NELSON'S COLUMN

Hello everyone,
just to cheer you up its peeing down so I am housebound today, not a lot of change since the last letter but our french is sloooowly improving but our sign language is getting a lot better. We are gradually getting the better of the garden and I think that I am slowly driving the taupes out as they have started appearing in next doors garden (tough), we have spent a lot of time humping (that's french for carrying) logs into our woodshed to dry out for next winter as you have to think 2 years in front if you burn logs, even though we have full central heating sitting in front of a log fire with a glass of good red that has cost us 2 Euros' a bottle takes some beating.

We have just finished decorating and fitting out a separate apartment with a fully fitted kitchen and en suite shower that will accommodate 4 people, if anyone fancies a week cycling in fantastic quiet but very hilly country we can offer our hospitality exceptionally cheap just as long as we recover our costs that is, I have a trailer so I could collect 4 people and their bikes and luggage from Limoges airport about 40 minutes away, Ryanair fly daily from East Midlands for around £65 return and if you are lucky as low as £5 plus taxes.
The main things that I am missing is daily newspapers and cafe stops on the club rides as they never stop except to fill their bottles its just straight round and home but its just as social when you are riding as in the UK with all the same jokes, shouts for holes or gravel etc but in French and so far not having to swear at any motorists, I am going down to Carpentras in July to ride Ventoux for the 40th anniversary of Toms death with the Harworth lads and of course Dave Marsh but I am just getting back to fitness after almost a month of with a bad chest infection (dont laugh) by riding as many hills as I can find, I bet that you never thought that you would ever hear me say that but if I am to make it up Ventoux it has to be done.
We have had visitors from the UK mainly family virtually every other week and are going to be the same up to the end of August, we had our two eldest sons out last week and they made a massive personal contribution to our local bottle bank and the profits of our villge bakery,
The sun has just come out some I am going to go out on the bike for a couple of hours, I can get down to the northern parts of the Dordogne and back in that time then it will be a quick shower and a beer before tea.

All the best Dave and Chris

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