21 Sept 2008 Sunday - Patrimoine day, a big organ, and a trip

Sun shining again, so more washing goes onto the line. We walk into town and wander around. One of the “historical” buildings open to the public today is the Prefecture, built on the site of the original abbey. There is a large crowd of people outside presumably waiting to be let in so we give that a miss and climb the hill to the castle to find that today entry is free, but there is only half an hour to go before it closes at noon.

We pass this fountain on the way up the hill.

Tip of the day!

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There are 3 towers a museum and a shop to get round. This is impossible to accomplish in the time available, so we walk around the walls once, then go up the round tower, which is the most recent, being built in the 14th century. It is busy and S stops at the second landing. I continue up to the top of the tower and take more photos of the surrounding views from the top.

View of the abbey towards the river

The little pointy hill is the "Pain au sucre"

It is now 11.55am, so I head back down the stairs, taking more photos of some of the graffiti which has been carved into the tower walls over the centuries.

Is this the only blog to feature graffiti?

We leave the castle grounds and find a restaurant to eat at. We sit outside in the sun and have an excellent set lunch of 3 courses with wine and coffee for £10 each. It is baking hot and my face, head and arms are starting to sting a bit by the time we leave.
The guided tour of the old town is due to start in half an hour, so we sit on a bench in the shade before making our way to the tourist information office for the start of the tour. The guide sets off, without telling anyone a) that she is the guide, and b) that the tour has actually started. She is about 14 years old. We trudge around the streets and learn very little except that the Rue de le grand duc was not named after a Duke, but after an owl called le grand duc who used to live in the eaves of the houses hundreds of years ago.
The 40 minute tour takes about 25 minutes and we set off home.
It is bulb planting time and my hundred or so bulbs disappear in a small part of the cleared flower bed.
At 5.15pm we set off for the abbey to listen to an recital, which has been organised as part of the patrimoine events. The big organ is used for the recital (the abbey also has a small “jewel” of an organ too) and the organist is Christianne van Gorp, or at least that is what her name looks like on the hand written programme. The programme consists of 7 pieces, written by people that I have never heard of and takes about 40 minutes.

After the recital, we walk out into the sunshine and head home.
My mother now has two black eyes, and can just see through her closed eyes. My dad, aided by nephew C, sends me an email photo of mum.

Not a pretty sight, but she is not in pain like she was yesterday.

Don’t do it again mother!!!

The discolouration gets worse over the following days.

20 Sept 2008 Saturday - Jardinage

Up early to get to the Intermarche before the “rush”, then into the Bricomarche for a trowel.
Bright, sunny morning, so we are first to get our washing out on the clothes lines, then it is time to do some more gardening. I cut the grass and we tackle some more of the “Flower” or ivy beds. This takes well over 4 hours with just 20 mins for some lunch. The sun is very hot and I have not put a hat on, so I now have a headache. That is enough gardening for today. I think that it is always best to leave something still to do. Although the garden is small, there is no shortage of things to do.
Our builder’s van toots as they whiz past sometime around midday.
I phone home to chat to parents but there is only C, R and K at home. The others have gone off to hospital. My mother has tripped outside the house and cracked her head. I say that I will phone later. It seems that R has a girlfriend and so is not hanging about outside next door’s garden like he usually does when his family visit, hoping that the girl next door will come our to “play”. K is watching baby TV, and C is in charge.
We get cleaned up and walk into town. It is about 5.30pm and still over 20 degrees in the shade. Looking in the tourist info window, we discover that we are in the middle of two days of local history activity. We have, of course now missed day one. We head over to the abbey to see if any of the all day activities advertised for that area of the town are still going on. Nope.
We pop into the English shop and we are told that this weekend you can get into historical buildings for free, that you would normally have to pay to get in.
We will probably try to go on one of the historical town walks tomorrow and see some of the dancing and other events. The weather is supposed to be good again.
We stop for a beer at the Auberge and instead of 25cl of Stella each at 2.20 euros, we each have a 50cl glass. I am disappointed that it comes to 4.40 euros per glass. Unfortunately there is no discount for bulk purchases. In the supermarket I could easily have bought 4 bottles of wine for the price of our 2 beers.
Back home we have duck gizzards, which prove to be tough as old boots, so we have to abandon eating them.
The TV is still being a pain in the bum, and many of my channels which I have been watching, have become not part of my package for some reason. I will have to investigate once I become fluent in French.
I phone home and mum is back from the hospital. She has a bandaged head which is hurting, a black eye and a bloody nose. Fortunately my sister will be able to do all the catering…… J for the rest of the weekend.