenever there’s a Bank Holiday on a Thursday, many French people also take the Friday off too – faire le pont and they were certainly doing that in spades today.

The car park at the end of the headland was packed with cars so I had to fight my way through the cars to go down to the end.

No caterpillars today again, but there were plenty of people down there, with several of them loitering around by the bench.

Those of them sitting on the bench were certainly enthralled with all of the maritime displays that were taking place just offshore, and they had plenty to choose from too.

With no fishermen to attract our attention this afternoon I wandered off down the path on the other side of the headland.

Just out there in the bay is a visitor to the port whom we have seen once or twice in the past.

She’s a trawler called Hermine Bastien Steeven and despite her Dutch or Flemish name she’s actually registered across the bay in St Malo as you can tell from her registration number, which begins with “SM”.

It was actually back in April when we first saw her come into port. Things must be rather quiet right now at St Malo.

Meanwhile at the chantier naval there was no change at all in occupancy there today. Still just L’Ecume II and the dredger St-Gilles Croix-de Vie.

Lots of activity at the Fish Processing Plant as I went past this afternoon.

Quite a few of the smaller boats were there this afternoon and while I didn’t recognise them all, the ones that I could identify are, from left to right, Petite Laura, La Grande Ancre and Yann Frederic.

Back here I brought my coffee in here and sat down to drink it, and the next thing that I knew, it was 18:30. that was enough to put the damper on just about everything as far as today went

Tea tonight was an aubergine whatsit with pasta – at least, it should have been, but it turned out to be a curry that had somehow found its way into the wrong bag. Still, it’s all eaten one way or another.

After tea I came back here to listen to my live radio programme only to find that we have had yet another technical issue and the streaming service programme has crashed.

Actually, what I think has happened is that the power cut that we had the other day has interrupted the timer and whoever does the scheduling is on holiday so it hasn’t been reset.

But that’s convinced me that I’m not going to do another live concert. It’s a lot of work, you have no idea how much, but I enjoy it so much and the finished product (when it works) is a real work of art so I don’t mind at all.

And so I want it to reach the widest possible audience and that results in having to do a lot of publicity. And then finishing with egg on my face when it all goes tits-up.

The game is, quite simply, not worth the candle. I can’t deal with the anguish

Thursday 26th May 2022 – I’M QUITE SURE THAT …

… this physiotherapist is doing her best to finish me off. This afternoon our session finished with 10 minutes on the exercise bicycle and she programmed it so that the final few minutes were at the maximum resistance and I really struggled to make any headway.

The other day I mentioned something about staggering out of the building close to death and that’s just how I felt today.

But all in all I’m feeling pretty dismayed by what is going on with me right now. For the last few sessions she’s had me standing on one leg balancing with my eyes closed, something that has been a dismal failure.

And there I was in the past, scrambling over scaffolding, along beams and rafters, reroofing houses, reflooring bedrooms without any problems of balance at all. I don’t know what’s happened to me just recently but it seems as if I can’t really do anything as I used to in the past and all the enjoyment that I had out of doing things like this has gone. I’m in a bad way.

At least it seems that having abandoned that medication I can actually get up in the morning now. Once again I managed to leave the bed as the first alarm call went off at 07:30. That’s certainly an improvement from 10 days ago so I suppose that I ought to be thankful for that.

And after the medication I spent most of the day working on my Welsh course, making a table for the past and future tenses of the most common verbs and trying my best to learn them. And it’s not easy because I have a teflon brain. Nothing sticks to it.

Rosemary rang me this morning for a chat as well and we had another one of our marathon sessions on the ‘phone. As well as breakfast and lunch and a coffee here and there, I also had a shower. I must make myself nice and pretty for my physiotherapy session.

Eventually it was time for me to go out for my afternoon walk across town for the physiotherapist.

And once again, we seem to be playing “Musical Ships” this afternoon. Gerlean is still there from yesterday but Nais who was there the last time that we looked has now disappeared.

In her place, L’Omerta was now coming back into port to tie up at the fish processing plant where we usually see her. I don’t suppose that she can keep away.

There’s another smaller boat tied up there in front of Gerlean but I don’t think that she has anything to do with the fishing trade, and neither does the van that’s pulling up on the lower level, unless she’s going to be doing some repairs on one of the boats.

We’ve seen a couple of the little Jersey freighters in port over the last couple of days.

Thora in there yesterday and between her and Normandy Warrior, they seem to have cleared away all of the backlog of freight that had built up over the last week or two.

