Ouf!

For the first day in a long time, we have not woken to blue skies and bright sunshine – and we are much relieved! Since our Saturday night (3 July) thunderstorm in Besançon, the weather has been steadily getting hotter and hotter. We both enjoy hot, sunny weather but there is a point at which it gets too hot and we had well and truly passed it. On Saturday evening, when we arrived here in Isle sur le Doubs, we went for a (short, slow) walk into the town. The large digital time-date-temperature displays outside both the pharmacy and the real estate agency showed the temperature as 32o. We had to have a swim in the canal to cool down before going to bed that night – not something we usually do but we were alone on the quay and the water looked clean enough and we had a good supply of clean water on board to clean ourselves off with afterwards.

By Sunday afternoon, even J was “looking forward to a good thunderstorm”. Ever since her house in the Far North was flooded during a storm, she has had a real, visceral aversion to heavy rain – and a thunderstorm here only has a cooling effect if accompanied by such rain! We spent the day doing very little other than finding a shady place to sit in our folding chairs and read, and biking down to the river (less than 1km away) to cool off. For days we have been eating mostly salads and using the barbecue off the boat to do any cooking. Anything not strictly necessary that involved physical or mental exertion without the payoff of a cool-down was definitely off the agenda – no non-essential housework (boatwork?), no minor repairs, no blogging…



We have also been developing a greater understanding of the habits of some of our French friends. We find ourselves keeping curtains closed and trying to find any other way possible to stop the heat of the sun getting into the boat, remembering that Christian did the same thing at our place, when he came to visit us in NZ this summer. We have been eating dinner later and later, waiting for it to be cool enough to contemplate, let alone enjoy, and then, of course, we don’t go to bed until well after 11pm. Given that mornings are cool and we haven’t quite adapted to getting up later, the next thing for us to master must be the siesta!!

Meteociel.com, our internet weather forecasters, let us know five days ago before that we should expect the thunderstorm to arrive yesterday and if that wasn’t enough warning, the woman who served me in the bakery yesterday morning, confirmed that thunderstorms were to be expected during the day. It’s great to get accurate weather forecasting! Ever since we left Besançon, we have been planning to be here in Isle sur le Doubs – where we are, in fact OFF the river and on the canal, when the rain hit. We arrived sooner than we expected due to a lack of suitable stopping places in between but have been happy to stay here a bit longer as well, as this island offers boaties almost everything we could want:
– a supermarket and service station just across the road from the lower quay, allowing us to replenish supplies of diesel as well as groceries
– safe moorings on a canal (no possibility of being caught by rising waters)
– some shade to sit under when the boat gets too hot
– the river nearby where we can swim to cool down (there’s always water nearby but often it is either not appealing to swim in or not easy to get in and out of)
– the possibility of mooring free of charge if we choose no to access the water and electricity
– water and electricity to enable us to fill the tanks, do the laundry and (now that it has cooled off) also do the vacuuming before we leave
– a free wifi connection for boaties at the camping ground (as in many places, both are run by the local council and facilities are sometimes shared)
The port is also very near a railway station, which means it would be a perfect place to meet visitors, if any were due…

So, we have an overcast morning and a temperature of around 23 degrees, rather than the 28-in-the-shade (pharmacy)/30-in-the-sun (real estate agent’s) at the same time yesterday morning. We’ll be able to nip back to the camping ground to post this and some email, and vacuum the boat and fill it with water without getting into a lather in the process. We may even be able to give the decks a proper scrub – something we’ve wanted to do since they were covered with some nasty rust-coloured pollen in Besançon. Then we’ll enjoy a day of navigating in the cooler weather before the heat starts to build again, as it inevitably will.

Post Script….. things are still not what they seem!

The other day we left our overnight mooring spot at Laissey on the Doubs River and travelled to the first lock. One red light was showing (this is expected) Catherine activated the remote control and the lock began the process of being prepared for us. The display board showed one red and one green light indicating our request had been registered and the full lock emptied. In due course the gates opened but the red light did not go off as anticipated, the green light did and two red lights came on! Boats are forbidden to enter a lock unless there is just one green light showing. Catherine rang the VNF and explained the problem. The VNF man said he would send someone from Besancon asap to come and fix it. Catherine asked permission to enter the lock and tie up as we were on the river and there wasn’t a ‘waiting platform’ to tie up on. We didn’t want to sit in the river wasting diesel for the twenty minutes or so that it would take him to get here and VNF personnel are able to override the “orders” given by the lock lights. Permission was granted, so we entered the lock and tied up towards the back of the lock to avoid the turbulent water that rushes in as the lock fills. The lock was deep and it was a stretch for Catherine to get the ropes attached.

