Life in France

Which one?

A field of sunflowers near Limoux
A field of sunflowers near Limoux

If you’re in the US and tell someone that you are from Washington they might assume that you mean the state but it could easily be the nation’s capital or about 25 other cities, towns, mounts, and ports around the country. According to the post office, if you address a letter to Springfield without including the state name, they will have a choice of 41 locations where it could be delivered. Last Sunday our neighbors asked us to go with them to a festival in Villelongue which we had to look up in a mapping program to see how long the car ride might be. Since there are a dozen towns or villages in France with that name, we hoped they had chosen the one about 45 minutes south of Carcassonne. Continue reading “Which one?”

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Life in France

Small town shopping

Pedestrian shopping street in Carcassonne
Pedestrian shopping street in Carcassonne

Do you remember Western Auto®? Long before big-box stores and their parking lots filled acres of land around the edges of cities, small-town Americans went shopping for kitchen appliances, televisions, washing machines, beds, lawn mowers, and bicycles in a compact, family-owned store like those. It was the kind of place, as Bill tells the true story of when he was growing up, that before you purchased one, would lend you two TVs to try out, even on Super Bowl Sunday. Guess what store we stopped into last week on Carcassonne’s pedestrian shopping street. Continue reading “Small town shopping”

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Life in France

French locks

Yes, a French lock but not for today's post
Yes, a French lock but not for today’s post

I started to write that the first thing we did after getting the keys to our new house was to change the lock, but that’s not actually true. We knew the toilet worked but was a bit wobbly and needed adjusting so Bill took care of that straight away. Our next step was to order a refrigerator. After all, if we were going to be working on the place for the next few months, we might as well be comfortable and the local sparkling wine doesn’t chill itself. With those priorities checked off the list it was indeed time to change the lock and have a French lesson at the same time. Continue reading “French locks”

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Dealing with government, Life in France

En-tiley ours

Blue and white tiles in the kitchen
Blue and white tiles in the kitchen

It may have taken three months, that felt like a year, but we have signed the final sales contract on a house in France. The first time I mentioned anything about house buying on the blog was in a post from May when we had been taking some pictures of courtyards. We both crave light, finding dismal days depressing, so a house built around an outdoor courtyard, with glass doors and windows opening each room to the sun was ideal. There are websites (listed at the end) that give complete details about the entire house buying process here, but the highlights of what we went through are below. Continue reading “En-tiley ours”

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Life in France

Integration

Rooftops of Carcassonne looking towards the castle
Rooftops of Carcassonne looking towards the castle

If you lived in the USA, especially the south, during the 1950’s and 60’s, just the mention of this blog post’s title word might have made your blood run hot or cold depending upon your upbringing, experiences, and/or outlook on life. To live successfully in another country, or perhaps even in your own, we find integration a very important word. In fact, for us in France intégration is a requirement. Continue reading “Integration”

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Life in France

Trip to Trèbes

Trebes from the Canal-du-Midi
Trèbes viewed from the Canal-du-Midi

As the crow flies, it’s only about 7 kilometers (4.4 miles) to Trèbes which is the next town east of Carcassonne along the Canal-du-Midi. The driving distance is 10 kilometers that you can cover in around 13 minutes. According to our local tourist authority’s booklet Walks: Nature and Heritage if you follow the towpath along the canal you can get there in 2 and ½ hours on foot. Since we have chosen to live without a car and our avid-hiking friends, Gaynor and Pete were with us, you can guess how we got there. Continue reading “Trip to Trèbes”

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Life in France

The language of dance

Dancing in Carcassonne
Dancing in Carcassonne

Several times you’ve probably read here about our English friends Gaynor and Pete whom we met by chance (I call that “meeting by Bill”—the man who knows no strangers) when we still lived in Atlanta. They are quite an active couple both outdoors whether cycling, kayaking,or hiking and even indoors with the foxtrot, cha cha, and tango for example, or a helium balloon. Continue reading “The language of dance”

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