Sadie

It was a stumbling, tentative introduction, followed by not insignificant problems which, at one point, seemed insurmountable. But I am delighted to report that after a fraught and indeed high stress week, Andy has finally got it together with Sadie and I hope you will join me in welcoming her into our household. Sadie is the Sprinter, the Mercedes long wheel base Sprinter that Andy, oops, I mean 'we' will be transforming into a spacious and comfortable campervan. He fell for her a week ago but picked up on a mechanical problem when test driving her, which turned out to be the rear differential and that has resulted in the rear axle assembly being replaced. All this at the expense of the garage who were selling the van and who failed to spot the problem when they accepted the vehicle in part-ex - they will be quite considerably out of pocket on the deal! Their loss, our gain. Andy and Sadie will be returning home next week and then the transformation shall commence!

I, in the meantime have being doing Stuff'. This morning, the Stuff was getting the elderflower champagne started using HFW's recipe which is here. From this...to this...and hopefully, in a week to some bottles and a short while after that into my tummy. If only I could transmit the scent of elderflowers through this blog ... simply wonderful.

This afternoon, I drove the 1 1/4 hours over to Lac de Montbel to do the lake circuit on the mountain bikes with Pat. I can't remember how many kms it was but it was great fun - good technical singletrack in parts and wonderfully dry all the way around. We had a blast! However, this finally caught up with us in the home strait and we got a little bit wet - great fun!Tonight, the storms have passed and clear blue skies have returned. We shall see what tomorrow brings.

Into the mountains

The weather yesterday was appalling. I was awoken early by thunder and by the dog mithering - he simply hates thunder! It was wet all day so I took the opportunity to catch up on paperwork and indoor jobs. This of course meant that I was keen to get out today, especially when blue skies greeted me as I looked out of the window this morning. So the pooch and I headed over to the Guzet ski station which instead of snowy pistes, is now a mass of green slopes and wonderfully runnable tracks. I parked at Prat Matou and headed in the direction of Col d'Escots It was a stunningly beautiful morningMont Valier in the distance with Guzet ski station bottom rightVery little snow remains on Pic de Mont Rouge and Cap de Pis Blanc
I was heading for the track that leads from Col d'Escots around the bottom of Pic de Freychet
and on to Gerac below Pic de Seron (2489m)
It was warm and the pooch seemed to be struggling today. So from Gerac we headed up to the little Col de Cerda (at the bottom of the left hand flank of Pic de Seron above) and then contoured around the hillside to pick up the descent track from Pic de Freychet. Suddenly, in front of me, an enormous bird rose up into the sky in front of me. It was a Griffon vulture which is common in the area. And then another three appeared and started circling above my head towards the crags. I eventually got my act together and shot a short video of them.

The run back down the track was fast and fun. I covered just over 14kms with 573m of height gain. Stats are on the usual site.

More even hotter potterings

It has reached 30 degrees in the shade today. Too hot for anything vaguely active. But I was out in the potager this morning before the sun came round, sowing greens, more beetroot, more lettuce and spinach. I also set a layer of grass cuttings around the base of the tomatoes, chillis, aubergines and beetroot to try and restrict the evaporation of moisture from the soil.

Good news on the van front - after a week in the UK, Andy has finally found a Mercedes Sprinter LWB that ticks all the right boxes and a sale has been agreed. Collection hopefully on Tuesday. Projet camping-car, ça commence! It will however be a week before he can drive it back as there is a great deal of stuff that he still needs to buy over there for the conversion.

Hot potterings

While it was still relatively cool this morning, I set about the potager, pulling the rocket and mustard that has gone to flower (all very pretty, especially the yellow flowers of the mustard, but darn it, I need the space!), weeding and tidying ready for another batch of sowing tomorrow morning. Baby carrots, more beetroot, greens, turnips and more rocket will probably go in.

This afternoon, I had a session with the mower in an attempt to tame the developing jungle that is either side of the potager. Morris is a powerful beast, petrol-fuelled and with a strong will. It takes strong arms and strong hands to control him when he gets going. Just the kind of machine we need here. But we worked well together and the grass now resembles a lawn cut with nail scissors. OK, I jest. But it is does look a whole lot better. Obviously. The job had gone so well that I was feeling really quite brave, so Morris and I went on a little outing along the chemin above the house that I walk along every day with the pooch which was desperately in need of a trim. Morris coped admirably and an alley has now been cleared the length of the chemin which is probably 300m long. What a team. But enough was enough. The temperature had reached, oh, I dunno, high 30s in the sun and I was dripping in sweat and ready for a lie down. But I made do with a cold shandy - admittedly it wasn't yet beer o'clock but hell, I had earnt it!

That's more like it!