Not very long afterwards, we were dismayed to see another boat arrive, clearly wanting to enter the lock. We would have to move our boat forward to make room for them, just a common courtesy of course – but not easy in such a high lock. We were astounded when the two Dutch men in the arriving boat shouted at us that we had activated the red rod instead of the blue one, which is the one that sets the process of filling the lock going. (We hadn’t touched either rod because we knew there was a problem and were waiting for the VNF man). They assumed they knew the cause of the problem, even though they had just arrived. They didn’t bother asking and would not listen to our explanation. They were adamant that we had obviously done something wrong. In the end, I shouted at them to be quiet and listen. They were not impressed with that at all! C also had to ask them to listen, and finally they did…..sort of. They calmed down a bit when C said that a VNF man was on the way. C sensibly took the view that we were in this together and there was nothing to be gained by further antipathy. They asked us to move forward, C explained it would be a stretch for her to reach the ropes to take them off and re-position them. One of the men climbed up a ladder, moved our ropes forward, tied up their boat behind us and in due course the repair man came. We left the lock in our usual competent manner. C said it was a pity I didn’t have a chance to look back and watch them make a dog’s breakfast of their exit. As soon as possible we slowed down and let them go past us. We preferred to slow down and travel alone rather to share any more locks with such objectionable people.

Two locks later, there they were in a full lock going nowhere. We wondered what was taking them so long. Were they dallying to annoy us? We tied up to a waiting platform and C went and asked them if they had a problem. What a shame they hadn’t offered us an opportunity to explain our predicament! They had entered the lock, it had filled but the gates didn’t open to let them out. They had called for assistance.

It has been quite some time since I have felt so very angry. What a shame I let such pompous men generate such feelings of outrage!

Going with the flow

We arrived in the university city of Besançon not sure whether we would stay here for two or three days. We have now been here almost a week and intend to leave first thing tomorrow. So what factors have influenced our decision(s) to stay here longer?

First of all the moorings are safe. They are pontoon moorings (i.e. they rise and fall with the water level) on a canalised part of the river just beneath a lock, so if there is a lot of rain all at once, we are protected from the rising – and possibly raging - river. That said, there is a sign on the town wall on the opposite side of the canal, which shows how high the waters rose in the 1910 flood and I’m sure no lock would protect us from that!! The water would have been running over the top of the lock and right through the town. Fortunately, that was in January…

Weather has had a great influence on our decision-making this week. The first few days here were almost unbearably hot and we, Wellingtonians, not known for needing to find a breeze, were desperately looking for anything that looked like air movement – and not really finding it. What saved us, though, was the fact that the port in Besançon is on a small island and on the other side – all of 70 metres away - is easy access down to the river, upstream from most of the city. Although we are reliably told that “no-one ever swims there”, we have… repeatedly, and have thoroughly enjoyed it. It seems to entertain the locals and it cools us down like nothing else can - so everyone wins!

Then, on Saturday evening, just when we were thinking that the heat would prevent us from ever getting to see any more of the city than this small island, the weather broke with a crashing thunder storm and the temperatures cooled. The timing was impeccable as Besançon is a student city and Saturday evening on our island in the middle of the city was likely to attract groups of young people drinking. The rain certainly put paid to those plans! The next few days were cooler and we were able to venture out on bikes and on foot to discover more of the city, especially the remarkable citadel that sits on a ridge high above the city. It also meant that we were able – and willing – to attack one or two small jobs on the boat: a bit of painting here and some repairs around windows, which leak (an on-going task).

At this stage, our decision to stay on was helped by the way in which the port charges are organised. It costs 8 euros a night for mooring but 36 euros a week. After Day 4, it simply made sense (and cents) to say on for another three nights!

