Le Couvent Diary

It's that time of year that I absolutely love. The sun shines, the flowers start bursting through. Everything is green and lush and we're back down to daytime tee-shirts. Whilst Ali works at getting the house in tip-top condition for our forthcoming guests I work on the garden and all the 'outside' things. Yesterday saw me getting the bikes ready. That meant replacing four collapsed inner tubes and a couple of tyres, cleaning the bikes and giving everything a good oiling. Here they are ready to roll:

The irises, roses and jasmine will soon be in full bloom

I'm delighted to see that we still have a full complement of bees hanging out in the crook of the virgin's arm way up on the roof:

And the vineyard vegetable garden's looking great:

Over the past week we've had our A-team of volunteers staying. They come each year to help us in the vineyard, but it's much more than you might imagine. Each day one pair is responsible for getting up early to prepare breakfast for up to 16 people. Then there's a huge drive to get all the tools, machines, food, drinks, crockery, water, dogs, petrol, and people into the cars and on the quad ready for a day's work in the vineyard.

They've been strimming, ploughing, pruning olives, making glass bottle walls, burning, collecting rubbish, hacking back pathways and cutting hedges. They've worked like Trojans and we've had huge fun.

Then, each evening  two more people have prepared supper for around 18 people. We've eaten extremely well, and guzzled a fair amount of Languedoc wine too. It's been an excellent week and you can see photos at our vineyard website: 5000vines.com .

Our plucky volunteers pay to get here, hire cars, then work for a week. We give them rooms at Le Couvent to sleep in, food and wine and a tee-shirt. They tell us they really enjoy it and they keep coming back for more. We all have a very good time and laugh a great deal. They have certainly put their feet on the stairway to heaven.

Two of our vollies, Chris and Sue, are staying on at Le Couvent to look after everything while we go off to Australia to see Ali's family. We leave on Tuesday and will probably sleep for the entire 30 hour journey. We'll blog again at the end of the month. Have a very happy March. xxx

There have been many wonderful short courses run by our pals, Nicola & Teddy, over the road in La Maison Sans Fiche but I've never been able to go to any of them since they've always coincided with our work-period. Until now that is. So today, tomorrow and Wednesday I'm chipping away, along with four other learners, in the Spring sunshine.

And what a complete joy it is to concentrate on nothing but the stone/wood and the tools. No-one dare let their minds drift, for fear of chipping off a vital part or feature.

I'm joined by Erzsi, Jenny, Michel and Christina. We fumble along together in a German, French, English, Hungarian kind of a way. And everyone is understood.

It all ends with a fab lunch. What a wonderful way to spend a few mornings.

Any ideas what mine is going to be?

Don't you think this vine looks magnificent, heralding the sun with a stretched back and arms raised in triumph? 

I'm back in Roujan after a rather sad, grey visit to Ipswich. The Roujan sunshine has shone it's very best today, and I snapped a few pics while we were walking the dogs in the vineyard.

Ali at the Caux view corner

Rosemary alive with bees (which wouldn't keep still for long enough to photograph.

Pine trees full of pollen ready to set our volunteers sneezing when the zephyrs blow.

We have a garden full of landscape gardeners today, along with a plethora of tools and chainsaws. It's that day in the year when the team from La Griffe Verte come in to prune the trees, rake away all the leaves and chop back the Banksia rose that irritates the fuel delivery man. (It scratches the top of his ancient petrol lorry)

By the time they leave the mico-coulier will have had a haircut of at least a third. That should please guests booked into the Orange bedroom who will find their mornings heralded by glorious sunshine and slightly less birdsong, we hope. The sparrows took up residence in it last year and produced a deafening dawn chorus all summer. Mercifully no one complained.

As a bonus of having the gardeners in, I get to have my lovely nephew, Josh, working here. He's now a fully qualified paysagiste and is studying for his Professional Baccalaureat.

I love it when the garden has a real tidy-up. It feels as though summer is not so very far away. Today it is clear and sunny and not at all cold. Tomorrow I have to go to Suffolk in the UK where I fear it will be as cold, wet and windy as forecast. Thankfully I'll be back by next weekend.