Le Couvent Diary

Just before we re-opened for the summer season I was planting geraniums and  petunias in pots all over the gardens here at Le Couvent. Imagine my surprise on finding a hen's egg when digging out an old plant in one of the pots by the pool. I lifted it out carefully and took it in to show Ali. I was reluctant to crack it open knowing how revolting it would smell if it had been there an age. So I ditched it.

The day after I returned to clean the pool. The newly planted flowers had been turfed out and a furious search had been conducted - in the neighbouring pots too. So what do you suppose had buried the egg there in the first place? It wasn't a guest from last year - we date all our eggs when we collect them from the nests. It wasn't our dogs since neither is allowed anywhere near the pool in case Flynn the Husky drowns. (He can't swim) It wasn't Ali and it wasn't me. Anyone willing to own up, or offer a suggestion?

Yesterday Ali and I took a hike up a vertical track in nearby Faugeres to view the flatlands of the Languedoc. The walk is wonderful, but you need to know you can walk back down the easy road when you embark on the mule track that runs for 500 vertical metres of rough stones.

When we reached the top the 360 degree view was superb despite it being a gloomy , drizzly day.

There is a precipitous drop from the top which would have UK Health and Safety officers quivering since there are no barriers to spoil the photos.

We've become barbecue freaks. I blame the inventor of the Cobblestone.

If you haven't heard of it it's a round brick of pressed coconut which lights in an instant and is ready to cook with in less than three minutes. It fits perfectly in the fab Cobb barbecue and it's become my absolute favourite method of cooking.

So yesterday we left Faugeres with the soggy dogs in the back of the car and headed for a secluded spot in someone's vineyard near a stream where the dogs got even soggier. Rosé wine, Toulouse sausage, sautéed potatoes and a can of petit pois and carrots has never tasted better.

So wonderful was yesterday's barbecue that we decided to eat outside again today. We'd thought we might do fish on the beach, but a bank of thick mist made us think twice and we pitched up near the aerodrome at Nizas.

Delicious sardines were ready within ten minutes of arriving there and we then lobbed two plump trout fillets on the Cobb. Served with salad and followed by hot caramelised pineapple this was the perfect meal.

With goats clanking not far away and a glass of rosé in hand, what could be a better way to spend a May evening?

Some years ago my mother and her late husband, John, were on a cruise in the Mediterranean. She didn't much like cruises but John loved them. On the wall of the ship was a quote from The Olive Tree by Aldous Huxley. It meant enough to her that she copied it into her diary.

A few weeks ago I spoke to her about the sadness I had felt at hearing olives being wrenched from the land adjacent to ours. The tenant of the land was removing four of these noble trees to the garden of his new pink villa on the edge of the village. They were magnificent 100 year old trees, wide enough to hang a hammock in, but he set about them with a chainsaw before the digger hauled them from the earth with chains. I heard them scream and had to walk away.

When I spoke to her about it Mum was reminded of the piece, and without a word to me set about finding the relevant diary. Then she and her lovely helper, the divine Tara, plotted to find a copy of the Huxley book. Tara searched the internet, found an excellent 1937 copy in Sussex. She ordered, received, packed and posted it to me here in France, along with Mum's original note torn from her diary.

Here it is.

'If I could paint and had the necessary time, I should devote myself for a few years to making pictures only of olive trees'

I like to think that the spirit of olive trees links my mother and I.

Today I made a gate. Of course. Without success I'd looked high and low for a gate with which we can separate our bullied hen, Darling, from the others. She's been in a small courtyard under one of the bedroom windows, but, as we're about to re-open, she has to be evicted. Darling is soooo noisy in the morning that we can't leave her there to wake our unwitting, sleep-seeking guests. Hence the gate. No-one seems to make a 1.5 metre by 1.6 metre gate for less than 1,000,000,000,000 euros plus tax, so I had no choice. It cost me 34 euros and took about two hours and a lot of tools. I'm hoping it won't be hell to install. I'll have to ask my pal Teddy to help since I can barely drag it, let alone lift onto prongs, handily concreted into the wall at exactly the right intervals. I do hope Darling thinks it worth the effort.

Just to prove that Summer is finally on its way I sploshed into the glacial, but pretty, swimming pool for the first time this season today. I managed half a length before I thought the heart attack imminent and turned around to safety. I was cowardly, but my recall is that it was a lovely thing to do and I can't wait for my next plunge. Maybe I'll get to the other end.

Another clue to the passing of the Winter is that the barbecue is on its third outing. Here it is happily smoking away with some chicken sizzling away. Ali's been feeling a bit grotty with a bug for the past couple of days so I'm hoping she can't face it and I can have hers too. For those of you who say 'but that's not a barbecue' - oh yes it is. It's a very wonderful Cobb barbecue for which one can buy magic coals made from coconut shells which light and are ready to cook with in less than five minutes. Wonderfuel. It's smelling delicious from where I'm sitting - out here on the balcony at 7.00pm with gentle chickeny, jasminey, lavendery zephyrs passing by.

I've seen planes passing overhead today and not one of them fell from the sky, so I'm hoping tomorrow will herald the very end of all the no-plane shenanigans so our lovely guests can get here safely.

I had a great weekend. Having worked in the garden at Le Couvent all week, my treat for the weekend was to work in the vineyard. No honest, that does feel like a treat to me. It's beautiful, I can see for miles and the birds sing their socks off. I've worked out a new watering system that I think might see the vegetable garden through the summer without killing me in the process.

But the strangest thing happened there too. On Saturday I was weeding in the potager when both the dogs started barking madly. I looked up to see three completely white gowned figures coming towards us from the top of the vineyard. They were not 50 metres away, and for a moment I thought I was hallucinating until I recognised them as three nuns from the presbytery in Mougeres, just outside Roujan. The dogs were decidedly wary, but the nuns and I had a brief chat and they skipped on their way down through the vineyard, with one shouting back "Christ is risen, Christ is risen".

At moments like that you can feel as though you're going mad. With no witnesses it feels as though one could have dreamt it. But no, the dogs were still yelling in their shock.

But that's not all. Yesterday I was again in the vineyard, feeding the trees in the orchard. Once again the dogs started barking and looking across the amphitheatre vines at a lone nun who was just standing there, looking across at us, for a good minute. I waved, but she didn't wave back. I, for some reason, thought she might have been saying a prayer over the vines. After a short while she left and I heard other voices going off up the hill, behind the trees so I assume she was with the other nuns. The dogs were spooked, but I like to think the wine from Le Couvent might have been blessed this year.