Sweet was the walk along the narrow lane...

 is the opening line of William Wordworth's poem about walking and it's so relevant to our region of Corrèze. When we bought the house we had no idea that there we had glorious walks (and cycle paths) from the village. We have wide skies and tree covered lanes and you're never far from the sound of water.

In winter when the water level is high there is an energy to the river that's invigorating. Summer brings quiet pools, perfect for paddling and cooling down a hot Mortimer.

Footpaths in France are well marked and easy to follow, most are colour coded with cycle paths tending to be numbered. We also have the Saint Jacques de Compostelle pilgrimage route (Santiago de Compostela) running through the village, in fact we walk some of it each day.

Feeling more adventurous? You don't have to spend long in the car to discover some fabulous walks. Our favourites include Château de Sédières where you have a choice of lakes to walk round (or fish if you want to stay awhile) and some rather challenging off road biking. The abbey town of Aubazine is another favourite spot where you can walk along ancient canals. The abbey is also where 12 year old girl learnt to sew, you may know her name - Coco Chanel.

For big skies you may want to go further into the Millevaches National Park with it's rolling hills and secret forests.

Well I could rattle on but I think the photographs tell the tale better than I! If you want to know more about our life in Corrèze then you can follow us here on Facebook or on Instagram

Hot chocolatey mornings

"It's the first day of autumn! A time of hot chocolatey mornings, and toasty marshmallow evenings, and, best of all, leaping into leaves!"*

Okay so there aren't many dropped leaves yet, they're not even really turning red. You can see a change in the colour on some trees but I think we're still a couple of weeks off. Finally after a very dry summer we have had a reasonable amount of rain, enough for mushrooms and fungi to spring up everywhere. The weather has been cooler, much to the relief of Mortimer who can once again enjoy longer walks.

Our evenings are getting chillier now so we've had the pellet stove going. Across the two houses we have three, no four, types of heating. The main house has oil fired central heating and a log burner whilst the barn has the pellet stove and some electric underfloor heating in the two en-suites. Much as I love the romance of the log burner I really appreciate the cleanliness, efficiency and speed of the pellet stove. I come upstairs in the morning, press a button and it starts instantly. By the time I've showered and am back upstairs for breakfast everything is toasty. Our local Gamm Vert had an offer on the pellets at the end of the summer which we arranged for delivery last week. Because the store is in the village the guy trundled them down to us on his little forklift and helped us unload them into the sous-sol. Such great service!

We came back from holiday with renewed energy for the renovations. I finally finished the pointing in the entrance hall and Andrew completed the re-wiring. Last Monday was crunch time as our electrician came to install the main board. It took him most of the day to connect it all but he did it and there were no errors. Andrew was particularly pleased when the earth rod registered 84  (apparently this is very good) The re-wiring has been such a huge job, so many decisions had to be made as to the position of sockets, switches and lights. Some of the rooms didn't even have all the walls so Andrew had to build these too. I can't begin to tell you the admiration I have for him. By the time we reached Monday evening we both felt de-mob happy.

We decided that we would spend the rest of the week doing some long overdue planning, well apart from a celebratory lunch. The electrical work has been such a huge part of the renovation project that we hadn't really set a structure as to the next stage  I'd already started the window renovations but that is slightly weather dependent. The next big job is plumbing but fortunately this can be broken down into more manageable mini-projects. We started by reassessing two of the en-suites and have made a couple of tweaks that will improve them. I've spent time researching bathroom fittings and orders have been placed for showers and basins, and my oh my do we have some fancy basins! 

Currently the house hot water is supplied by the oil heating system but that only had to do one bathroom and two sinks (kitchen & laundry). Once we've finished we will have a kitchen & separate utility, four showers, one bath and five basins. Not only would the boiler not produce enough for all of this but oil is a very expensive option in France so we are fitting two electric heaters known as 'ballons'. The en-suite with the bath is at the far end of the house so Andrew has decided it can have it's own. Siting of this has been a bit of an issue but, because we've had time to think properly, Andrew has come up with a cunning plan which actually improves three rooms.

This week we've got back to physical work again with Andrew tackling the two ensuites over the garage. We'd decided to give them both underfloor heating but the floor level (I use the term level very loosely!) was causing quite a headache. It's oak floorboards straight onto the joists, beautiful but so irregular and impossible to tile over. The decision was made to take these up, they will be re-purposed, and then lay a new base to take the heating mat and tiles. Another advantage to this is we can stuff insulation under the floors. Sounds like a simple plan but as with all old houses it's not proving to be quite so straightforward, at one point I was levering a wall up so that Andrew could add extra joist supports.

