A Virtual Break!

"It's been a while since you last posted something" said my regular reader. 

I have to agree, but life has been a little busy of late. Just after we returned from our trip to the Isle of Wight written about in the previous post, Ann was diagnosed with breast cancer and immediately started on chemotherapy. Receiving such a diagnosis, especially when it affects someone who is your entire world is absolutely devastating, but the chemo has worked well and has recently successfully finished. 

Then, a few weeks ago, I eventually gave in to constant nagging to get my back problem looked at. Long story cut short, I spent 2 days at the local A&E and was transferred to the Spinal unit at Southampton for emergency surgery. Again, this was successful and I now find myself on a fairly long road to recovery. It is quite frightening at 2 o'clock in the morning to be told by the consultant surgeon who is going to be performing the surgery that you are a couple of months away from complete and permanent paralysis from the waist down. So in view of all that has been happening, we decided to put all our plans on hold for a few months.

And then came Corona Virus. So "a few months" might well become a year or two.

All the book writing commissions have dried up for the duration with the publishers that I work with noting that the publishing business has become very tight of late and being cautious of adding to their catalogues. Fortunately, all my existing titles are continuing to sell in reasonable numbers with the royalty cheques dribbling rather than rolling in and I have a couple of "treatments" as they are called ready to go as and when the publishers are eventually interested, but for now books six and seven in the series remain on hold. I can't even get out to do any photography at the moment as my camera bag is now too heavy for me to carry! You have to be a committed photographer to understand why I need to carry so much stuff around with me on the off-chance that I might need it. Even though I know that I probably won't.

A Day at the Watercress Line

I was able to sneak out for a day just before Ann's chemo started. It was another photo charter day giving line side access across multiple locations and exclusive use of the line for the day. I'm quite pleased with a few of the images that resulted from the day:

loco 506 was the subject for the day. recently restored and returned to traffic, it has been painted and sign written in the final style used by the Southern Railway just prior to nationalisation. In an otherwise inaccessible location, the blue sky and autumnal copper colours in the tree make a fine contrast to the black engine

these photo charters tend to start early in the day, in the case of this one it was just after 6 o'clock in the morning. About an hour later, we're heading from Ropley towards Medstead and overlooking glorious Hampshire scenery

same location as the previous shot, but taken from the other side of the track and now with the sun shining on the train. everywhere else in the UK, the lamps or discs on the front of the loco told the running staff and especially the signalman what type of train it was. On the Southern, it indicated the destination or route

we swapped our passenger carriages for a goods train after lunch, here seen making an enthusiastic start away from Ropley

The 2020 Holiday That Isn't To Be

We like France. We like the weather, the food, the wine, the good, empty roads and the people. The fact that I can speak passably good French probably helps and I have been told by several native French people that they can't hear an English accent when i am speaking French. Or perhaps they are being polite!

We had originally planned to have our honeymoon in France, but a complete lack of money put this on hold for a year. So, in the summer of 1981, just before our first wedding anniversary, we bundled our tent and camping gear into, on and around our trusty Ford Escort Popular and headed to Carcassonne. we took the morning ferry from Portsmouth to Cherbourg and being lazy, we decided to look for an overnight hotel, rather than put the tent up for the night. That strategy backfired a little; we left it too late to start looking and ended up in a shabby B&B or Chambre d'hote as they are called in France. It was grim, but only cost us 50FF (then about £4) for the night. The second night, we did the same but found somewhere much nicer just south of Cahors and then spent 2 weeks on a camping just outside Carcassonne. 

Viking Victory - the original ferry that ran between Portsmouth and Cherbourg (not my picture)

For the return, we planned to do the same thing, hopefully returning to Cherbourg for the ferry with just one overnight stop. Same problem finding somewhere, but eventually fond somewhere very nice in a small village astride the N20, the main road between Toulouse and Paris. I asked for a room for the night and was answered with the usual Gallic shrug, but told that they did have just one room available; would we like to see it? Well, naturallement, we would. Monsieur le Patron took us across a garden into a stable block and showed us into a suite of rooms at the top of the building. Bedroom, sitting room, hallway, toilet, bathroom and balcony. the rooms were decorated with silk tapestry and were exceptional. "Very nice", I think "I be we can't afford it...". I asked how much, the response was 200FF, or about £16. We took the room! But there was a snag; for that price, we were obliged to have dinner in the restaurant. Which was again exceptional. 

Our total bill when we checked out in the morning for room, dinner and breakfast was in the region of 400FF. I handed over my credit card. "Mais, non... Pas des cartes". He would only take cash. We didn't have any; it was Monday morning and in 1981, the banks in France didn't open on a Monday morning. We negotiated with our reserve fund of sterling and with the banks being closed I think we got a pretty poor exchange rate and were left penniless. So we drove as fast as we could - or at least as fast as an overloaded 1100cc Escort could manage to Cherbourg where we just missed the overnight ferry. It was a wonderful holiday; we've been back to Carcassonne several times and have often looked for the hotel along the N20, but have never found it again.

the original tent, but a later holiday as the car parked alongside is not the Escort. Notice the empty wine bottle in front of the tent

La Cite - the Medieval city of Carcassonne. It isn't entirely original having been rebuilt many times.

inside La Cite. Lots of souvenir shops selling suits of armour and restaurants providing the local dish of cassoulet. Delicious!!

The plan this year was to be much the same. Ferry from Portsmouth to Ouistreham, overnight stop at Falaise in the grounds of William the Conqueror's castle, a second night between Tours and Chateauroux, a third night on the edge of Cahors and then two weeks just to the north of Carcassonne. The return would be two overnight stops and the afternoon ferry back to Portsmouth to get us home in the evening.

I suppose we could haul the caravan out from storage for a few nights in June, park it on the driveway, set up the barbecue for some entrcote frites one night and cassoulet another night with croissants for breakfast and just pretend. If I speak to everyone in French for a few days, please excuse me...