Before indulging in the customary tales of woe as in "it ain't all plain sailing" ....for that, you must read on - but just a moment - and for the record; we are moored at Hede-Bazouges (about 5 klm south of Tinteniac) for the forseeable future and loving it all very much. Our address is :
Malcolm and Lucie Walker,
Bateau Body and Soul,
Ecluse De La Petite Madelaine,
Hede -Bazouges, France 35630
Our telephone numbers are as follows:
0033 640 73 38 49 (recommended)
0033 684 69 92 20..(if all else fails)
We have good wifi connection from the Lock Keepers Cottage in which our new found friends Guillaume (Pronounced "william" only starting with a "G") and Katerina live with their three children (8,12 and 17) and we are moored on the left bank, by the third lock of the longest stair-case flight of locks in France. We are opposite the Petite Madelaine ecluse (Lock House), and have at the moment, free electricity and water, though we expect to be charged by someone sooner or later.
Hede-Bazouges (not to be confused with Bazouges-Hede - a smaller village nearby) has a very small port which we share with several other boats, three of which are fellow "full-timers". So far, it could not be better, especially as we have a car which enables us to reach other essential places and "must do's". The village is pretty in itself and has plenty to offer both in terms of food shops, pubs, post office - but it also has a thriving theatre which could be fun. We will soon find out.
Our local friends Marie and Olivier - from Tinteniac - have joined us in the port at Hede-Bazouges, with their two boats, and our other friends, Katerina and Guillaume, are geering the place up for the September 19th and 20th Annual Jazz Festival at which I am invited to contribute, with my piano and melodies divine. Guillaume has found me a base player to accompany me.
To our delight we are surprised by the arrival of Keith and Louise (Ritchie) on "Saltire" (last met in Meilhan 2 years ago). They have had a very exciting sea-trip from Bordeaux. We listen to this hair-raising story of near ship wreck and life-boat drama on their sea voyage up the coast from Bordeaux to the Arzal estuary and the rivers and canals of Brittany from the south. We feel relieved that, not being built for the sea, Body and Soul could never have followed suit. Crossing the St. Malo estuary and as far as the barrage, is about the most we can risk.
Happily, they complete their journey thanks to a French lifeboat team, and are able to travel north towards us, up the Villaine river through Redon and Rennes meeting us, quite fortuitously, at Tinteniac as we steam southwards from St. Malo.
We can laugh about it but - enough of the good times! - Now for the bad and the sad and not very funny....it's the 28th of July.
I speak about the death of Teddy who is "put down" on this day - his final visit to the local vet; exactly a year and one month after the death of his older mate, Spud. His heart and lungs cause him increased difficulty breathing. He has strong medication which sees him happily through the last three months of his life. Just over 15 years old - he makes it to Brittany against all expectations.
In his last week we take him for a cooling "wallow" in a rock pool on the beach at Cancale. He loved the beaches and the sea. Sadly, we are now dog-less.
Lucie and I agree that we should bury his body in a nice patch of ground - not 10 yards from our mooring. Our lovely lady vet (who also cries at his final parting) expresses surprise at our request for the return of his body - she is concerned about our plans for his private burial and tells us that we would actually be breaking French law. She reluctantly suggests, however, that we should buy some lime to cover his body in the grave to hasten decomposition and prevent odours.
Off we go, tearfully, to the nearest "brico" shop to buy a garden spade and a bag of lime, believing that we are "doing right" by him - you can understand? ...a beautiful resting place with some flowers, close by us in the Port .... best for him and both of us - we could visit his grave?...and so on.
Readers may remember the green plastic flower pot we bought for Spud, planted with a sprig of rosemary for remembrance, which lit up in the dark . Yes?
No?... really, I'm afraid so.
But then we find that lime is only available, on order, from a farm shop in large bags which would anyway need a tractor to carry even one of them.
So - still keen to be doing the right thing - I try digging the selected spot for Teddy's grave with my new spade, thinking that if I dig it deep enough, we wouldn't need lime at all. Nobody but us will know. It is getting dark.
Teddy's stiffening body is lying on the back seat of the car but neither the cheap Chinese spade nor I are up to the job. Alas, the spot we choose has inches of concrete and hardcore covered with a thin layer of grass. I give up.
We decide to take his body back to the vet's surgery the next day; to be sent for cremation by a commercial company. His ashes, they assure us, are to be scattered out at sea.
We have a cheap Chinese spade by which to remember him .....it is hardly used.... as well as a ton of photos on our PC computer - but ahah! Wait.....
You won't believe this, but on the very same sad morning, after returning from the vet, our pc/computer also gives up the ghost (the hard disc apparently) - so we take the "stack", together with our slightly out-of-date external back-up disc to a marvellous man in Combourg who tries his hardest to save our files. We trust him completely and indeed he finds the back-up disc to be in good order. So there is hope. We leave him with his promise to ring us when he has tried again to salvage whatever he can of our files.
True to this promise, he calls after midi with more bad news. The "mother board" has "gone" too, he says. So no files are recoverable.
As it happens, of course, he can offer us a brand new replacement computer with all the latest stuff on it and as fast as one could ever imagine, at a truly amazing price. So amazing is this offer that I lose my presence of mind and I drop the little external back-up disc - our last resort - on to the tiled floor where it smashes irretrievably. So now we have a new tower computer/pc. with no files/music/photos at all, other than those we manage to scramble from a few past USB sticks and, of course, the albums on this blog (in the left hand column) which can be copied back in to our "pictures" file. We miss our old friend, of fourteen years, very much.
Two deaths is quite enough for us and so we decide to "dry our eyes" and "call it a day". But there's another shock coming; In the middle of the night - Lucie wakes up in a sweat after dreaming that my passport is out of date*. We need this for our trip to the UK on the 7th September. So we're up at 4am to find out, incredibly, that her dream is proved to be true. It ran out this July. Let's hope it only takes three weeks to process.
Lucie completes what's necessary, post-haste, with forms filled out on-line, using our super new 'pooter and, with new, sinister photos of me from a local passport machine and loads of stamps from the post office, it goes off before midi that morning. Phew!
We're still waiting.
Huh! It's never all plain sailing is it?
*Mea culpa -
Lucie, upon reading this blog, gently reminds me of the enormity of her role in sorting out my passport problem - and almost everything else, for that matter, in what is for me a lovely, but still foreign, country.
As Lucie rightly points out, and I confess, that it is she (not "we"as above) who gets up at 4 am to tackle the on-line passport renewal form, having dreamed the problem in the first place. In truth, I arrive on the scene in time for breakfast!
It is Lucie who arranges our early visit to get colour photos, colour photo-copies, envelopes, stamps etc. We are taken there by Keith and Louise who happen to be going to the market at the nearby town, Combourg. Whilst they enjoy the market, Lucie drags me reluctantly in and out of the post office and photocopying shop and she finally makes the post before lunch. I can only do as I am told, watch in awe, buy les cafe cremes and tell the jokes.