Back on the blog finally!

The past 2 weeks have been very busy tracing family ancestry, cooking new and exciting dishes in the kitchen, meeting more new friends (whom I am sure come for the cooking!), tasting wine from diverse regions, talking to many of our wonderful Australian family and friends, and enjoying the sunshine and the beauty which Spring brings to France.
No wonder we are behind updating our blog…..

OK! Firstly thank you for the gifts that we have received in the past 2 weeks. The look on our faces when we received Twisties and Aussie chips was priceless. Sorry, you missed it! If you think we passed these on, well………
Thanks to Pat and Wally who graciously sent 2 parcels. Merci beaucoup!

Today we had a Paella lunch, cooked by an English/South African gentleman called Mike and we shared this occasion with our Moroccan friend Karim! The picture says it all! Mike lives across the road from us.

If you enjoy and Oyster or 2, they are sold outside the church here every Sunday and they are so fresh. Shucking is an art, and finally we have mastered how it is done, thanks to our Moroccan friend. You can buy a dozen, based on the size from 3 to 5 Euros.

We had the opportunity to visit a vineyard about 1 hour North of here that produces wine, which does not have preservatives, and is delicious. We travelled there with our very dear friends Noël and Suzanne whose primary language is Dutch. So.... here we are at the Vineyard, Noël is speaking to the owner in French, talking to his wife in Dutch and translating to us in English some of the French we could not quite pick up. A remarkable man! We felt like we were at a Tennis Match and we were the BALLS! After an hour of wine tasting we walked away, (OK!OK!, so we wobbled away), with 30 litres of wine. Well!, we have to taste the wine before we introduce it into the bar..
We also visited their Dutch friends who have a holiday house in that area. Interesting time, whilst we listened to Dutch, conversed in French and English and wandered around their property in Baugé.

We now also offer a babysitting service for dogs. Babysat Virgule the Dutch dog, who responds to Dutch, French and English. Even the dogs are multi-lingual!

No news on our ‘working permi’ as yet. However we are still confident it will happen.

Classic quotes of the past weeks:
Ö Pete, would you like a strawberry in you wine love? “Why? do I have an apple in my beer?”
Ö Our dear elderly friend David had to go for a medical and a psych test. The Doctor asked him, “what day is it today, David?” David looked bewildered and replied, “how the hell would I know?” That’s life in Gourgé, and you don’t have to be elderly!!
Ö We received an email from our very pregnant daughter who lives in London. She is a Speech Pathologist who specializes in working with very young children. This is one of her wonderful stories. “So many funny moments with the children as I am getting bigger, and they all start remembering about the baby when they see me. Even some of the little 2-3yr olds see me and say "Angie…baby" pointing at my belly! So sweet…. I am yet to convince a few of them that I can't 'open' my belly to show them the baby and that I didn’t swallow the baby.... hehehe. They all now have to see my actual stomach and feel it, or put their heads up to my skin...it's so funny to watch their faces. Only a couple have asked how it comes out...hmmm how to explain that to some language disordered children!!”

Jusqui’à la semaine prochaine
Peter and Donna

An eventful week (Une semaine riche en événements)

Thank you to all our wonderful family and friends who 'rose to the occasion', answering our pleas for help, by sending Australian items to us in France. Let me explain......

There have been many people in this village and surrounding villages who have given us so much support and help over the past months, in an endeavour to get this café/bar opened. Included in this long list are Mayors, Solicitors, Directors, Teachers and people of diverse Nationalities. All giving of their time and energy, and not asking for anything in return. Our small way of saying 'merci beaucoup' is to give something from our wonderful country. In a nutshell, we are having problems with the French Consulate in Australia acquiring our working card, which allows us to run a business here in France. The French here are doing everything they possibly can within their jurisdiction to help us 'fight the good fight'. Too long a story to go into now....... Anyway, we are very thankful for these gifts, and for them to keep coming, as there are many people to thank:) We are in the paper again, in regards to this issue! Attached is the copy.

Besides the endless meetings we have had in the past weeks, we have managed to fit in our scheduled French lesson, speak with most of the family in Australia and the UK, work in the garden, as Spring is upon us, drink coupious amounts of French wine, come to the rescue of a mature age gentlemen who fell off his horse. OK! this one I will explain.

The horse was spooked by a dog and reared, hence his rider fell to the ground. All we saw was this horse galloping across the Roman Bridge without a rider. So, as you do, we ran around the back of our house to find this man lying on the ground in the middle of the road. Panic kicked in when I realised that I might have to ring the ambulance and try and explain to them in French, what the problem was and where we were. OK! OK! think Donna...Right, I knew what to do! Banging furiously on the window of our next door neighbour Jean-Michel, and yelling come here!, come here!, was the better option (in French of course).Anyway, I then decided to go chase the horse. What I was going to do when I found him, was not in my train of thinking at that stage. YES! I can ride a horse. It is getting on the horse that I have a problem with! Anyway...Jean-Michele came to the rescue and the gentlemen was able to get in his car (thank goodness, he was not injured too much) and they went off to find the horse. My sister thought it was hillarious that all I could say to Pete was 'I will get the horse, you save the man!', considering the horse was not in sight? Well!, the man was worried about his horse!

