Lost in France

The weather has suddenly improved.  We have had three days in a row of blue skies and bright sunlight and it is as hot as holidays.  Dolly and I celebrated by getting lost in Grange d’Ans on Friday.  There are two Grange d’Ans walks marked on the map from the tourist office – Grange d’Ans Nord and Grange d’Ans Sud.  We have already done the Nord one so we were trying out the one to the Sud.  These walks have helpful little yellow markers to direct your path.  Either the markers ran out or we missed one.  Following the rainy season, every bit of bud and blossom has grown so tall that it is possible that a marker was hidden under leaves.  Trustingly, I had not bought a map.  So we were lost and bamboozled.    I did try to retrace our steps, but our steps had been so varied that that wasn’t any help either. 

 Lots and lots of beautiful countryside spread out in all directions round us without a signpost and hardly a road to steer by.  Occasionally we came upon a hamlet of four or five houses, but saw no-one about to ask the way.  French villages often appear very deserted at all times of the day.  I finally found an old man in a beret and a thick blue work shirt leaning against a barn.   “La direction de Grange d’Ans?” I said politely.  “Uggh?” he replied.  So I repeated my question and he said, “Uggh?” again.  I was so desperate by this time that I had a third go at it.  “Aah,” he said, “La Grange!” and he pointed to the right.  I had this trouble with an old woman in Grange d’Ans the last time I was here.  Unless you can pronounce things like a child born in the area, they cannot understand you.  And it isn’t called La Grange, it’s called Grange d’Ans – or at least it is on the map and the road signs.  I’ve been wearing a pedometer on these walks and we’d done 8 kilometres in the heat by the time we got back to the car.  Dolly was so pleased to collapse in the shade that I had some trouble dragging her onto the back seat for the journey home.

Together with our friends, Mike and Kerstin Wood, Mike and I were responsible for setting a quiz on Tuesday.  Mike did one round consisting entirely of 30 sports questions and someone remarked that they didn’t know he was so interested in sport.  Interested is  too weak a word.  He loves all sports.  We were out to lunch today with our friends, Mary and Alan Rogers and others, when Mike suddenly rose up and said he must be going as he had to get back in time to see the Wimbledon Men’s Finals.  He wanted to watch it in the privacy of our house where he could shout, swear and encourage with gusto.   Anyway, Andy Murray has now won and all the British can be very happy, especially the Scottish British. Mike is delighted.