Yes that is the garage below

I'm back on window duty which gives me more time to think about the room designs as it's a fairly mind freeing job. I'm still on the hunt for vintage lighting as my needs seem to grow. I worked out we have a total of 17 rooms that need lights. Now a couple of them are just loos (although one of these will sport a chandelier) while others are more complicated, I think the sitting room has three separate lighting circuits plus there will be floor lamps. I'm doing quite well at the moment though with another chandelier and a pair of fancy wall lights added to my stash.

Of course autumn life hasn't been ignored. Our menu has changed, my new (old) oven dish has proved perfect for roasting vegetables. Soups have replaced salads and Andrew has already had one duck confit making session (it's the season for inexpensive duck in France). I have some figs that need to be made into jam and am even beginning to think about the Christmas cake.

So that's it, I think we're all up to date now. As always you can follow/friend us on Facebook or if you just want the pretty photographs then we're here on Instagram.

*Winnie the Pooh - Pooh's Grand Adventure

So what happened to May?

For the life of me I can't understand where May went! I know, I know, I'm getting older and so the years seem to shrink but it's getting a tad ridiculous. Last time I posted it was the 3rd of the month and tomorrow it's June. It's not as though we've been gadding about. French lockdown restrictions have been eased, and will do a little more from Tuesday but even so. I've had to have a look at my photographs to see what we've done this month. So here we have a pictorial record of May 2020 at The Old Notaires House.

It was the month that I noticed the bearded iris around the village. I had never really spotted them before, maybe it's been a particularly good year but some of them have been stunning.

After the rain

This has to be my favourite, such beautiful faded colours

Before we were allowed to stray more than a kilometre from home we were still exploring new paths around the village and we forged a new route. At one junction was this seemingly ancient stone cross marking the Saint Jacques de Compostelle pilgrimage route. I know I've mentioned before that the Rocamadour path goes through our village and there are several examples of the cockle shell on ancient buildings.

Cross of St Jacques de Compostelloe

We also found this old wood shed. I can't resist an old building -  barns, sheds, old doors are a magnet to me. In a roundabout way this led me to artist Sharon McDonagh who paints on the subject of decay and also 'urbex'. Urbex stands for Urban Explorers, people who go out in their urban environments photographing old and abandoned buildings. If you have Instagram do a search for Urbex, there are some amazing photographs.

Old shed

Making the most of our new freedoms we went dog walking a couple of times at Château Sédières, a favourite of both us and Mortimer. We need to go back soon as the water lilies are just about to flower.

Never one to miss an opportunity to paddle

Château Sédières

Work on the house has been going well. Andrew is ploughing on with the new electrics. Nothing had really changed since electricity came to the house in 1959 but because we are redefining spaces it needs a complete re-design of the system. It also means 101 decisions and I need to be confident that the furniture will remain where I've designed it, sockets stay in place and the lighting works. With metre thick granite walls it's not an easy task to add a power socket. I've been continuing the window restorations and will be doing so for quite a while as there are still eleven to go.

One of many that need refurbishment

Poor Andrew spends a lot of time chiselling out the old granite walls for cables. It's tough work.

We have been having some fun too. The brocantes are slowly starting to open and we've purchased some vintage lighting and some art. The weather has been beautiful, really quite warm for May with several days at 30 degrees. This is the first year of the barn terrace so I was able to get out the table we found at the end of last year and we added a large sunshade. It's now a rather pleasant spot to enjoy a coffee or evening apéros while we watch village life.

This one is for the garden guest suite

We needed to try this one out for size and fortunately it's perfect for the new dining room

And of course we've both had haircuts which was such a relief, if not a slightly bizarre experience.

Haircut in a bin bag and a mask

Slowly the village is coming into summer mode, fishing is now allowed and this is a favourite spot just by the chapel.

Fishing in the River Corrèze

And of course the markets are back and we are enjoying the most wonderful vegetables.

Woodland asparagus

So that was May. I will try really hard to not leave it quite so long until the next blog post. If you want to know what's happening on a slightly more regular basis then we'd be delighted to see you here on Facebook or have a look at our Instagram squares