May

What is it with the weather?
Since the last blog we had weeks of rain, which has at least made the countryside around here lush and green. We are now experiencing sunshine with a cool wind, with the odd bit of warmer weather. The pool is clean and sparkling and our guests last week were determined to be first in for this year. They didn't stay in long, but the honour goes to Tommy and Taylor....

Tommy and Taylor get the award for first in the pool this year!

Tommy, Vicky and Taylor seemed to enjoy being here as much as we enjoyed their company.

Aperitif time!

Assault course training!

Yomping through the vines.

Alf

 This is Alf, our new team member! He enjoyed some days out with Taylor - awaiting photos of his adventure.
We have been trying to get to know the area where we now live, so whenever we find ourselves with a free day we set off to explore. Last week we headed to Bordeaux then north along the Gironde to Medoc.

Chateau Pichon Longueville

Fishing nets on the Gironde by the car ferry at Lamarque.

Lovely to see all the fantastic chateaux - but the wine a little on the expensive side for us! Give us Duras appellation every time.
Around Vue de Duras the wildlife is at full throttle. The black redstarts are nesting under the balcony again.

Dinner

me, me, me!

Four hungry mouths keeps the parents very busy, and prevents us from sitting in our favourite spot.

The doves are back too. They have nested in the tilleul tree, as we removed last year's nesting site when we trimmed the palm tree of all the dead leaves. They seem quite happy where they are.

A beautiful dragonfly by the pond (which is full of very noisy frogs!)

An orchid in our un-mown meadow.

One of the many lizards which appear whenever the sun shines.

 Just a little snapshot of life at Vue de Duras in May. The hens are still laying, the guests are still coming and Hugh is settling to a new routine (but not getting far with the shutters!) Roll on summer.....

A whole year at Vue de Duras

Well, here we are, a whole year later!
A year ago today, we arrived in Duras, to take a look at the house that was about to become ours.

What a year since then. Look back over the blog for details!
This week has just about seen the last of the builders with the re-roofing of the back of the house. We're hoping that the coming winter will be a bit warmer in that part of the house, now that it has new insulation and is water-tight.

We have re-used all the old tiles on the lower roof, so it looks just the same, but we know it's better. Clearing the ground beneath the overhang, where all the new tiles had been stored for months, I found the remains of the roof before the last one, but it looks so much better now.

We have had a good first year for our B & B business, with guests still arriving - mostly house hunters at the moment, but the year has also seen holiday-makers -English, French, Dutch, Australian, and guests at weddings at the chateau in Duras - mostly French. We've enjoyed meeting them all, they've been a lovely bunch of people, thank you to all of them. We've also enjoyed visits from friends - none of whom over-stayed their welcome and we look forward to seeing them all again!

Our newest venture is 'tea and cake on Sunday afternoons'. 

Earl Grey cup cakes, ginger cake and coffee fudge cake

Tea with a view

Tea with a view - and some shelter!

Join us if you're near-by. Ring first just to make sure (details on our web-site).
 3-5pm Sundays.

A few photos to sum up the last month.

A Sunday morning hot air balloon.

Autumn sunrise.

Newly planted vine next to the gite terrace - grapes for eating.

Newly planted birch trees, by the pond.

Weeping willow

Passion flower to grow over the fence

Geoff and Judith, enjoying a lovely September day with us.

I'd like to think that these are the collared doves hatched in our palm tree!

Autumn sun set.

Early morning alarm call!

A beautiful car belonging to some of our lovely guests.

New arrivals

Lots of news to report in this blog, but I'll start with the promised pictures of our bargains from last weekend's vide grenier....

a treadle sewing machine - complete - to use as a dressing table in one of the guest bedrooms

a sweet little table for another room

the marble top for the table below, for one of the bathrooms

Lovely bargains, can't wait to get started on a wash and brush up to get them ready for public viewing.

But now, the really exciting news......the arrival of our new chicks.....
first... the erection of the fence to keep them in

Celebrating the completion of the fence - we're ready for the chicks!

And here they are - or at least some of them! We have five hens (we hope!) and one cockerel.

Examining her new (temporary) home

We picked up the chicks on Sunday morning, but we were not alone! We were accompanied by a film crew (the lovely Kate and Suzi) from ITV making a TV programme about Brits living in this part of France.

Us, Morgan in the middle, who did such a brilliant job of raising our chicks, Andrea and the two Jonathons from Domaine Gourdon, previous home of chicks and Kate and Suzi with the filming equipment.

A quick break in filming  - what to do next?!!

The coop has been painted and decorated, but is still a bit big and high for the little ones, so they are staying in the concrete hutch next door for the time being.

 

We have a couple more new arrivals too..in the bird box above the kitchen window (completely ignoring the new box with the infra red camera!) this little redstart is sitting on at least 4 eggs.....

 ... and these two chicks are the first brood of a pair of collared doves nesting in the palm tree in full view of one of the guest rooms. They are currently sitting on a second clutch of two eggs.

Another first today......the swimming pool is finally ready and we had our first dip

I almost forgot, the gite is looking good, the tiles are laid in one of the bedrooms and shower rooms, and looking great.

Hugh says he keeps on working because he thinks Nicole and I spend too much money when he's not here!........

I wish...........really a visit from Jerry, in his beautiful Rolls!
and this is what Hugh does when he's here anyway....

Only joking, his feet have hardly hit the ground while he's been here for the Easter holidays, and he's back to the UK tomorrow to earn some more pennies.