Volunteering In France | Interning in France

Hugh doing the skirting boards

This Thursday has been a bit of a changover. Seeing as it’s Hollie and Vanessa’s last week, someone of course needs to take over from their roles! We thought the best idea is to have Hiroko take over being Mum from Vanessa in hope of some tasty Japanese lunch! While Vanessa showed her the ropes, Hollie updated Emily on her computer tasks and Hugh and Sergey are just making the finishing touches upstairs in Gite 4 which should be ready very very soon! We also said goodbye to John as he carried of his travels to Spain.

The last lunch that Vanessa made consisted of some delicious pasta to fill us up for Lyn’s exciting French lesson!

For dinner we went greek as Hollie and Vanessa cooked us a wonderful moussaka – the second first this week for LG! Afterwards we all headed down to the lake for the last concert at Brossac lake this year – rock music by Prince Miiaou! We decided not to stay too late so we could be up bright and early the next morning for our exciting day trip out!

Wednesday, Hiroko has been making the finishing touches of her Japanese blog and web pages well worth a visit the link coming soon. The fridges got a well deserved sprinkling from Hollie and Vanessa. Emily helped by John carried on with the gardening. Paul, Hugh and Sergey were finishing off with the wall in Gite 4 when disaster struck – Paul went and injured himself and needed to go to the hospital at Barbezieux.  Luckily John was around to take him he can now take a few days deserved rest. This is a poignat reminder that you should have adequate insurance cover as the bill for Pauls treatment would have been in excess of 2,000 euros.

Sidney enjoyed a lovely bath which cooled him down lots on this hot day, he’d been panting all day! – 35 degrees C

After work, Vanessa, Hugh and Emily popped down to the lake before Hugh (with the help of Vanessa) cooked us dinner – chicken, mash, peas and carrots topped of with gravy! Paul has been resting his leg!

So it’s Tuesday, the weekend is now over and it’s back to work with some beautiful weather. Today Paul, Hugh and Sergey carried on with the building of the handicapped friendly bathroom in Gite 4. Paul also took Vanessa to Chalais to do the weekly shop. Hollie, Hiroko and Emily did some gardening.

In the evening Hugh went to football training with Brossac football club whilst we enjoyed a Japanese delight cooked by Hiroko called chicken nanban! Later that evening John from England, an old campaigner from years 2009 and 2010 came to visit; he’ll be staying with us for a few days on his way to Spain!

Early start Monday off to the Market at Chalais as it is a Bank Holiday here in France. Lunch time saw Hugh return from his trip to Angoulême and in the evening Paul took Hiroko, Sergey and Emily to the Lac Frisson restaurant for dinner.

After Dinner it was Pétanque at Brossac;. The evening ended at midnight after some stunning boules.

On Sunday Hugh set off to Angoulême to meet up with some family and Paul took Sergey and Emily off to a local Brocante in Berneuil. Sergey found some bargains for presents and Paul purchased some more badminton rackets to replace those broken plus some extra Boules for Petanque.

The evening saw the return of Hollie and Vanessa from Lourdes.