The availability of wifi, preferably free of charge, also helps in us decide to stay longer in a place. As it happens, the port is just across the river from one of Besançon’s tourist offices, which has an unsecured wifi connection, which we found on our first night. We’ve been using it ever since – from outside – as when we went in to ask about wifi, it wasn’t one of the options they offered! We’ve also paid for some wifi time in the port as we have had some serious web-searching to do and there is only so much you want to do perched on a park bench with the computer on your lap.

Getting reasonably-priced groceries here has been more difficult than you might imagine. The port is almost too centrally-situated for that. We are quite close to the market – but while the market has fabulous, fresh produce, it often isn’t well-priced. C finally found a discount supermarket today but it was a good 20-30 minute cycle away, much of it uphill. However, we have found that cycling uphill to the supermarket has benefits – the ride back downhill, with groceries on board (in panniers, basket and backpack), is pure joy!

Weather and will permitting, we’ll leave here tomorrow – probably quite early. We are heading up the river towards Mulhouse and Basel/Bale. There are two options for leaving Besançon – one involves a DIY lock and one involves a loop around the city and a tunnel. We are facing towards the loop – and that would be going with the flow of the river, at least for a while, so that is probably the way we’ll go…but we’ll see how we feel in the morning. Something might happen to change our minds.

A lesson or two when people watching

or "Things are not always what they seem!"

Things were not what they seemed… when on Friday, we left the lovely spot of Choisey at 9am and came into the port of Dole an hour later. There were finger moorings, plenty of spaces, no wind to speak of and we were on a canal. Backing in should present no problems, right? Wrong! There was an undetected strong current, the river was just up ahead and a lot of water streamed into the canal at that point. Backing across a strong current without thrusters was no simple matter. Fortunately a fellow boatie came to our aid and the mooring was accomplished without any fuss. We thanked him profusely and he said it was a difficult manoeuvre and he wished someone had come to help him when he was trying to dock.

After a look around the charming and interesting town of Dole, we sat in the shade of a tree and watched the port. We know we can learn a lot by seeing how others do things. Dole is a Nichols hire boat port and Friday is often a change-over day. .

Things were not what they seemed… as we watched three people cleaning a hire boat. We assumed they were getting ready to leave and were giving the boat a personal clean before they left. They were German, an older couple with what we assumed was their grown up daughter. Well, it was astonishing! The boat was hosed and scrubbed within an inch of its life for a long time. Much time was spent polishing the windows so they shone. The old man would have a shouting paddy if things weren’t done exactly the way he wanted. We felt sorry for the women; if he behaved like that in public, how did he behave in private? And how clean did the boat have to be for them to be happy living in it for a week?!


Then we found out that they had just spent 2 weeks on the boat and had spent two days cleaning the boat before handing it back to the hire boat company. The hire boat company must have been delighted! Incredibly when the boat was finally spotless, the three of them sat down in the boat and proceeded to have a few cigarettes. For those of us who hate the smell of cigarette smoke, that seemed incomprehensible.

Later, there was an opportunity to chat to the women. The older couple turned out not to be the parents of the other lady. The two women met in Namibia 24 years ago, discovered they lived close to each other in Germany and have been firm friends ever since. So much for the accuracy of our people watching! The same three people (we never exchanged names) came to NZ a few years ago and had a lovely time for four weeks touring our fair land in a camper van. The Catlins and the Coromandel Peninsula got special mentions. The ‘other lady’ spoke good English. She told us her father was a POW in England during WW2 and spent his time working on a farm, he then stayed on for a further five years at war’s end having become friends with the English family and learning to speak English. The man returned to Germany, married, had three children and the two families have remained in close contact ever since. The man died a few years ago and his wife (and mother of the other lady) just three months ago.

We were in port for several days and without exception people had trouble backing their boats into the moorings. We always went to lend a hand. In all cases the mothers / wives /girlfriends, who have to manage the ropes, were very thankful for the help we offered as they were struggling to catch a bollard as the boat drifted away downstream. Some of the men said thank you, some did not acknowledge us, perhaps they didn’t like other people seeing that they were not in absolute control of the boat. One or two of the experienced boaties did have a pretty fancy technique for using a springer rope to come back upstream and round the finger mooring at the same time. It would have been even more impressive as a technique if they had thought to tell their rope-handlers what they intended to do!

