This morning was another early start as I was up with the Jenkins family as they got ready for school and work. The sounds of parents telling children to turn the telly off and get ready for school and “where’s your home work” were reassuring waking up in a strange room and bed.
The night before Tom and I had spent the evening reminiscing about our school days, and all the scrapes we got into. We shared a room with a bunk bed, Tom on the top bunk me on the bottom. You get to know people pretty well when you have shared a room 12 x 15 foot for two years. This reminiscing was accompanied by the bottle of scotch I had brought Tom for putting me up for the next couple of days and my head was slightly the worse for wear!! A confession! We remembered when we borrowed a pub sign from Bideford which had been taken down to be re painted ‘The Portobello’. We carried this about a mile back to our boarding house and lent it against the wall. Beets a traffic cone. As it was so large it was impossible to conceal so when our House Master came to make his nightly inspection he was some what taken aback with our knew décor. He had to hold back a smile and after a half serious telling off told us that we would have to get up a 5am the next day and take it back, which we duly did.
After the family had left I set to work cleaning the mud that had covered the 7 in the rain the previous day. The sun was out so the hood came off and I headed into Rennes having my first taste of driving in this beautiful country with the hood off enjoying the sun. The Sat Nav took me straight to a secure underground car park so there were no worries about leavening the car. I then selected a café that had plenty of buzz and people walking by and engaged in some people watching.
The French are all so elegant no track suits here unless they are actually jogging. The word CHAV is thankfully not in the language. Even the teenagers though very casually dresses seem to look like they are in a teen soap. Us Brits used to be renowned for our smartness abroad but these days its locker room rather than club house. However I’m doing my bit to keep the British end up and sported my pink striped shirt and sleeveless cricket jumper.
One of my tasks for today was to get mobile broad band on pay as you go. Would you Adam and Eve it there is no such thing in France. You must have a French bank account in order to get Broad Band even if it’s not on a contract. A very helpful chap in ‘Phone House’ [Car phone Wear House in English] who spoke perfect English explains this to me. I’m therefor some what concerned as to how often I will be able to up date this BLOG. Apparently free Wi-Fi at MacDonald’s is the ticket.
By lunch time the early starts of the past couple of days had caught up with me and the sky was turning grey so I headed back to Tom’s for an afternoon nap which was most welcomed. I was woken by the sound of very heavy rain on the sky light and with horror thought I had left the 7 on the drive with the hood down, but then remembered I had gone back down and pushed it in the garage.
After writing a couple of post cards I walked into the Village of Acinge to find a post box. It’s a similar size to Shrivenham with a lovely church of St Julian but not quite up to par with St Andrew’s though the rearadoss was very impressive as it had no east window. The village has a couple of bars, to Boulanger, pizza parlour and a one stop shop type set up and a small school. There is a working water mill and a beautiful river running around the out skirts of the community.
Tomorrow I hope to visit Fougers and with a bit of luck the sun will finally shine.
The night before Tom and I had spent the evening reminiscing about our school days, and all the scrapes we got into. We shared a room with a bunk bed, Tom on the top bunk me on the bottom. You get to know people pretty well when you have shared a room 12 x 15 foot for two years. This reminiscing was accompanied by the bottle of scotch I had brought Tom for putting me up for the next couple of days and my head was slightly the worse for wear!! A confession! We remembered when we borrowed a pub sign from Bideford which had been taken down to be re painted ‘The Portobello’. We carried this about a mile back to our boarding house and lent it against the wall. Beets a traffic cone. As it was so large it was impossible to conceal so when our House Master came to make his nightly inspection he was some what taken aback with our knew décor. He had to hold back a smile and after a half serious telling off told us that we would have to get up a 5am the next day and take it back, which we duly did.
After the family had left I set to work cleaning the mud that had covered the 7 in the rain the previous day. The sun was out so the hood came off and I headed into Rennes having my first taste of driving in this beautiful country with the hood off enjoying the sun. The Sat Nav took me straight to a secure underground car park so there were no worries about leavening the car. I then selected a café that had plenty of buzz and people walking by and engaged in some people watching.
The French are all so elegant no track suits here unless they are actually jogging. The word CHAV is thankfully not in the language. Even the teenagers though very casually dresses seem to look like they are in a teen soap. Us Brits used to be renowned for our smartness abroad but these days its locker room rather than club house. However I’m doing my bit to keep the British end up and sported my pink striped shirt and sleeveless cricket jumper.
One of my tasks for today was to get mobile broad band on pay as you go. Would you Adam and Eve it there is no such thing in France. You must have a French bank account in order to get Broad Band even if it’s not on a contract. A very helpful chap in ‘Phone House’ [Car phone Wear House in English] who spoke perfect English explains this to me. I’m therefor some what concerned as to how often I will be able to up date this BLOG. Apparently free Wi-Fi at MacDonald’s is the ticket.
By lunch time the early starts of the past couple of days had caught up with me and the sky was turning grey so I headed back to Tom’s for an afternoon nap which was most welcomed. I was woken by the sound of very heavy rain on the sky light and with horror thought I had left the 7 on the drive with the hood down, but then remembered I had gone back down and pushed it in the garage.
After writing a couple of post cards I walked into the Village of Acinge to find a post box. It’s a similar size to Shrivenham with a lovely church of St Julian but not quite up to par with St Andrew’s though the rearadoss was very impressive as it had no east window. The village has a couple of bars, to Boulanger, pizza parlour and a one stop shop type set up and a small school. There is a working water mill and a beautiful river running around the out skirts of the community.
Tomorrow I hope to visit Fougers and with a bit of luck the sun will finally shine.
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