Why France?

[Jardiniere]

oh and its hot in the summer

[smallblueplanet]

We are in Quercy - Quercy Rouergue - east of Cahors right on the Lot Valley - we do have differentiated seasons - we live in tiny little house that we bought for holidays originally and its right on the road on the edge of a large village with doctor, shop, boulangerie, brocante, post office and restaurant.but it still manges to be france profond. we like it cos its possible to grow old here they are building a maison de retraite at the other end of the village ......

Sounds very pleasant, what's the name of the village (I'm not stalking, I just want to have a look on multi-map or michelin later on )? How hot is it in summer? Do you get snow?

[Jardiniere]

St Gery - we get a little snow and some pretty ferocious frosts - we are right in the river valley and get lots of mists - but on the causses above the valley the weather is slightly different . In the summer its high 30's - no gardening between 10 am and 5 pm.

[piskieinboots]

ah ha - well I did ask and it sure got you athinking and following Snadger I went into Monty Python mode

[smallblueplanet]

...In the summer its high 30's - no gardening between 10 am and 5 pm.

Ohh, my kind of weather. I really want a swimming pool - well I can at least dream big!

[TonyF]

I agree with all of the above - and you want seasons, we got them. I'm not that far from Jardiniere and also live in a river valley so we get the same.

Would I go back to the UK - only for a visit, there's no way I would want to live there.

And the list missed out the health service which is absolutely brilliant tho changing.

Sorry, all except HSL, it's not that easy to get the traditional/heriotage seeds here so HSL is still a good option.

[piskieinboots]

yer but - we'll (English team) still whoop their butts in a couple weeks time - yeeeeeee haaaar

[scarey55]

Would I go back to the UK - only for a visit, there's no way I would want to live there.

In a similar vein - we had a "holiday" UK and couldn't wait till we could get back home (something that never happened the other way around )

[smallblueplanet]

In a similar vein - we had a "holiday" UK and couldn't wait till we could get back home (something that never happened the other way around )

What did it feel like the other way around? To see the UK as a 'stranger'?

[TonyF]

What did it feel like the other way around? To see the UK as a 'stranger'?

I don't see it as a stranger per se because I was born and bred there and still have family there. I go back because I have to. In the whole of my life I've never been homesick but the end of 2006 when we made our annual pilgimage to the UK, I really really missed being here and wanted to come back asap.

I've refused to go back a couple of times in 2007 and although I've now got to go back in July for a Uni thing, I'm not going back until late November.

What do I think of the UK - smelly, dirty, shopping malls, East London is now the pits, London is chaotic (no more than major cities here tho), so much traffic, so many excuses for working 45 hours a week plus (none of which actually make any sense), crap NHS (no offence to thos working in it, it's not your fault, if they can do it here why not there), fast food outlets everywhere, supermarkets that 'have to have out of season stuff because the customers 'demand' it', hugely obese people, bad language (and I'm not a prude, was a copper in East London but hearing small kids f-ing and blinding is not acceptable), it's just all too much now.

And although the alternatives were appealing (Scotland, up north somewhere) we wanted the weather for gardening, I wanted a more spiritual (closer to the earth, animist, wiccan, not organised religious tho) life and living our lives in a degree of affluence and comfort which, after 40 years plus at work for both of us, much of which was bloody hard, traumatic, dangerous and difficult tho thoroughly enjoyable, we thought we deserved.

Oh, and my family live in the UK, J's cousin John also, excellent reasons for emigrating - but somebody gave John our address and we got a bloody Xmas card from him - NO, he's not visiting us!

[travellers joy]

Try it and see!

[Two_Sheds]

I am just watching Julie Delpy's film "2 days in Paris."
Hilarious, shows how patronising the French can be. But in a good way!

j'adore la France xx


they are in Pere laChaisse (sp ?). I'VE BEEN THERE!

[smallblueplanet]

I understand homesickness Tony, when I was a teenager we used to live in Oz (mid 70s), I was homesick then. One time after I'd returned back to the UK I went on a working holiday staying with relatives in Sydney - I was homesick in the taxi leaving the airport, horrendous!

But times have changed, everywhere is 'closer'. You can get English radio & tv in France, there's easy access both transport & communications (unlike to Oz then!). But still homesickness is irrational....

....however your description of the worst of the UK is too familiar and your reasons for choosing France are similar to what ours would be.

[travellers joy]

I've lived in France so long that the them and us is out the window. The cheap property prices are irrelevant. But would someone tell me how to get rid of the sodding clematis that has creepers bigger than a fireman's fist and that can climb up to 50 meters and live far longer than me. The next door farmers say I can only do it with Roundup. This can't be the basis for organic gardening can it? Don 't tell me I can dig the roots up because I wake up in the middle of the night with hands numb from trying to get the sods out of the earth

[smallblueplanet]

Can't you just saw through its trunk? It'd die off then.