The promised Christmas & New Year Update

The first blog of a new year, and a look back at my 10 day holiday which seems have gone by in the blink of an eye, there are a number of posts to read, so scroll down a bit... and as if by magic a bit later some photos will appear... thanks Liefje..

It all started at 4:30am on Christmas Eve when I set off for Dover to charge down to Sigogne, it was a dull day, but then that’s the best sort for driving. It was surprisingly quiet on the 06:40 crossing to Calais, unlike today which it is absolutely heaving, and so I guess the boat will be full, even the first class lounge, usually a quiet haven is full today.

Back to Christmas, I arrived in Sigogne in brilliant sunshine, which as usual came out just as I got to Poitiers, strange how that almost always happens, driving through France under dull skies only for the clouds to part at Poitiers. I passed our guests, Franca’s brother and his family, twice on the run down to Sigogne, Franca’s brother was coming down to stay with us for Christmas.

So by 6:00pm we were all around the fire with a glass of Champagne starting to get into the Christmas spirit. Enrico, Franca’s brother and Marlies, Enrico’s wife and 2 year old son Mauro came down from the Netherlands, so their drive was even longer than mine which meant an early night for one and all before the big day. Fleur was excited about Christmas for the first time, where as Mauro did not quite understand what was going on. Fleur managed to get to sleep and slept until 9:00am, so none of the getting up at 4:00am to see if Santa has been yet...

Franca and I said that we would not have so many presents this year but when you looked under the tree there still seemed to be an aweful lot of presents for such a small family, and it took and hour and a half to open all the pressies, everyone was very pleased with their low tech pressies, the only person who got high tech stuff was Franca, and I still have to set up her new radio for the kitchen which has an iPod connection, and the idea is to buy Franca an iPod so she can listen to all the songs she wants to when she gets fed up with the radio.