We knew that we’d have to be aware of the current when we left the port. We wanted a ‘copy book’ exit. We had seen the difficulties others experienced with the bow of the boat being swept sideways very quickly with the current. We used our ropes to position ourselves as we wanted and were then able to organize our exit in a seemly manner. This part of our ‘watching behaviour’ stood us in good stead.

Things were not what they seemed for a man with a video camera… we arrived at the first lock, tied up and the lock began to fill, when we noticed a man excitedly running towards us as fast as he could. He reached the lock and started videoing us. It was a beautiful spot. The sun was shining and there were lots of lovely big trees to provide shade. Then the man went down the side of the lock, and while he was still using the camera, walked straight into the canal! He was so busy looking at our boat through the lens he forgot he was walking towards water. When he resurfaced, Catherine asked him if he was okay, he said he was but he clearly felt foolish. We don’t know if his camera survived the ordeal.

Later in the day when we were very hot we decided to go for a swim in the river, Doubs. The water looked cool, clean, clear and very inviting…. and guess what? Things were exactly what they seemed!

Le “grand” depart

I am writing this post sitting in the boat in the beautiful port town of Dole. Erewhon did get put into the water last Friday, as we were hoping, although she didn’t do quite the usual amount of flying to get there. Normally, Guy picks the boat up from inside the compound with the crane and takes us over the fence and straight into the canal. It’s a heart-stopping experience as we watch our boat (which is also our home while we are here) fly at a height of at least seven or eight metres on its way to the water. This year, however, there were too many boats between the fence and the canal, so they lifted us onto a trailer and then took the trailer canal-side and popped us into the water from there. There was still a heart-stopping moment or two, though… between them Guy and his new assistant, Michel, didn’t quite get the balance right before lifting the boat into the air and it swung around a bit, nearly – but not quite - crashing with the boats on either side in the compound. Whew!

As always, it was (and still is) wonderful to be in the water. It’s where a boat is supposed to be and it feels right. There is a softness, a gentleness about it, which puts the expression “on the hard” into perspective.

Of the nine days since then, we spent four in St-Jean-de-Losne getting ready to leave and, more particularly, waiting for the weather to improve. It was cold and windy for days – not at all the sort of weather you want for navigating! We happily spent our time socializing and entertaining, provisioning the boat and making final preparations before leaving. We froze as we watched the fireworks that accompanied the annual “Blessing of the Fleet” ceremony at St-Jean but eschewed the reportedly boring ceremony itself on the Sunday in favour of a visit to the market at Chagny with Brian and Liz. That was a good decision. It’s a huge market with everything from bread, cheese, fruit and veges to clothes, linen and mattresses – and most things in between. We found a really good restaurant for lunch and then returned to SJL just in time to stow our purchases and watch NZ’s astonishing World Cup draw with Italy live on their boat.

With a favourable weather forecast for the remainder of the week, we decided to leave SJL on Tuesday, as indeed did Brian and Liz, although they will stay on the stretch of the Saone near SJL as the bad weather has so hampered their navigating plans that it was no longer worth them paying their VNF (navigation fees). That doesn’t actually stop them navigating but it does mean they don’t have the right to go though any locks. Fortunately, though, there is a good stretch of the Saone around SJL with some lovely mooring spots, so they will get some boating done. We left the marina together and then parted company some four kilometres up the Saone, where we came up onto the Rhone-Rhine Canal. This is the itinerary we talked about before we left NZ - it will take us north east towards Mulhouse in Alsace and up to the borders with Germany and Switzerland. We will then turn around and come back again – but not before venturing across the Swiss border to visit Basel and maybe also do some visiting in Germany.

We have quickly and happily found our navigating rhythm – very slow! If you look at a map, you’ll see that the distance between SJL and Dole is around 23km. It took us three full days to cover that distance with lovely stops at both Abergement-la-Ronce and Choisey (2 nights) along the way. The latter was fascinating – a beautiful, well-kept old village right beside the canal but when we went up to the top of the hill, out of sight of the canal, we found the great commercial “parks” on the outskirts of Dole. That’s the best of both worlds for us – calm, romantic views from the boat but easy access to a supermarket and every other kind of shopping imaginable. We found a fantastic bike shop and treated ourselves gel seats and panniers for our bikes: the former will make longer sight-seeing rides more enjoyable and the latter will make transporting our supermarket shopping – especially some of the heavier liquid items - much easier. J also liked the look of a bike that has a little electric motor on it. She swears she’s going to save her pennies and go back for that one day, when “normal” cycling gets too hard… The people in the shop couldn’t have been more helpful and we went away with a free brake adjustment and along with a lesson in how to do it ourselves in future. When you know nothing about bikes and boats to begin with, there is so much to learn… but we are learning more all the time.