But those two little mini-containers are quite interesting. They are of the type that Thora carries on her deck, presumably to transport high-value goods, and they have been dropped onto the quayside waiting for someone to come and take them away.

And no Marité. I don’t know where she’s gone but she’s making a good trip of it.

And finally, the Bar Ephemere, Chez Maguie is open on the Place Pelley.

It’s been installed for a couple of weeks now but today was the first time that I’ve seen it actually open with the crowds of clients loitering around. But no boulonauts this afternoon, which is a surprise.

Going down the Rampe du Monte à Regret, I was almost squidged by a cyclist who took it upon himself to cycle down there. They seem to think that everything is permitted here in Granville.

And it wasn’t just me either. It’s a Bank Holiday today so there were crowds of people in the town today, all at risk from errant cyclists.

And here’s a thing!

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that there has been quite some controversy about the kiddies’ roundabout that appears every now and again on the Place Charles de Gaulle, with claims that it’s over-size and forcing pedestrians to walk in the road.

The on that is the subject of all of these issues is a pink one, but today we have another one, a yellow one, and this is definitely smaller than the pink one.

So the question is, is this a permanent replacement for the pink one or just a temporary one? Watch this space.

The walk up the hill to the physiotherapist’s was a struggle this afternoon. A real struggle. And apart from that I found that I’d forgotten my fitbit, forgotten my pouch thing with my wallet and cards, forgotten almost everything.

And my physiotherapist is away for a few days so she’s had to shuffle my schedules around.

When she finished with me she threw me out and I staggered off down the hill in agony. I’m really not doing too well right now

It was a long and weary road going through the town and back up the hill towards home.

But at least there was something for me to admire while I stopped to catch my breath. A more modern version of an early 1960s Real Oilfield.

When they stopped producing them in the UK in the late 60s they sold the design and the presses to India who manufactured them and once they had ironed out the notorious British quality control issues, began to import them back into Europe.

My friend in Munich has one and I’ve mee mulling over the idea of treating myself to something like this or even a Triumph baby Trident but I can’t even pick myself up if I fall over, never mind a motorbike as well.

There were a couple of trawlers on their way into the har bour as I walked up the hill.

One of them went off to by the Fish Processing Plant but the second one came into the inner harbour to tie up at the pontoon here.

She’s Cap Lihou, a trawler whom we have seen on several occasions in the past. By the looks of things she’s one of the last trawlers to come into port this afternoon.

Having recovered my breath for a moment and waved “hello” at one of my neighbours heading down the hill, I carried on with my struggle up the bank towards home.

Instead of going inside for my coffee I carried on across the car park to have a look at what was going on down on the beach.

Surprisingly, because it wasn’t a very nice day this afternoon, there were quite a few people down there on the beach this afternoon.

It’s probably something to do with the fact that it’s a Bank Holiday in France today. The Month of May is full of Bank Holidays – we have May 1st, and then VE Day, and then Ascension followed by Pentecost. That explains the crowds.

There were crowds of people on the path up here too, and judging by the number plates of the cars, I bet that half the cars on our private car park were nothing to do with the occupants of the apartments either.

While I was up here I had, as usual, a look out to sea to see what was happening there

There was the last of the trawlers over there on the left on its way back to the harbour and there was one of the shell-fishing boats making its way back too but that was about that.

So having satisfied my curiosity I headed back to my apartment for a coffee and where I rather regrettably fell asleep for a short while. And cold coffee isn’t my cup of tea, I’m afraid.

Once I’d recovered I had a listen to the dictaphone. The first voyage had something to do with Spanish exploration in the Golden Age with the three cities of Asturias … “which is actually a Province” – ed … Barcelona and I can’t remember the third that were on some kind of promontory or peninsula. All the boats had set out from there and gone off and discovered all different parts of the World and so on. These towns are really famous as far as Spanish history went as a result but I awoke quite quickly in this dream so I couldn’t really find out much about it.

And then I was in Stoke on Trent at a big factory complex that had been built in an old quarry. They were demolising it and as they were knocking it down to the ground where this quarry had been infilled they were pulling out all kinds of lorries, plant and machinery etc that had been used as infill. I was astonished by all of this stuff. I thought that it was brilliant. They told me that part of the grounds had been an old Primary School and when the area had become depopulated they had taken it over and demolished it. They told me how they had demolished it. The wall had gone and it had turned into a nature garden before completely removing it to make it into an industrial property etc. It was really quite fascinating. But I couldn’t get over all these lorries that were buried in the side of this quarry as infill and had been backfilled all around.

