After nearly 30 years of dreaming we've finally bought our own bit of Provence and spend as much time there as possible. A lover of everything about the area especially the markets, the Brocante hunting & cycling the quiet lanes. Blogging about my favourite things in the area from places to visit, shopping and cycle trips
In 8 days time we should be at the Notaire’s office in Apt, on the verge of signing the final paperwork ‘Acte Authentique’ for our new house in the Vaucluse. As you can probably imagine things are a bit frantic at home as we are trying to get everything ready to take with us in the … More A new start – one week to go
I think it’s fair to say that we now have enough equipment to stock a small shop – in fact we recently opened the door of our Chapel for me to sell some of my jewellery (yes I know it sounds posh, but it came free with the house & has proved to be very useful!) and more than … More 3 months to go
Three weeks today we will be heading down to Provence, ready to sign the final documents that will be needed to complete our house purchase, which as you can imagine is something we’re really looking forward to (to say the least!) To be honest we’d originally thought that just one of us would travel down to take over … More Trains Planes, Cars & Bikes
It’s less than 18 weeks to go now until the start of the cycle ride from here to the Med and we’ve seen a bit of a change in our plans, which means that only my hubby & 2 boys will now be doing the ride. This isn’t because I’m worried about doing it, (in fact … More And then there were 3……..
As those who have been following my blog for the past year will know – our big dream has been to own a home in the Vaucluse, an area we have been visiting for the last 25 years and which already feels like a second home. We had felt that we wouldn’t be able to purchase … More Our Dream is a big step closer…..
Sometimes things crop up in a time-line on Twitter or Facebook, which just strike a chord with me and that was certainly the case this week when I saw this: When our first efforts at buying a house in France fell apart, just before signing the Compromis de Vente, we were absolutely gutted and it would have … More Sometimes Good Things Fall Apart – the house hunt continues
When I left home to come out house-hunting my hubby’s final words were ‘ It’s not going to be a holiday you know’ – and after my experiences over the last couple of days he was spot-on. It’s fair to say that this trip has been planned like a military operation and so far it has … More House-hunting in France is a full-time job
We’ve now stopped ranting about what happened last week with the French house purchase and dusted ourselves down a bit. We’re still very disappointed with what the Agents described as process that was far from ‘correcte’ on the part of the vendor, but as we see it we are left with 3 options, stay bitter … More Back to the House-Hunting …..every cloud has a silver lining!
Today hasn’t been the best of days – we were expecting some trials and tribulations associated with buying a house in France, but I don’t think we ever expected what has happened today! Since we had the offer accepted on the house near Uzes we’ve had a busy time just getting to grips with the basics of opening … More What’s French for Gazumped?
I had a quick look at the calendar this weekend and realised that in 25 weeks time we will be pushing our bikes off the Ferry at Roscoff and starting, what we hope will be, a fantastic cycle ride through France to eventually dip our toes in the Mediterranean at Sete. As I mentioned in the last … More 25 weeks and counting…..
Postcards from Provence and beyond 