We arrived in Dole yesterday and are moored in what must once have been the moat around the town. It’s a gorgeous place with water all around – a couple of canals as well as the river Doubs run along the base of the town. The port is overlooked by the church with its huge bell tower. We hear church and/or town hall bells marking the passing time nearly every day in nearly every place we moor. The bells of the church here are relatively gentle and more melodious than most. We’ve explored the old town and been to market this morning. We hooked up to water and electricity today for the first time since leaving SJL, so we’ve done the washing and will vacuum tomorrow morning. We’re expecting Christian for lunch and have found a lovely leg of NZ lamb to feed him…It will also feed us for the next two or three days as there won’t be room for anything else in our tiny fridge. We’re planning to leave here on Monday morning, weather permitting. It seems fine just now but we won’t know until we can connect to the internet to get a forecast, which will happen at the same time as we post this. To do that that, we’ll need to climb back up into the centre of the old town to the Tourist Information Office. We need to take advantage of the free connections while we are here or it may be another nine days before you hear anything from us.

We hope the rest of our journey is as straight forward as this has been so far. We also wish you a New Zealand winter that is not too harsh and hopefully even enjoyable from time to time.

Up in the air

Finally, a blog posting! It always takes us longer than we think it will to get to the stage of being able to write. It’s not that we don’t want to or that we don’t think about it (a lot), nor is it that there is any shortage of subject matter; it just always takes us a long time to get settled and into the right space to put some thoughts on paper.

It’s always a mission to get here. We work to the last minute in NZ to make sure we have as much money as possible under our belts for the summer ahead and then we spend the last couple of days packing and tidying up the house and garden (if the weather allows)… Then there is the trip itself. This year’s version: home – Wellington airport - Auckland airport (LOVE the walk from domestic to international!) – Sydney – Dubai – Paris, Charles de Gaulle – Hotel Mistral near the Gare de Lyon. One night in Paris gave us the chance to catch up with Jean-Marc and Alex for dinner, if not yet with our own bodies and minds. Then, the train to Dijon the following morning, lunch (and a siesta) at Christian’s place before the final leg to St-Jean-de-Losne (via a supermarket to stock up on the most important – and heaviest – items).

And so we arrive at our boat late on a Wednesday afternoon, completely knackered. No matter that we have been wonderfully looked after en route – from the start when Graeme dropped us off at the airport in Wellington to Christian’s care at the finish. We’re still utterly exhausted and looking forward to a long sleep…

But the boat has been packed up for the winter, which means that it is perched on blocks and accessible only by ladder, (almost) hermetically sealed with a big tarp over the top and insulating panels covering every window. Every drop of water that could possibly freeze and split something in the freezing temperatures of an inland French winter has been drained. All clothing and linen has been packed in plastic bags to keep from getting damp over the winter, the carpets have been rolled up and stored away in anticipation of the electrician and mechanic undertaking the requested work over the winter, and open hatches and displaced belongings motor bits show that the boat was winterised but not yet de-winterised. Humidity removing packs are throughout the boat, having done their job and converted their original solids into slimy liquid. To get the bed ready for that long sleep requires just about everything to be moved, found, unpacked (the suitcases go under the bed in the main cabin and it’s a mission to get them there but there’s no room for them anywhere else), put away, temporarily stored…and just as we were getting started, the rain did too, which meant doing all the above within the confines of the boat itself. It’s difficult to convey just what an effort these apparently minor tasks can take in such circumstances… and enough to say that we were eventually rewarded with the sleep we so desperately needed.

