May and June Languedoc Digest

Well, it has been a very busy couple of weeks down here in La Sud de France. Pleasant as in sun, sea, Soirees and serenity. We wish you were all here to share this beautiful situation with us.

Pat snapped this photo of morning sunlight playing with shadows in our kitchen. The ultimate in serenity. Week before last, we had record heat here with heat index over 100F. Usually it seldom exceeds 85 until August when it reaches low 90s on occasion. the humidity is usually non existent so its always pleasant. EXCEPT for this heat wave. It only lasted 3-4 days and now we are normal at 82-86 with 30% humidity

The Neighborhood party 2014

On the 23 May, the annual neighborhood party was held in "le salle du troiseme generation" (the old folks room). We were forced inside due to an unlikely thunderstorm which just as we were getting under way. Food was pot luck and great.The dishes were passed from table to table starting at one corner of the room and continuing until it was complet. No one went hungry as there was a lot of food left over. The cave provided the wine and several brought Pastis. I brought a Oporto which disappeared very quickly. Pat's salad was totally gone very soon. The boulangerie provided the bread, 3 or 4 large loaves sufficient to supply the Sermon on the Mount. You cut or tear tear off a piece and send it along. There were about 40 or so and many were new since last year so our neighborhood is growing.

pain du ronde

Servez-vous le pain 

Pain longez

Dessert 

Pizza night in Alignan

We asked some of notre amis to come to Alignan on Wednesday for the pizza Chez Mario et Mimi at the cafe here. We had 18 and all liked the pizza even though again we were chased inside by the weather. But all seemed to appreciate being together again like the "good ol' days"

Robert and Dorothy

Di and Margaret

Bert

Margaret and Jeffrey's cookout

A couple of weeks ago we went over to our good friends Margaret and Jeffrey for a cookout. They really do it up in superb style. Unique dishes served with the most convivial manner. Roland and Mary France were there as well as their elderly neighbor. Aperos were lovely and then food came for three hours. Fabulous and on a grille the size of a napkin. Keith and Diane were here and brought us the news from Lands End where they live in England. Di had fallen down the stairs (as had Pat and I in a previous month) and was bruised terribly although she was reluctant to demonstrate until the Viognier had taken its toll. Then, well then, you see below.

Richard and Jeffrey

Di after sampling Roland's Frontignan 

Alison and Richard kept things lively with their tales of setting their garden afire and nearly burning the village to the ground. but at least that dreaded hedge is gone!

Madame and Mary France

must have been funny

Stair damage

le Blanc de Alignan

Traditional Dancers

Alignan held an event at the cave to showcase their wines last week. The format was buy a wine glass for 3 euro and they keep filling it up with their featured cepages. The show started with a band and traditional folk dances in costume. Very entertaining for us as we haven't seen much of this sort of tradition. Soon after this dancing, a round of audience dancing started until the entree began to be served from the buffet line. The repas was 10 euro and included a very large plate of charcuterie (cold cuts and dried ham) followed by a heaping plate of paella interspersed with fits of dancing for those so inclined. We finished off with tarte de pomme (apple pie) and coffee. This is of course followed by even more exuberant dancing particularly from those who availed themselves the opportunity to buy some of the cave's finest wine.

Pat's Heroes

Traditional Dancers

The poulan made a special guest appearance about dix heure (10 o'clock) and the parents and children ( and old people like me) had a grand time clapping, singing and dancing to the poulan song.

le Poulan et les enfants

 le jardin de Patricia

Pat bought some flowers and confiscated an island around a tree in front of our house. She planted hers about the same time the city boys were changing to summer plants. Since then the city has been watering her petite jardin and but for the obvious animal problems, all is doing well. She also slipped in some Jalapeno piment plants we had grown from seeds in March. shh, don't tell as it is illegal to bring in foreign agri products.

le jardin publique

le Maison

Tuesday Club

Richard Crockett

Alison Crockett

 The Tuesday club is an organization of predominantly Brits that get together to share experiences here in le Sud de France. We went a couple of weeks ago with Richard and Alison and had a grand time. Although there was no program on this day, (only a great midi meal with local domaine wine) , I went again last Tuesday and heard a very interesting talk on what happened in the Languedoc during the war. Seems, (in addition to the resistance)  there was operation Dragoon where an American led landing force of 200,000 landed on the south beaches. There was little opposition and the Germans fled immediately partly because they couldn't stand and fight and partly because Hitler called up all forces available to confront the advancing enemy from Normandy.