Oh, I just love the Plateau de Beille. It's a spectacular spot, very accessible and with stunning views. We visited the nordic ski centre up there a few times this winter and I did the Trail Blanch in January, but, not counting the few minutes that I spent up there after cycling up from les Cabannes 2 years ago, I have never explored the Plateau outside of Winter. I did however have the feeling that it could provide some fantastic running on good tracks and trails. So, after yesterday's aborted run and with clear blue skies now safely in place, it was time to explore. It did not disappoint. I'll let the photos do the talkingI ran and sometimes walked as far as the little promentory that you can see on the right in the photo below, just above the Col des Finestres and beneath the Crete de Genibres, just under 7kms in totalThe perfect picnic spot (biccies for the dog, a banana for me), looking towards the Pic de Ruhle in the backgroundand the Col de Didorte in the middle...After soaking up the sun and the clean clean air (2000m alt), we turned around and retraced our steps. Pic de Barthelemy in the distanceGreat running underfootThe local breed of horse, the Merens, is now back up on the high pastures which is lovely to seeI have not felt too good about my runnings legs over recent weeks, in fact not since the Citadelles which was 2 months ago now, when I really pushed myself hard. I have suffered with aches and pains of various sorts and have really felt pretty out of it - instead of getting stronger, I felt like I was going in the opposite direction, which has naturally been demoralising. So instead of running, I have been out on the roadie a fair bit with Andy, which is great cross-training. However, I feel like I may at last be getting my running legs back and, more to the point, my enjoyment of and enthusiasm for running also seem to be returning. I didn't push hard today and deliberately treated it as a recreational outing rather than a training run. But I wanted to run. And when I ran I felt strong. I will be revisiting the Plateau de Beille again, soon, as it ticks all the right boxes for what I need right now. Just a shame it is a 2 hour round trip. The sooner we move the better!

Stats are on the usual site

Thwarted

After a morning down in Foix with meetings of various sorts, I was looking forward to getting out this afternoon seeing as the weather has cleared up a tad. I fancied running the forest track that leads from near Cominac, to the Col de Viele-Morte and along to beneath the Tuc de la Coume. But at Saraillé there was a most unwelcome sign on the road indicating 'Route Barrée à 1km/ Road closed in 1km'. OK, no problem, on to plan B. I knew there was a footpath up from Saraillé to the Col which would mean some steep walking rather than running initially but hey, it's all good exercise. It started off well enough. The commune has clearly been making great progress in clearing trees that came down on the path in the big snow storm in early MayBut then I came across a couple of pretty big uprooted trees which had not yet been cleared from the path Not a problem. I could pass below them and rejoin the path. Excellent. On a bit further and .... goddam it, the chainsaw gang must have run out of fuel!! The path and the hillside above it were littered with fallen trees and branches and below was a steep drop off.There was no point me spending an age fighting my way through/around/over the debris when there was no doubt more of the same further along the path. I was supposed to be out for a run, after all! So I turned round and ran back down the path. 'Run' aborted, Unfortunately it is much the same story throughout this immediate area. There was a notice pinned to the post at the entrance of the forest track at the Col de Port the other day advising that any traffic whether it be on foot, horse, bike, motorbike or vehicle was forbidden along the track for safety reasons due to the fallen trees. It's going to be a while before all paths and tracks are cleared. So tomorrow, I think I will head up to the Plateau de Beille and explore some of the paths and tracks up there on which I had so much fun in the winter. It's set to get hot over the next few days. Yay!

A potager update

It's been a while. In contrast to last year when just about everything that I sowed or planted was successful, the failure of this year's early indoor sowing efforts (I blame the seed compost which is different from the one that I used last year) along with the destructive early May weather left me thoroughly dispirited. Consequently, I have had to resort to buying tomato and chilli pepper plants and to resowing the gherkins, sweetcorn and French beans. So anyway, I did a quick reconciliation of developing progress in the potager and elsewhere today and this is how things stand;Bottom section (top of photo) from left to right;
- parsnip seedlings (germination successful - hurrah!)
- Charlotte and Rocket potatoes doing well
- peas (now started climbing up the sticks- come on boys!)
- a mix of shallots and onions
- a couple of savoy cabbages - more cabbage plants will be added to that row shortly if I don't decide to sow some greens instead
- a couple of aubergine plants (last year's two plants provided more than enough fruit)
- two rows of various tomatoes, capsicum and chilli peppers

Top section (bottom of photo) from left to right
- baby sweetcorn (I'm going to stick something else in alongside them but don't know what yet!)
- a few oak leaf lettuce plants and some round carrots to fill up the row
- half a dozen celery plants (doing great!) with coriander in the rest of the row
- nearly two rows of beetroot
- rocket (first sowing is just going over, second sowing is now being picked)
- Early Nantes carrots
- various mixed salad and mustard leaves starting to go over
- spinach which has done sod all - a resow is required
- French beans finally taking off
- raspberry canes

I also have a number of cornichon (gherkin) plants in pots on the terrasse which are at last taking off, some trailing winter squashes and courgette plants which are becoming established and garlic, red onion, white onion and shallots which are thriving in a patch front of the barn. All in all, I seem to have crammed a lot into a small space once again. Let's hope the produce is up to last year's standard!

On other matters, 4 new tyres for the car this morning - ouch! Off down to Foix tomorrow to get the tracking sorted - I will hopefully get in a roadie outing while I am down there. Sun and warmth are promised from tomorrow afternoon onwards - excellent!