The following day was something of a struggle as well. David Blanquart, the head of the boatyard, confirmed that almost none of the work that we’d asked to have done over the winter had been done. The battery charger had been replaced and was now making a disturbingly persistent whining sound in the living area and one part of our engine that needed checking and possibly replacing was sitting forlornly in the corner of David’s office awaiting attention, its odd English dimensions apparently giving reason for scorn. We obviously weren’t going to get into the water very quickly and it seems only the most vital work will get done before we leave… a disappointment for us but, now in our third year of dealing with the French boatyards, hardly a surprise. Also disappointing from our perspective was the lack of familiar faces in the marina, although we could hardly be surprised at that with our arrival here so much later this year. This was also another day of cleaning and organizing – with added frustrations as there were quite a lot of things we couldn’t put back in place or weren’t worth cleaning properly until the de-winterising had been done and the mechanic had finished working on the motor (which is under the floor in our living room). When Guy did arrive late in the afternoon to reconnect the pipes so we could at least have running water, the result was water running in places we didn’t want it – leaking out of the hot water cylinder, the shower rose and taps, under the basin in the toilet and, at one stage, shooting spectacularly out of the connection to the water pump (fortunately below floor level and therefore straight into the bilge without too much mess). Guy fixed the first problem, time fixed the second (we now know that washers shrink and harden over the winter but come right after the water has been in them a while) and I fixed the rest… None of it was particularly serious but it can get to you when your resistance is already low. We’ve had days like this before and, although they aren’t easy, we know that you just need to get through them and that things often look up in the morning.

And indeed they did. If we’d have been on the water, you’d say that we found our sea-legs. I don’t know what expression you should use for living in a boat on blocks but we certainly did hit our rhythm the next day. We developed a plan to paint the decks, and had begun sanding by the end of the afternoon. We were reunited with our wonderful bikes and delighted in riding them again, and to our great joy, several old friends (Brian and Liz, Heather and Dave, Steve and Treena) showed up in the marina at the same time as we were making friends with our new neighbours, Jim and Nancy from the US and Phil, Cathy and Anthony from Clevedon. To add to the joys of the day, Brian and Liz brought with them our new, portable twin tub washing machine!!! The Wonder Washer will, no doubt, do service to someone else…but Thomas (the wondrous clothes spinner) seems to be on his last legs and may be put to rest here. A good and faithful servant.

Incredibly, that was nearly a week ago. Since then we have finished sanding and filling the decks, and painted everything except the cockpit, which is quite tricky anyway as it is our main access to the boat but made more difficult by not knowing when a mechanic might turn up because he would certainly want to be working in exactly the place where we’d be painting, or had just painted…and they are not known for their careful movements. Anyway, what has been done looks great and it’s been a miracle of timing through uncertain weather and frequent but unpredictable showers of rain (and the occasional downpour). The rest can be done when we’re on the water. We’ve been out for dinner or drinks most nights, watched a couple of World Cup matches, including NZ’s draw with Slovakia, been to the book swap and replenished our supplies. We’ve stocked the cellar (the 18 bottles of wine costing well under NZ$100 in total) and the kitchen… and we are still waiting for the work to be done on the motor.

When I started writing this post, we were waiting for news of some special, difficult-to-source (read “expensive”) screws, which had been ordered and knew nothing beyond that. On a trip to the toilet block in the driving rain a little while ago, I called in to the office in the hope of an update. Good news - not only have the screws arrived but they’d like to put us in the water on Friday morning – which means there is now a nominal deadline for the work to be done… Fingers crossed that nothing urgent comes up to distract them from that plan – and that Friday will see our boat up in the air (on its way to the water) rather than us being in that situation, as we have been until now!!

Christmas Eve (24 December here!)

…and the sun is shining. This is worth mentioning because we have seen so little of it since we arrived home at Labour Weekend, two months ago to the day. Our plans for an eternal summer have so far been thwarted by the reluctance of summer to show its face in Wellington, although this doesn’t seem to be true for other parts of the country. Since our return, we’ve put up with maximum daily temperatures in the mid-teens and lots of wind, cloud and rain. When we have had sunshine, it has so often been accompanied by a southerly “breeze” – the southern hemisphere equivalent of the North wind.

So, what have we been doing in the two months since our return? We have both found work. J is back at the Department of Corrections coordinating the volunteers in the three Wellington prisons – a job she left at the end of March 2008. She contacted her previous manager about a possible reference for another job she was applying for and ended up being offered a three-month contract in her old job as the Department is restructuring and not able to make any permanent appointments. That situation hasn’t changed, so it’s not impossible that the work will continue beyond the end of her current contract. We’re not holding our breath, however.