But when the alarm went off I was busy telling Liz the story about someone I once knew in Stoke on Trent who had bought a few houses for cash in a subsidence zone. They were really dreadful houses but he was hoping to build up a property portfolio of them. They really were in awful condition. That was as far as I reached when the alarm went off.

And that was a pity. Had I started to tell that story a few minutes earlier, I might actually have met up with Zero. I’ve not had any of my young lady friends accompany me for ages and I’m missing them terribly. I really must improve my aim

Tea tonight was steamed veg with falafel with vegan cheese sauce, and very nice it was too. But right now I’m off to bed. Wishing myself sweet dreams but somehow I don’t seem to have the same enthusiasm that I had a while ago.

And don’t forget, on Friday and Saturday at 21:00 CET, 20:00 UK time, 15:00 Toronto time, one of the five best live concerts of all time. BO NOT MISS A MINUTE

Tuesday 24th May 2022 – WELL, JUST LOOK AT …

… this! We were only talking about this a couple of days ago.

If you look very closely at this photo you’ll see, dangling on the end of the line just above the water, is what looks suspiciously like a small fish on his hook.

Of course, it could well be something that our fisherman might be using as bait to catch something larger, but on the other hand it could be the encouraging sign that one of our fishermen has at long last managed to pull something out of the water while we were watching.

Wonders will never cease. At least I won’t be quite so quick to pour scorn on the activities of the fishermen in the future. As is said in Proverbs Chapter 16 Verse 18, “Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall”

But here’s something else that I was much more pleased to see this afternoon.

As I walked around the headland, just pulling out of the harbour was Normandy Warrior on her way back to Jersey, having presumably picked up the swimming pool and the speedboat that have been on the quayside for the last couple of days.

Apart from the fact that we know that her sister, Normandy Trader, is currently in dock being overhauled, we can tell that this is Normandy Warrior because she doesn’t have the raised deck at the back of the wheelhouse.

Something else that caught my eye, miles out in the English Channel beyond the Ile de Chausey was this sailing ship.

As to who she is, I wouldn’t really like to say. It’s true that Marité wasn’t in the harbour this afternoon but that array of masts and rigging on that ship in the distance doesn’t look as if if belongs to her.

and unfortunately, I have too admit that when I returned to my apartment after my walk, I forgot to look at the radar to see if I could identify her from there.

Do you ever have that feeling that it’s really not your day today?

So while you admire a few more photos of Normandy Warrior loaded up to the gunwhales with freight and on her way back to the island, let me tell you something about my day today.

Just by way of a change, I was in bed at something like a respectable time – 23:30 if I remember correctly – but in the absence of this night-time medication it takes me an age to drop off to sleep.

But sleep I did, eventually, and I was once more wide awake a good few minutes before the alarm went off at 07:30. Mind you, it was more of a struggle to leave the bed this morning than it has been of late.

As I said the other day, I’m not out of the woods quite yet. I’ve just moved into different woods.

It took me a while to make a start on work today as well, and that’s something of a change from the last couple of days too.

There was a Welsh lesson this morning so I had to prepare. It’s about this fifth time that I’ve prepared this particular lesson, what with one thing and another.

And it didn’t go as well as I would have liked it to either. I just couldn’t get going this morning.

And it’s half-term next week as well so there are no lessons either. As far as I’m concerned, this is the wrong time to be having a pause, what with my exam coming up in less than 4 weeks’ time. I’m going to have to do better than this if I want a decent result.

After lunch, I had an urgent task to perform.

On Sunday I forgot to make some fruit bread and then I promptly forgot on Monday too. And so this afternoon, having been living on toast for the last few days I made myself a big batch of fruit buns.

For some reason I ended up with a dollop of dough that was much bigger than usual and instead of making a batch of 8, it made a batch of 12. And it mixed together quite nicely too. In fact, one of the best that I have made.

And so I left it to proof for a while and after I came back from my afternoon walk I baked them in the oven. And they look, and smell delicious too. I can’t wait to sample one for my breakfast tomorrow.

In the cake tin now are enough to last me up to the weekend and the rest are in the freezer.

Anyway, with the dough busily proofing, I wandered off outside for my afternoon walk around the headland.

And as usual, I went across the car park to look over the wall down onto the beach to see what was happening there.

Surprisingly, I couldn’t actually see anyone down there this afternoon. It was actually quite a nice, warm day without very much wind. Just the kind of weather to bring out the crowds, but in fact I couldn’t see a soul.

