Friday, 29 June 2012

Gone fishing

After a break of at least 40 years I have now taken up coarse fishing again. Apart from the local lake here in Huelgoat which is within walking distance from my house there are 2 other lovely lakes, St Michel and Drennic, both of which are only about a half hour's drive away, in addition there are loads of rivers and canals so I will have no shortage of places to explore.
In total it cost about 200 euros to get started, I bought a carbon fibre rod plus reel, line, weights, hooks, floats etc

Included in the price was a yearly licence which covers the whole of Finistere apart from the Category 1 lake of St Michel and Drennic, There was an extra 20 euros to cover those which I bought at the same time. Apparently there are loads of good sized trout in both of those lake so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

I did hear somewhere that there are carp up to 50lb in our local Huelgoat lake, I'm not so sure my first effort matches up to that!




This is adding a whole new dimension to my life, just sitting by the lake fishing on  a still peaceful evening with the ducks flying in to settle down and the swans coming by to take a look is a good enough reason in itself even If I never land a big one!

Sunday, 24 June 2012

An update at last!

It's been quite a while since I've updated on here so I'm busy looking for excuses, of course I could easily blame it it on a lovely 2 week visit by my brother Roger, and my sister in law Margaret, but as he will probably read this I shall blame it on the weather instead!

In addition I can blame the weather on the progress in the garden, in truth that is part of it coupled I think with the tall fir trees sucking all the goodness out of the ground for years. I have to say I am more than a little disappointed in it particually given the amount of effort I've put into it this year. I shall put it all down to experience though and will try to get some manure from somewhere in the Autumn to turn in to improve things for next year. The broad beans have been a total washout and the peas are not much better. Some of the root vegetables may come on but I'm not hoping for too much now.

I have made another start on cutting down some more of the fir trees, it is a bit of a long winded job as I have to move the scaffold pretty much every tree and the clearing away and cutting off all the branches and twigs etc takes the biggest amount of time.



It has been over a month now since I submitted French tax returns and I have had no communication from them, I would like to think that I have filled them all out correctly and the longer it goes without hearing the more chance there is I think. Wish me luck!

After waiting what seems an age, we had a phone call this week to say that the workmen would be arriving the next day to install the wood burner we ordered at the beginning of May. They arrived at 9am and were cleared up and gone 3 hours later, I was very impressed. During that time they had to sheet off the room for dust bore a hole through the concrete capping slab on top of the chimney, bore another hole through the ceiling in the lounge fit a chimney pot and cap install a flue liner assemble and install the wood-burner including fitting an internal flue to the ceiling height, fitting a collar at the top and plaster boarding and skimming where the flue went through the ceiling and clearing away all in 3 hours for 2 men. I was most impressed and can thoughrally recommend the company
Cheminees Lencot, 
ZA Du Launay,
 29600 St Martin Des Champs 
Tel 0298 620191 

www.cheminees-lencot.com



All I have to do now is to keep enough logs cut and split to see us through the winter!