C has taken on what is referred to as a “portfolio” of work – that means a whole series of part-time and/or short-term positions, all of them related to language teaching in some way. She’s a part-time languages adviser to schools; part-time lecturer in language teacher education and occasional contractor to critique resources for learning languages in NZ schools. In January, while the rest of the country is on summer holidays, she’ll be trying to manage all of these at once. Some serious juggling will be required, especially as the first week of university teaching coincides with a very full week of language material critiquing… still the thought of the next summer in France will see her through! We are lucky to have found the work so easily.

Speaking of next summer in France – we have booked our tickets to leave here on June 7 and will leave Paris on October 7 to come home. That’s later and shorter than we would ideally like but made necessary by the demands of one of C’s jobs. Still, it’s that same job that means we can afford to travel again, so we’re not really complaining. Better 4 months on the boat than none at all!!!

As the winter weather really starts to bite in the Northern Hemisphere, we are happy to NOT be on our boat, despite cheerful missives from other friends who still are on theirs. We are enjoying being in our own home again and have planted our little vegetable garden. We’re just about to start eating the lettuces and silver beet but the cabbages, broccoli, capsicums, beans and tomatoes are a few weeks away yet. They are, however, flourishing and so the garden is full of potential. The flower garden that we created at the front of the house last year now looks utterly established, if not slightly overgrown – it seems incredible to be cutting things back already. We still have lots of work to do on the other flower beds but all in good time…

We haven’t yet done anything to the inside of the house this year but that is about to change as well. We’ve decided that we can afford to make some changes in the kitchen, which will result in the addition of a dishwasher (yay!!!), modernisation of all the cupboard doors and the heightening of the benches - the previous owner was tiny and the bench height is about 10cm below the norm. Even J finds it too low, so you can imagine how C struggles – and she is the one who really likes to cook! Work on installing the new kitchen will start in the New Year. Much of the painting will need to be done first. We’ll do the laundry at the same time and that will be the last of the 80s wallpaper hidden forever. Only the gold/mustard-coloured floor coverings from the same era will then need attending to…but not before the summer of 2010/2011 and then only if we find work again.

The friend and former colleague whose extended leave has created work for C has also kindly left us her car to use. This is most fortunate as C works in Karori, about 20km (a train and a bus ride) away in one direction and J works at Rimutaka, about 20km (train + 20 mins walk) in the other direction. We managed with public transport options for a couple of weeks but having the extra car really is a god-send!

We have failed miserably in some of our preparations for Christmas this year. Hardly anyone has received a Xmas card from us and some presents will remain under the tree until well after Xmas because we didn’t have them bought and wrapped before their recipients took off for the summer holidays. Still, we’ve succeeded in getting some others off in time and we have got suitable food (and drink!) in store. Our tree is up and looking beautiful – mostly because we had an early Xmas dinner a couple of weeks ago with friends who’d be elsewhere on the day. Those of you from the Northern Hemisphere probably don’t realise the extent to which the logistical arrangements for summer holidays and Xmas can interfere with one another in this part of the world.

Unlike many people, we have no set routine for Christmas; we just go with the flow… Tonight we are celebrating with our neighbours across the road. C’s made a summer pudding, which looks gorgeous! (Berries are a feature of Xmas desserts here – better than a traditional Xmas pud in this season.) Tomorrow, we’ll have a late and luxurious breakfast with friends up the valley and then come home and cook Xmas dinner for C’s very pregnant niece and her partner – assuming that the baby doesn’t decide to appear before then.

After Christmas, we are going to spend a few days in Dunedin, where C will celebrate her 50th birthday on January 1st with her family. We think it will be the first time mother and all five siblings will have been together since the 40th birthday celebrations, so that’ll be pretty special. Everyone in the family knows how to cook, to organise, to fit in and to clean up, so nothing is actually planned – it will just happen and it’ll be fun and easy.

So, all that remains is for us to wish you a very Merry Christmas, wherever you may be and whatever the weather. May the New Year be filled with love, good health, happiness and at least a little bit of adventure, and we look forward to catching up with you sometime during the year.