Blue Sky Living

Snow in the Luberon

It's all very festive here in the Luberon. Christmas markets, truffles and snow on the mountains. This weekend Tanya, Elodie and I headed up Mont Ventoux and nearly got stuck up there. At least we discovered our nearest ski resort - Chalet Reynard 2 lifts and a great restaurant. Ski and boot hire is approx 20 euro for the day, plus 10 euros for the lift pass.

In the meantime anyone living in Provence and looking for a late Christmas present should pick up a Provencal Monopoly set in a Maison de Presse. The rent for Apt is apparently €300.

Enjoy the photos and see you all in the New Year when hopefully the Blue Sky will have returned(it might look blue in the pictures - but the storm closed in again pretty quickly).

   

Kir Royal

 

 My excuse is that I have been very busy recently, writing a fourth book, researching articles for and selling advertising in a magazine, salvaging our construction project which threatens to be engulfed by the world financial crisis and helping as much as I can to look after our one year old child. The other mitigating factor is that my wife Tanya completely forgot as well. Confused? Well here is a clue, it's got something to do with butterflies.

You would have thought that the bulging postbox would have jogged my memory, but no I just scooped all the cards out assuming that they were for Christmas. To my shame my parents, Tanya's parents and all Tanya's sisters had remembered the date I'd forgotten - our wedding anniversary. Yes 8 years ago today, we were married in St Michael's Betchworth (this is the church where Hugh Grant forgets the ring in Four Weddings).

Trying to make up for my oversight I whisked Tanya to Lourmarin for a drink. The Moulin de Lourmarin, the village's luxury hotel was shut, and so we wandered through the rainy streets in search of a glass of  Champagne. In anywhere but France my plight would have been hopeless - in the middle of a rural area, in mid-winter, in the rain at teatime - but the village cafe came to the rescue. Not an eyebrow was raised among the pastis swilling regulars of the cafe l'ormeau as I ordered two Kir Royals.Two furiously bubbling glasses arrived together with a sweet amuse bouche.It wasn't quite a five star hotel, but I can report Tanya and I are still speaking.

By the way the symbol for an 8th wedding anniversary is the butterfly.

Construction projects in Provence

Way back in April, Tanya and I decided to finally buy a house in Provence. We looked at everything available, discovered that we couldn’t afford what we wanted, and then fell in love with a dilapidated shack near Lourmarin. The idea was to knock it down before it fell down and start all over again.

We engaged an architect and a project manager, and said that we would only go ahead if it was finished within a year. There was a Provencal scratching of heads and then some reluctant nodding. It was possible.

Well it’s now nearly Christmas, we are due to be moving in to our new house in 4 months and the picture above shows the current state of the building site.

Adding to our worries the project is being financed in London, and the value of the pound means we may be up on the roof fixing the tiles ourselves. Currently we are waiting for the soil engineers to confirm the foundations we need, their report is expected next week, then again their report has been expected next week for the last four months. Already there are mutterings about the work not being completed by July and August next year when of course the whole of France goes on holiday. So now we are looking at April 2010.

The moral of the story is that deadlines are flexible in Provence…..