Work on the Terrasse

We are making steady progress on the new room Pat calls the conservatory. The roof is about 19 feet high at its highest and we are trying to break it visually into segments design wise. Other wise it is just a vast expanse of blank walls. I have fashioned some columns to help create some contrast and dimension on the flat walls. the columns also serve to hide the wiring that will come later. It is all done in bricks of various sizes and has a footer and a header with a chapeau and crown moulding at the top. 

It was reasonably easy except for the crooked non-plumb walls. But it will be covered in a type of plaster so it won't really show.
We are having the walls rendered (plastered) up to 3 meters high. this will create architectural interest as the walls and the columns will be finished in a different color. A border of faux bricks is planned around the top to separate and the upper part will get some paint.In preparation for this, I had to run the electrics to provide a smooth finished product. With my mortar buster, I channeled out a canal to place the wires in which will be covered up later when we finish the walls. I also placed the boxes in mortar so they are sturdy when using them later.

We will have sliding glass doors separating the conservatory from the outside terrasse. To make this happen, a beam was required to attach the doors below and the fixed panels above to so there would be strength and no sag which would ruin the sliders. I ordered a manufactured beam called a "nail web" to span the 6 meters. I negotiated the installation with Mssr. Roque who is supplying the glass works. They installed the poutre (beam) on 3 aluminium posts making certain all was perfectly level. He then took precise measurements and told me about 3 semain (weeks) to fabricate. Then he will come back to install.

Setting the poutre and fixing to the wall

Precision

A fine adjustment with an angle grinder

Rendering the walls 

The next step is to finish the walls in the interior room. Negotiation is the same here as anywhere but maybe worse because an English speaker is considered vulnerable and ignorant with money in the bank to the Macons (contractors) It is a struggle but you can negotiate to something approaching a fair price. and so it was with David Touche. We argued for about 40 minutes before he relented and gave me a fair price.
 They started by forming up the area to be covered 3 meters high and added a greage mesh to hold the scratch coat. They then take a big hose and a powerful concrete pump and spray the walls. I have seen this done on gunite pools in USA. One man sprays and the other works it into the mesh and wall with a large flat trowel.

They then must let it dry/cure before the finish coat is applied.

During the process, David's father died and we have endured several delays. 

The Third Chambre

We have started serious work on the bedroom on the 2nd level. I had a devi (quote ) for the plumbing that I found to be almost two days labor too much. It was quite a simple, straightforward job that I didn't feel obligated to pay an exorbitant bid for. I think another case of "bid it high and see if they will take it". Being dissatisfied and having no other good options, I decided to do it myself. All it took was a plumbing tool used here for the type of piping used. I bought the kit and had the job done in about half the time of the "professional". It is not necessarily pretty work but it was pressure tested for about a week without incident. Oops, there was one small incident. when I turned the water on to test it, I had left the shower tap open and we did cause a bit of water for about 2 minutes until we figured it out.

The waste lines are in, the supply lines are in and we are now ready to finish the placo work and tile the shower and paint the room. Then set the fixtures and voila!

We have had Jim, the Irishman, here for the last week. He has sanded and put a fresh coat of poly on the front door. Then he cleaned the poutres in the third chambre and applied a liberal coating of linseed oil. He started the tiling on Friday. So a little progress is being made. Photos to follow.

More renovation or travail, travail travail....

Well, it has been a very pleasant semain  down here in La Sud de France. Pleasant as in sun, windy, warm and welcoming . We wish you were all here to share this beautiful situation with us.

Stairs

Stairs here come in kits. I searched all over the brico places for regular stair stringers to custom make our stairs to the terrasse from the garage but ended up with a kit instead.

It consists of the “stringers” which are notched out to accept the treads. It is one of those things that looks simple until you get your hands on it. Trying to fit 10 treads into slots on two stringers proves to add more gray hair than anyone would want. It was about 10 feet long and we could get one end started but by the time we got to the other end , the first part had jumped out of the slot.

It seemed you need about five people to hold what you had just completed while others were moving on down. We finally used long clamps to hold it together until the glue in the slots had set. At 3 foot spacing, along screw was driven in, but you couldn’t do that until all was properly fitted. It only took about 5 hours. Pat had pre-stained and added a coat of clear so they looked very nice finished.

Last panel

The old house had wainscoting throughout the street level. Due to the rising damp problem, several of the panels required extensive repairs. Wood rot and wood worm made the remaining panels very fragile. Because of the modifications and rebuilding of the walls, all the dimensions were not the same as the original panel length.

Most of the panels were adapted to new locations. This panel was totally built from scratch to fill the remaining wall in the kitchen. The panel was square but the walls are not straight so it is difficult to scribe them to the walls. (Which I did not do on this one.)

