Bill was anxious to fence the land so that we could have animals. After all, this was one of the main reasons for us moving to France and buying a place with six acres. The vague wave of the arm and words of the previous owner, “it’s over there somewhere” had not really helped to clarify where the boundary actually was. And we were far too scared to ask the neighbours who had been watching our every move through binoculars.
Bill was anxious to fence the land so that we could have animals. After all, this was one of the main reasons for us moving to France and buying a place with six acres. The vague wave of the arm and words of the previous owner, “it’s over there somewhere” had not really helped to clarify where the boundary actually was. And we were far too scared to ask the neighbours who had been watching our every move through binoculars.
Bill was anxious to fence the land so that we could have animals. After all, this was one of the main reasons for us moving to France and buying a place with six acres. The vague wave of the arm and words of the previous owner, “it’s over there somewhere” had not really helped to clarify where the boundary actually was. And we were far too scared to ask the neighbours who had been watching our every move through binoculars.
As arranged, the workers from the Mairie turned up in not one but two lorries.
With a great deal of good humour they sorted the rubbish into different recyclable materials, loaded up their vehicles, swept the lawn and bid us goodbye. All that without asking for a penny (more humble pie for hubby).
As Christmas approached the previous owner of our mas and his two daughters prepared to move out of The Other End. We were highly excited to see (for only the second time) the rest of the house that we had purchased. And not more than a little curious to see how they had been living all these months.
I met Shaun at my yoga class in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria. A teacher of literacy at the local college, he had dreams of becoming a circus entertainer.
Several fraught phone calls later it seemed that our furniture was making slow progress through France in our direction. On the appointed day we received a phone call to say it was on its way up our hill. We ran outside to be confronted by two grumpy blokes sitting in a tiny van on the drive outside the house.
Join Marian Thornley every week as she shares the ups and downs of her move to, and life in Céret Settling in France We woke up for the first time in our new home, realised…
by Marian Thornley How not to move to France Our cycling/house-buying adventure was taking place only a few weeks before the first of various financial crashes hit the world. Luckily for us, we managed to…
So it was that a couple of days later we cycled into Ceret town centre and collapsed onto a bench outside the Mairie in the shade of the huge London plane trees.