Campsite man

I feel I should say a little more about campsite man (Pierre-Henri). We first met him last year when we stayed on the campsite for two weeks. He got on well with Ian because they are around the same age and both had had financial problems related to ex-wives. Last year Ian and him spent a lot of time moaning about women and money! Campsite man 'rents' the campsite from the commune (local council) for a nominal amount and maintains and runs the campsite. He is pretty much on his own which means that he is on site 24 hours a day 7 days a week from April until October. Last year he lived in his tent but this year he has upgraded his accommodation to a wooden garden shed the size of a small garage. Outside the garage doors he has created a small garden where he grows a few tomato plants and flowers and sits on his garden chairs to enjoy his morning coffee!

We dropped by to say hello to him earlier in the year, something he seemed to appreciate, and he welcomed us back this summer, when we got to know him a little better. As well as an ex-wife he has two ex-restaurants and a two houses in addition to his garage. One is lived in by his ex and one by his current girlfriend (although I would imagine that over the summer he gets little opportunity to further that relationship as he is surrounded by campers). He has just been given the permanent custody of an ancient camper-van whose ageing owner has finally decided to part with it (as he is no longer capable of driving it back to Germany). Campsite man will live in it from now on and so is trying to sell is garden shed!

Campsite man is essentially very French but, like most French people in the area gets on well with the English immigrants, even though he likes to tease them about their dreadful food and the fact that they (and the migrant grape pickers) are the only ones brave enough to stay in the campsite after September! He likes his coffee, his wine, and is quite knowledgeable about planting and the seasons. We learnt two things from him. Firstly, if you hear the frogs croaking after 10.00pm then it will rain overnight (this was certainly true) and secondly that anything planted on a saints day in October (I can't remember what one it was but it was around the 25th!) will take root and grow. We are hoping that there is some flexibility here as we planted some tree saplings while we were there and we are hoping that they manage to survive!

Campsite man 2

Ian was fully engaged all week building the llama house so while we were in France it was my job to run errands, do the shopping and generally be friendly to everyone. I made several trips to see campsite man (Pierre-Henri). It was his last week and there were three old camper vans on the site. On the first two mornings that I went there it was deserted and campsite man was nowhere to be seen. However, on the Friday I finally saw him. He looked tired and even thinner than I remembered him in the summer. It was cold enough to see your breath and he was clutching a bottle of wine under one arm and saying goodbye to the remaining campers. He didn't recognise me straight away but when he did he seemed generally pleased to see me. My attempts at communication were limited by my inadequate French but after a while he started speaking in a little English (something I never knew he could speak!) and then we communicated using both. He told me that he was finishing with the campsite all together. He had had enough of the local commune and had fallen out with them and told them that he would not do it the following year. He decided that it was too hard with too much stress to make it worthwhile. He was about to start a job in Agen in a factory repairing electronic goods. From what I could understand this was a revival of an old factory that had been set up years ago, where he had worked as a young man. I wished him well and felt quite sad a I don't think the campsite will be the same without him. When we were leaving the following day we saw him driving his camper van in the opposite direction. We tooted and waved at each other. I wonder if that will be the last that we see of him?

French Cuisine

We are now beginning to return to a more 'normal' and non-French diet! I know French food is meant to be amongst the finest in the world but whenever we are there we are always struck by the lack of fibre and the increase in protein leading to a seriously bunged up state! This must be a common condition in France evidenced by the size of their toilet rolls, which for me would only last a day but seem to cope with the average French bottom for a week! Breakfast of croissants, lunch of steak and chips and cheese or ham for supper (accompanied by large chunks of white bread and salads full of hard boiled eggs) does nothing for the alimentary system and as if to prove the point the French have amongst the highest incidence of colon cancer in Europe. Mind you, as if to compensate they have a admirable selection of yogurts with bifidus actif, guaranteed to improve alimentary transit in 15 days!

Campsite man Pierre-Henri told us that he ran two restaurants before deciding to run the campsite. His mash potatoes and vegetables were all bought from the frozen food man and boiled in the bag!

Back to blogging at last!

Got back today about two hours ago! Have missed blogging and feel humbled that I could not get it to work from the campsite even though campsite man (Pierre-Henri) let us log on to his wireless network from our PDAs. Problem.. no cookie (whatever one of those is if it isn't a hard baked thing covered in chocolate) to let me get to the sign in page and I shamefully did not write down the details on how to blog by email! So I am feeling very frustrated as every time something interesting happened I thought.. I must write about that on my blog..but I couldn't! I did make some notes and I hope to make up for it over the next few days.

Next purchase.. a small laptop that works with windows and has bluetooth! (I have just been told that I also need 'wireless').