Final day in Laroque des Alberes

That's it, I'm off tomorrow! I went into 'town'--Argeles-sur-Mer--to pick up a ticket to Nimes for tomorrow morning--my train leaves at 746AM, and I'm not looking forward to the 630 bike ride into Argeles. It's been windy--again. I watched trees out my window last night, expecting them to fall over or snap in half.

(A few people have complained they don't see MY FACE in pictures. Well, here it is, a picture of my face. Pretending to be French or a choir boy or something...Yes, it's a 'self-portrait'!)

Last night we had a bonfire for the Solstice, a day early. We had a rather glorious fire, burning in less than an hour wood that had taken us half a days work to collect. The firepit 'we' dug (I didn't dig it) looked and worked great. A little Polish vodka and today I have a mild headache and everything smells like smoke. The wind picked up my jeans off of the clothes line and landed them in the smouldering ashes this morning--now I've got singed, smokey jeans...

My baggage has actually gotten larger in the last four weeks. I am still arguing with myself about getting rid of some of my clothing...

My last couple of days off were wasted variously. There are two grandchildren visiting for the holidays who brought with them colds from England. I spent 36 hours in bed, not being able to eat or drink anything. When I got up, the guys claimed I was trying to get out of doing the dishes. Oh, I'd go on about the guys here, but I'm holding my tongue for a bit...

Saturday I got up at 6 to help at the market in Ceret--the kids were going and Namua had a cold. The intent was that I would do a little relief work, so she could take the kids to get some food, warm up inside. Did I mention it's COLD here? By 930, everyone was packed up into the van and headed home except me. I didn't mind too much--it was frightfully cold, though. I got to chat a while with the fellow across the lane, selling French books. He'd be competition if it weren't for the language difference! He raved about Corsica, and I'm doubly excited about going there, although I've been warned by Sylvian that it's cold!


The market at dawn. We'd about set up already, and the kids were little ice lumps on the folding chairs we'd brought them, huddled under a rather thin blanket.

There are Christmas decorations hung in all the villages around here, rather pretty, and not unlike at home, though with less colour. I prefer less colour.

















Setting up for the market. Namua is the blur in the second picture.

The door to the apartments beside our stand. Plainly pretty!