So I’ve no idea at all where everyone had gone to this afternoon. Presumably they were all watching the fisherman pulling that tiddler out of the water.

And while I was there leaning on the wall I had a look around out to sea to see what was happening there.

Way out in the bay was a trawler – well, at least, I think that it’s a trawler but it has a superstructure like no other trawler that I have ever seen here in Granville. Mind you, it was wandering slowly up and down out there as a trawler might do if it were to have its nets out.

It’s a convention of the sea that a trawler with its nets out has to show a white light as a warning to other maritime traffic but at this kind of distance in daylight I wouldn’t be able to see it.

And as you have probably noticed, it’s another day with really good visibility. You can see the island of Jersey quite clearly in the background.

Yes, I mentioned that the view this afternoon was really quite impressive.

Once more, we can see the Ile de Chausey in all of its glory, with the colours being quite clear without all that much enhancing.

But surprisingly, even though we can see for miles, we can’t see any maritime traffic at all out there in the vicinity of the island. Not a yacht, not a cabin cruiser, not a speedboat.

And certainly not one of the ferries. This would have been a really nice day to have gone out there for a walk around the island. But just like the ferries to the Channel Islands – they don’t seem to be doing very much in the way of marketing here. It’s all very well running ferries and the like, but you need to let people know all about them.

It wasn’t just out at sea or on the rocks that we had the fishermen this afternoon.

As I walked off along the path towards the end of the headland, a couple of cabin cruisers came around the headland in the other direction. The only thing that sprung to my mind was that they were fishermen looking for a cosy spec for a couple of hours before the tide goes back out.

There were quite a few people on the path this afternoon as well so I had to fight my way around, yet for once there was no-one on the bench by the cabanon vauban. First thime that we’ve ever seen a fisherman pull something out of the water and there wasn’t anyone there to watch it.

Here’s someone who we haven’t seen for quite a while.

We’ve seen the red and the yellow powered hang gliders quite often just recentlly but the yellow autogyro has been conspicuous by its absence. But today while I was walking across the car park at the end of the headland it flew past overhead.

Incidentally, there was something in the newspaper about someone who was 98 going for a flight in one of the light aircraft that operate from the airfield. That had me thinking that if I don’t get a move on and do something, I’ll probably be older than that by the time that I actually take to the air.

Down at the port by the fish processing plant, it looks like we’re having another game of musical ships.

The other day we had L’Omerta and Petite Laura. And then yesterday we had L’Omerta and Gerlean. Today it’s the turn of Gerlean and Nais to hold the fort.

Back here I brushed the bread rolls with milk and brown sugar and then put them in the oven to bake while I came in here with my mug of coffee where I … errr … fell asleep for a few minutes.

And to my surprise, there was nothing on the dictaphone through the night. It looks as if I had a really good sleep for a change, even though it didn’t feel much like it when I awoke.

Tea was a taco roll with the left-over stuffing from yesterday, and it was even more delicious than yesterday.

But now it’s bedtime. Another long, interrupted sleep like last night and I’ll probably feel even worse.

It reminds me of Pyrrus of Epirus, who said after his victory against the Romans at the Battle of Asculum, “If we are victorious in one more battle with the Romans, we shall be utterly ruined”

EPIC HALL

The Poisoned Pen (or Poisoned Chalice, more like) – or my relentless struggle against reality

Tag Archives: trawler

Sunday 21st August 2022 – HAVING FINISHED …

Tuesday 9th August 2022 – I’VE HAD ANOTHER …

Monday 25th July 2022 – THE WEATHER HAS …

Sunday 24th July 2022 – HOW LONG IS IT …

Thursday 14th July 2022 – WHILE I WAS …

Monday 11th July 2022 – LAST NIGHT WAS …

Wednesday 15th June 2022 – I’VE HAD ANOTHER …

Tuesday 14th June 2022 – AFTER YESTERDAY’S …

Monday 13th June 2022 – NOW HERE’S A THING!

Monday 6th June 2022 – MUCH TO MY OWN …

Tuesday 31st May 2022 – I’VE HAD A …

Saturday 28th May 2022 – I’VE BEEN RATHER DISAPPOINTED …

Friday 27th May 2022 – IT’S NOT BEEN A …

Thursday 26th May 2022 – I’M QUITE SURE THAT …

Tuesday 24th May 2022 – WELL, JUST LOOK AT …

Your reactions

Excellent

Useful

Interesting

Weird

Surprising

Boring