Sunday 12 October – Indian Summer

One statement I had made in my last couple of blogs was that autumn days can be amazing here and last week and, if the forecast is to be believed, next week have had, and will have, some real Indian Summer days.

Despite, or perhaps because, this year has been so dry in the summer, we are starting to see some amazing autumnal colours and everything that produces fruit, nuts or berries appears to be laden.

The jasmine on Hayloft’s terrace has started to turn a wonderful red and the cotoneaster on its south wall has more berries than we have ever seen on it.

The same is true of the hedge alongside Hent Gorreker were the liquidambar trees are looking stunning and the holly bush in between has enough berries to feed many birds over the winter.

Even our own pear tree, which we had been told by neighbours would never produce much fruit as pear trees don’t grow well here, had more fruit than ever.  David collected as many as possible and made some lovely poached pears to enjoy over the winter.

For project work, that hasn’t been as productive as I’d have liked …

In my last blog I had said that I had hoped to make an order for the materials we needed to start the plaster boarding inside the pool house unfortunately, I haven’t been able to do that.

For that job we have a good friend who is acting as an advisor and has offered to assist with the installation who, sadly, has been very unwell for a couple of weeks, including having to have an operation last week, so he hadn’t been able to visit and advise.  Thankfully, he is on the mend and was strong enough to come a couple of days ago so I should be able to make some progress soon.

Equally, creating the corner posts is a task that I need assistance with from David.  However, he is busy with his own personal training clients (in person and online), group yoga and pilates classes and his gym work, not to mention poaching pears, so his time is precious too and I haven’t managed to nab him to start the posts yet.

That’s not to say that we haven’t done anything, and we have started clearing out the garage which is one of my autumn / winter objectives.

It may not look too different from the last images yet, things have changed and we have taken the first, very full, trailer of rubbish to the déchetterie including the 2 old gas ovens and cubic meters worth of expanded polystyrene.

Almost all of the ‘easy’ things I mentioned in my last blog, have been removed (although I need to paint the final bits of the coffee table before moving that to the pool house) which leaves the things that are harder to dispose of immediately.  Some of that is a large pile of knot weed foliage and rhizome that I have been collecting as we try and kill the weed behind the pool.

As knot weed establishes itself so easily and is invasive, I can’t just throw this away or take it to the tip.  The only real option is to keep it until it is dried out (which we have done) and then burn it – which is the harder part as we no longer have a bonfire site.  I will burn it in the firepit as soon as I can but, because the weather has been so good, I have had laundry drying outside every day and I don’t want it smelling of smoke!

Just before last weekend we had David’s Dad, Roger, join us for a couple of weeks and, at the weekend, 3 of his, and now our, friends arrived for a week’s holiday.

Making the most of the good weather we have taken Roger to a couple of the local markets in Morlaix last Saturday and Daoulas today and walked a stretch of the old Roscoff to Concarneau railway which has been converted into a foot and cycle path.

The Voie Vertes (green routes) that exist across the region are excellent for walking and cycling, the track bed of old railway is the closest to us and passes through some beautiful countryside and well worth exploring.

Last Wednesday we took Roger’s friends on one of our favourite circular walks around Locquirec which was both beautiful and extremely hot – about 24 degrees when we were enjoying our post walk refreshment at our usual café in town, one that we thoroughly recommend visiting – the town not specifically the café!

Roger’s friends left us yesterday and Roger is with us for another week but we should be able to continue progressing things – although one task has become more pressing and will take the first few days of the coming week.

As I look outside, other than a few aircraft contrails, there isn’t a cloud in the sky.  This weather can’t last forever so I hope to make the most of it while I can …

Kenavo.