Toilet in garage

Pat had previously showed the finished toilet in the garage but here is how it started. Working with the steel framing is quite a change from wood studs.

It is quite easy once you get the hang of it but presents a few challenges along the way. It is very strong once the placo (sheetrock) is attached but exasperatingly flimsy until. You crimp the montands (studs) to the rails (plates) with a device that penetrates both pieces and barely hold it together until the placo is installed. Placo is screwed into the steel which also can be frustrating as all the screws don’t want to penetrate the metal below.

Threshold

I tried for several hours on different attempts to repair a threshold to the terrasse area. I tried to cut and fit wood to rebuild an old wood threshold complete with a drip ledge to shed any rain or water. Then in a stroke of genius (or blind luck) I decided to try my hand with a concrete product for the first time on detail work. I previously had only poured simple slabs and while not particularly proud of this work, it is totally in keeping with an old house.

The problem with wood was it would not conform to the twists and turns of the floor and wall and difference in heights. Mortar, on the other hand, is molded to the situation. After summoning all my courage, I formed up, mixed a batch, and fashioned a perfect (almost) threshold. Even Jake liked it as you can see as he stamped his own autograph to my work.

Terrasse walls cleaning and prep

We cleaned the walls of the barn (terrasse)  earlier with small pressure washer and it was time to tackle the "conservatory". Pat calls it that since we had clear panels inserted in the roof shortly after we returned. amazingly bright and airy with the roof 25 feet tall at the high point. the difference now was the conservatory doesn't drain like the terrasse level did. this means all the water used to wash the walls must be manually removed. this was accomplished with a squeegee and a shop vac. I worked the ladder and washer and Pat worked the squeegee and the shop vac.

Before and after 

Except for the very high places, it was reasonable easy too remove decades and decades of dust, spider webs and lint. I am sure the walls had never been cleaned sinced they were rendered.  the lower walls had a concrete lime render but above 3 meters on one wall ther was nothing except the brickes used to build the wall on our third level. it made quite an unusal pattern and we may leave it for interest or paint it the same as the other walls.

Balcony grille

In the fall, we had found a suitable "corps gard" (window grille) for the barn window. we finally coerced David to come and install it for us in March. We had de-rusted and painted it last fall and thought it would be a fitting addition to the old ruin. Benjamin and Jeremy parked the camion in the main road and set up their scaffolding and started drilling. They had to use my mortar buster since they hit a hard rock in the wall. After the holes were suitably large, they filled them with chemique, a chemical bonding agent used here that grabs the concrete and whatever else is in the whole and sets up incredibly strong in about 20 minutes. 

in about an hour, they finished with a promise to come back demain to put mortar in the holes. Benjamin was right on time and again thought nothing of blocking traffic while he mortared up the holes.

Floors

the clean and the unclean

In the salon, (or TV room) Pat worked for about a month on the terracotta floors.  They were filthy with years and years of abuse, dirt and debris from the barn and from the renters who never cleaned anything.  Because the floor could be cleaned only by sitting on the floor and working on one tile at a time it was uncomfortable work that allowed for only a few tiles at a time be cleaned.  I lost track of how much decapant she used but I considered buying stock in the mother company to regain some of the expense thru dividends.  Pat also used more razor blades and scrubbers than I thought could be found in France.  The dirty floor finally started to become recognizable as pale peach/sand colored tiles.  After scrubbing and scrapping and mopping for almost a month, Pat finally hooked up her floor polisher and used the scrubbers on that machine to get the last bit of gunk off the floor.  The artisan who cleaned the kitchen floors looked at the job Pat did and said that was as good as the floor would be.  The only thing they would do to make it better was to apply a coat of resin.  Since that was expensive and the floor was to have a rug we declined.  One of the things the artisan pointed out on the tiles was what looked like a very small kitten paw print.  He said it was the "mark of the savage" and the man that made the tile marked his tiles that way.  So I guess with a stretch of imagination you could say we have a signed work of art for a floor in the salon.

 

St. Adrian's Garden 

As mentioned in the last post, we went to St.Adrian's last Sunday for a really pleasant afternoon. This apparently is virtually all French as I did not detect any tourists or expats in the crowd. It was a very lazy affair where strolling and sitting in the bright sunshine was a delight.There was music by an Italian tenor who was quite pleased with his own voice and it rang through. The horse show was a bit tame with mostly prancing horses and riders accompanied on occasion by a formally dressed couple dancing. One pony was very spirited and stylish but he got into trouble when his prancing splashed water on the boss. The Carnival costumes were extraordinarily brilliant and the actor posed for thousands of photos.