J and Small T come to Stay

Small T tries out the pool in the garden

J and Small T at one of the cascades near Pont D'Espagne in the Pyrenees

Fishing near the bridge in Labatut

On and under the beach at St. Jean de Luz

Dinner at sunset overlooking the Atlantic

"Not Only" Vegetables "But Also" Flowers Grow in the Garden

Smoothing Out the Water in the Pool

Testing the New Barbecue

B Comes to Stay for a While

Well folks - these photos are from November - seven months ago when B flew in for the weekend and we took him up to Hautacam well before there was any snow or any winter either.

John made a trip to the Internet Cafe and got the photos posted. We will add words to them as and when we can. We are sorry to have left you so long without news and our blog.

Here we are in summer after a warm April and a slow wet start to May. The mountains are again covered with snow but the ski season is over even though John tried to stretch it out as much as he could!

In the winter we took J and small T up to Hautacam in a scary white-out. Rather a mistake - but John, J and T did get some better skiing later that week.

Then Hautacam literally blew away in a storm and John had to go skiing at Cauterets.

Here however you see us with B, the mountains and then the Napoleon Bridge dreamed up by the Empress Eugenie (wife of Napoleon III) because it was in such a spectacular situation. B is wearing a shirt rather superfluously asking you to mind the gap which can be seen to his right and which more reckless people than we are attempt to fleetingly fill by leaping from the bridge on bungees.

Oh, by the way the "A l'Amethyste" shop is displayed here as she is seldom far from our thoughts and because it is a shop in Lourdes - which we visited with B - selling gaudy trinkets such as madonnas in a snowstorm, flashy plastic crosses etc. likely to appeal to religious nutters, cynics and magpies. There are many such in Lourdes. (Shops, not magpies)

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Raising the Roof

THIS POST IS STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION - HA, HA!

At the time of writing (23/05/10), this is just a taster of this Post since the second photo will reveal all and this first one reveals nowt. This is a photo of me about to strike the first blow in the creation of the dormer window in our bedroom (I can now say "main bedroom"), giving views of the garden, wildlfe pond (WOW!)- see "Lake and Mountain", below -, barbecue (CRIPES!), swimming pool *(SHEESH!) and Pyrenees (DOUBLE WOW!).

* The "swimming pool" is a slight exaggeration.

Lake and Mountain

The Departement of Hautes Pyrenees is an area of mountains and lakes. Well, that's not wholly true. Most of the highest mountains of the Pyrenees are in the Departement, but the topography does not lend itself to lakes. In addition, the part where we live is quite flat. To partly remedy the deficiency, Ruth decided that we needed a pond - and despite the River Adour being within hearing distance in time of spate, like now when the mountain snow is melting. So I dug a hole. Quite a big hole.

The first picture shows our water butt containing the first 1000 litres (450 gallons) of rainwater which went into the hole. This was followed by approximately 8000 litres from the well.

The excavation of the pit yielded a fair amount of spoil which was wheeled away to the top of the garden to produce Mont Labatut, the highest point (arguably) in the village. The third photo shows me atop Mont Labatut with a drink and the cats enjoying the fruit of our labours. The last two photos show Ruth doing likewise. Since the pictures were taken, Ruth has spent a lot of time (and money) embellishing Lac Labatut with a flagstone edging, waterplants and fish.