Visit to Rochefort-en-Terre

Wednesday 18/12/19

Charmaine is visiting at the moment so we have been getting out more than usual.  Unfortunately French strikes and weather scuppered the owner's plans to visit and have the oaks pollarded so their trip fell through.

We haven't told the cats she's a vet...

Luckily, however, the flights into Nantes were still running with no problems so we drove through to pick Charmaine up.  We had done our research beforehand so we knew there was a parking lot that didn't have height restriction and we managed to squeeze Bokkie and and take the short walk to the terminal.  

The weather is quite grim at the moment, and we are spending a lot of time curled up in from of the fire with the cats and some books.  We managed to get out as well and took an evening trip to Rochefort yesterday.  

This town puts on an amazing Christmas light display and attracts visitors from far and wide.  We set off to our planned parking spot only to find that the river was overflowing its banks preventing us from reaching the bridge to the footpath.  We drove into the village to see if there was another option but were overwhelmed by the number of visitors and returned to the original spot and walked up the road.

It really was a lovely atmosphere and even an unexpected shower didn't dampen the spirits.  Well worth the visit, many thanks to B&T for telling us about it.

Tomorrow we will try to visit the market at nearby La Roche-Bernard, the weather forecast looks a bit iffy so we'll have to take brollys and hope for the best.

Hamba Kahle on Facebook

Brittany video of the day 14/12/19

Brittany pic of the day 12/12/19

Brittany pic of the day 11/12/19

The resident buzzard doesn't often venture into the garden so this was quite a thrill

Brittany pic of the day 10/12/19

When the weather turns cold find somewhere warm to shelter

Brittany pic of the day 09/12/19

Supervisor checking the state of the lawns

Brittany pic of the day 06/12/19

As we're not blogging so much on the sit I will add random photos from time to time.

Magical sunrise straining through the morning mist

Winter in Brittany

Wednesday 04/12/19

As the years draws to an end, winter has been setting in and we have gradually been putting areas of the garden to sleep.  The produce from the potager has finally ended with us harvesting the last of the carrots and spinach before the frost wiped them out.  The final fruit harvest was the medlars, a first for us.  

This medieval fruit has to be bletted before it can be used so, when the time was right, we harvested all the fruit and set it up in the grange to soften (rot?) until it was ready.  The preparation is similar to normal jams and jellies and a mix of bletted and un-bletted fruit gives the correct balance of pectin versus flavour.  We were trying for jelly but ended up with a thick syrup, still very pretty and tasty.  Quite a surprise from such an ugly fruit.

The French call the medlar ' cul de chien' or dog's arse!

The jelly is the most stunning colour - and taste.

The weather is quite changeable, it can rain a lot but when the skies clear the sunshine is wonderful, although the temperatures plummet.  For two people with nothing to do we have certainly been very busy and look back on every day with wonder.  We wonder what happened to it while we were out gardening!

Building anvil of a Cumulo-nimbus

When the sky opens out we are treated to the most wonderful sights.

We have a busy month coming up, the owners B&T are returning briefly with a tree-man next week to trim some of the oaks and remove some dead ash trees so we are making sure the property is nice and neat.  If we never see another leaf or acorn again...

A very shy Ragondin at the bottom of the garden.  The farmers aren't very keen on them though.

After that, Charmaine is coming to visit us for a week and then Debbi and Ettienne are visiting for Christmas.  We are certainly working our way through the alphabet.

We are loving being in Brittany (especially the cosy evenings snuggled with the cats by the fire), and have also started planning our Southern African trip next year.  Here's hoping everyone who reads this blog has a wonderful festive season - stay away from the Christmas sillines (Black Friday sales are just a marketing gimmick..)