Advertisement
Published: October 6th 2016
Edit Blog Post
Woolly says – Life on the farm is proving busy as I supervise Jo and Zoe with their work, we have been clearing one of the barns and they insist on having a daily break which I think is a very poor show and as for getting the logs into the wood store it took them hours!! If he helped it might be quicker! Woolly says – My supervision is a major help and I have to search for land as well, there is just no appreciation for my labours! I’d spent nearly a whole day arranging our next viewing, Jo looked baleful as I showed her the map, I failed to see the problem with a 12 hour drive but as she refused I was then left with the task of finding overnight accommodation as well. Having ensured that they had done all of their chores before lunch I programmed Tim Tom the sat nav and sat back to enjoy the scenery as we hurtled north, several hours into the journey and I saw a sign for Saintes, and remembered the beautiful amphitheatre where I had enjoyed chasing lions round the arena in my role as a gladiator on our visit there over three years ago, as I filled Zoe in on the adventure that she had missed I was even more delighted to see the signs for St Naizaire when I had been stranded on the fort there....scary stuff especially with my allergy to water!
Stranded with a Mammoth!!!!! It was lovely to take the trip down memory lane and I really wished that Ian was here to take over the driving as the motorway was giving me eye strain. As dusk started to arrive we drove the last 20 kilometres to the town of Chateaubriant and our home for the night. Woolly says - A part of the traditional province of Brittany, Chateaubriant was an important stronghold in north western France during the Middle Ages. The town appeared during the 11th century, around a castle and a priory. A fair, which still exists, was also founded in 1050. The town played a huge role during the Mad War between France and Brittany and became a significant cultural centre in the 16th century when the Renaissance château was built in the medieval fortress. During the Second World War there was a concentration camp and it is known in France for the 27 hostages who were shot there in 1941. Having booked into our room I was eager to explore but darkness had fallen and although it allowed me to see the huge spire of the church lit up it didn’t help with taking in the medieval splendours I had hoped for.
Exploring would have to wait and having found one of the only open restaurants we settled in for a scrumptious meal. Woolly says – With my belly full to bursting I was all for buying the land unseen! Our room was chilly and as we snuggled down for the night I used Jo as a hot water bottle hoping that I wouldn’t wake with frost bitten tusks. A cold night and a cold shower didn’t leave us feeling refreshed but having huddled up in our coats we made our way to the estate agents. Woolly says – The lady looked most surprized to see us, thinking that she probably doesn’t get many mammoths in her business I explained that we had arranged a viewing, she looked perplexed and explained that the person who had done the organising for us had obviously failed to let us know that the land wasn’t suitable for our needs and that permission wouldn’t be given for a campsite! I glared, Jo glared and Zoe stood shaking her head....why us!!!
To say that we were less than impressed was an understatement, neither Woolly nor I had received an email telling us this, only one three days previously wishing us a safe journey! Woolly says – Having kicked a chair leg and had a glare from both the women, Zoe became the voice of reason and explained that we had driven for over 6 hours yesterday and paid for accommodation and that obviously we were a little shocked to find this out now. I glared harder and I could see that Jo was tapping her fingers on the desk which is usually a sign of bad temper with her, I coughed and she glared at me! What had I done wrong! As the estate agent quickly scrolled through page after page on her computer we sat in a deadly silence, I considered humming but as if reading my mind Jo glared at me again!
A long ten minutes passed before she found something for us to view, smaller than the original and expected piece of land but since we had come all this way we felt that it should be seen, asking if we could wait for half an hour we left the shop and tried to console our deflated spirits with croissants. Woolly says – it was a super crumbly croissant and having left a trail of crumbs behind me I decided that we had enough time to look at the church in daylight. The Saint-Nicolas parish church was rebuilt in 1850 and it looked as impressive in daylight as it had last night. A small wooden door gave us access to the gothic looking inside, with huge pillars and some beautiful stained glass it was lovely and as I saw Jo checking her watch I gave a last look back, not as wondrous as the outside maybe but very nice indeed. The whole town was lovely with enough shops to suit Zoe, plenty of restaurants to feed me and enough history for Jo to enjoy.... I vote we move here! The car journey to the site was quiet, I hummed under my breath but Jo had gone back to glaring and as we passed fields and a small village I spotted a supermarket, tick in my box for pistachio’s!
The land was flat and had a good surrounding of trees with a drive way in, as the mammoth, Zoe and the agent stood at the gate I walked around and tried to visualise how it could be, whether it was my annoyance from earlier tainting it a little I don’t know, we won’t rule it out though. Woolly says – arriving back in the town centre once more we thanked the agent for her time and wandered back towards the car which was conveniently parked by the rather grand looking chateau. The Château de Chateaubriant was founded in the 11th century and renovated several times during the Middle Ages. After the French Revolution the chateau was sold and divided several times, and was finally transformed into an administrative centre, with the seat of the sous-préfecture, a court and a police station. All these offices closed down in 1970, and nowadays the château is partly opened to visitors. Except of course to us!!!!!
We really should be used to this by now, but if we had arrived 3 days prior we could have gone round it, as the small fiend huffed and puffed and tried to blow it down I tried to console him with some photo’s of the outside and the promise of a lovely sticky strawberry tart which I knew I would regret later! Woolly says – Why us! The buildings looked amazing and I could have had so much fun racing round the castle part looking for latrines and sliding over the lovely slippy floors, did she say strawberry tart?
Advertisement
Tot: 0.731s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 45; qc: 180; dbt: 0.3013s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 2;
; mem: 1.7mb
D MJ Binkley
Dave and Merry Jo Binkley
Beautiful
Great architecture.