Muddy Marge

Monbert (the return to)

Last night the realisation of just how relaxing it is, as the light begins to fade, and darkness sets in, sitting and reading is. As we’ve mentioned previously, the French are very keen on television, but we haven’t missed it at all. We are both thinking how wonderful it would be to go off in Marge for the whole summer, but we have responsibilities at home, so that trip will have to wait.

This morning, the  yellow and red of the early morning sun, coloured the sky, like the heart of a peach. After breakfast, we walked along the promenade to take one last look at the sea, before we set off. The usual Saturday morning activities of jogging, walking and cycling were happening all around us.

Before, we went for our walk, we noticed that in the school playground being us, tables and trestles were being set up in the playground. On the way back, we stopped at the entrance to the school to see what was going on. A team of men and women were opening oyster shells with ease and at great speed. They had already plated up half a dozen oysters along with a wedge of lemon on many plates. As we mentioned the town is famous for it’s oysters, we wondered if this was some kind of homage to the oyster, held at the end of every summer.

Today, it was sad for us to realise. that this will be our very last weekend in France this year. As we travel further north, despite the days being very warm, (this afternoon 28c), the nights and mornings are much fresher. Autumn is well on its way here, just as it will be back home.

Setting off along the coast, retracing our steps from when we arrived earlier in the month, we travelled through the marshland and nature reserve around La Rochelle, where a stork flew overhead, and then along the quiet country roads towards our lunch stop of  Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie, where along the way we saw a large number of free range geese, and couldn’t help wondering what their fate night be.

At Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie we put some figs we’d picked from a tree next to us at last nights stop, onto the dashboard to ripen in the sun, this place is normally reserved for the drying of John’s socks!

 Then we walked down to the large expanse of beach, found a nice spot, and sat and read our books, and one of us paddled in the calm waters of the Atlantic.

Tonight, we are back at Monbert. Philippe is away, but Odile was here to greet us. In French and English we discussed our travels.

Before going to our pitch, Odile gave us a punnet of miniature plum tomatoes from Philippe’s vegetable garden. Once before, Philippe gave us some cherry tomatoes, and these were just as sweet as the ones we received today. Odile has told us tonight and tomorrow morning will be cold, suddenly we yearn for the warmer climate of Spain.