We also managed to have our first Bar-B-Que (pictures attached), which was a classic, I made strawberry and walnut muffins and took them around the neighbourhood, Pete put his welding gear on and fixed the neighbours gate and bell, plus we met another Aussie who is here for 12 months.

Jusqu'à la semaine prochaine....(Until next week)

Peter and Donna

(double click on the photos to enlarge them, and then click the left arrow at the top of the page to go back to the blog)

A week of eating, drinking, some renovations and rendez-vous

This week we sent off a request to the German Embassy in Bordeaux to get recognition for Pete's German ancestry. In the past weeks we have discovered that Pete's Grandmother was French/German and Pete's Great Grandparents were French! We knew his Dad and Grandfather were German, however we did not have any information past that...It has been a very emotional time, and it certainly explains Pete's love and passion for France.

We have finally finished cementing the bar floor. Now to lay the tiles. OK! things go slow over here:)

It seems that this week was the week for being invited to dinner and lunch. Wow! so much fabulous food, wine and amazing company...An author (on her 3rd book), a retired lawyer/art critic, an ex diplomat who has given us so much support, a business developer, an engineer who has lent us most of his household tools, and a very multi-talented gentleman whose degree is in tourism and his expertise is in renovating old buildings. They are also bi-lingual. Way to go!!! We feel very blessed:)

We also managed to fit in more meetings with very influential people in the community to explain our plans for the café/bar, and a French lesson with our very patient and wonderful French teacher, Elisabeth.

Back in Aussie land, my sister was very pro-active this week and called me every day, ahh!

Our youngest son even broke his hectic life style to call us this week:)

We went for a brief walk this afternoon and these are the photos taken just up the road looking back on our property. Double click the photos to view in a larger screen, and then left arrow back at the top of the page.

Au revoir from Gourgé, France

Week-end of Feb 14-15

Another wonderful week-end with lots of sunshine, however the temperature was still between 0-10 degrees and very windy. Still able to go for walks. ..Above is one of the walking tracks which is just down the road. It crosses over the River Thouet.

For the first time we were able to sit at the end of our property beside the river and drink Champagne. Looking forward to Spring. We can see the new growth on the trees already. Just discovered a Mulberry Tree. Mulberry pie it will be for our customers in the café/bar!

We had a number of visitors call in for a chat and a drink. I wonder if they still will, when they have to pay??

There is a small basketball court in the yard, so we ventured out and played around for while. Some children came and joined us, and it was wonderful to have them around and listen to their laughter, as we miss our family very much. Thank goodness for Skype, and unlimited internet phone usage to Australia and the UK:)

Received a surprise on Valentine's Day..Ahhhh

A visit from an Aussie friend

John Nayler visited us for a week and these are some of the photos that he took. The 9th Century Church in the village, local scenery, one of the walking tracks 2 mins down the road, Chateau Roche 10 mins walk away and of course..........John had to work off his stay. He is helping Pete to lay new cement. Go John!!

Another wonderful day!

This is across the road from our property:) The building you can see in the background is a Mill dating back to the medieval ages. There is a picnic area adjacent to the river.

YES! this is us!

Bonjour:)
It is important that we integrate into the French lifestyle. Here we are doing our very best communicating in French, and explaining that our bar/café will be open in April, 2009 in Gourgé.

Gourgé is SW of Paris. The closest major town is Poitiers. The area offers beautiful countryside, a 9th Century Church, an 11th Century Roman bridge (which is at the end of our property) and 15th Century Châteaux. There are 5 different walking tracks and cycling routes.

Bring on the bar and the sunshine!!

More to come from the Aussies....
Au revoir:)

Snow in Gourge

We had a wonderful surprise on the 6th January 2009, with the arrival of snow. The river iced over and it was a magical scence for a week.

First Post from Gourgé, France (380k SW of Paris)

We both fell in love with this area in November 2006, whilst we were on holidays in France. The memory stayed with us, and was so strong that we came back to look at an old property that was for sale beside the River Thouet. This property which has been dated back to the pre-Napolean era, was for many years a bar/cafe. We are still trying to find out more details, however we do know it was a Petrol Station at some time, there was a bike shop here and we believe it may have been a toll house.

The village is called Gourgé and the closest major town is Poitiers. There were extensive renovations to do as it was very run down, however we had a vision of what could be! The setting was magnificent and the area offered so much to visitors. We decided to buy it, and here we are:)

It was very difficult to say good-bye to our family and friends in Australia. We knew in our hearts that for now this is where we were mean't to be, so we sold up what we could and arrived here on October 21, 2008.