Not quite two.

To the bakers for a raspberry tart for lunch. It is an unusual size - not quite enough for two portions but definitely more than one. This works out well. The Font will take one, possibly two mouthfuls, mutter ' Delicious !' and then push the rest across the table for Angus to finish. Sophie may get a tiny sliver of the pastry.

Having consumed our coffee, croissant ends and ( in Sophie's case ) a bowl of water we head down to the river. At this time of the morning the place is deserted and we have the entire waterside to ourselves. Tonight we shall be heading off for a three hour trip across country to the seaside hotel. The reservation team ( I think it's not so much a team as one technology indifferent lady )  finally confirmed the reservation last night.

The storms have brought down a lot of branches. These bob around in the water and bang against the wooden jetty. Sophie finds the sound to be intriguing.  Every four or five yards she stops to see where the noise might be coming from. At one point I pick up my pace as she sticks her head through the fence and considers leaping into the water . Thankfully, something distracts her and she thinks better of it.

According to the front page of the local paper the Pentagon is about to release a report on UFO's. This can't come a moment too soon for some of the village residents who remain convinced that our little corner of paradise is a tourism hotspot for visiting aliens. In the departmental capital there is a bookstore that sells cheaply bound paperbacks describing inexplicable lights and shapes hovering over the provincial French countryside. Cynics might attribute these sightings to the locals penchant for excessive wine drinking. Madame Bay, who long time followers will remember as a frequent visitor to the The Rickety Old Farmhouse before her arthritis became too severe, is convinced that aliens make a bee line for her orchard. Quite why this should be the case when they could, for example, go to Paris is treated with a shrug of the shoulders. ' I've seen the lights M'Ongoose! I've seen the lights ! ' Madame Bay has been instructed to stop driving by the young doctor in the medical centre. She is now driven round by her long suffering hairdresser daughter Sandrine. They bicker constantly. You can hear them before you see them.

There may, or may not, be a break in blogging for a few days. The hotel says it has 'weefee' but adds that the signal varies. ' Sometimes it's strong, sometimes it's not. It is the countryside Monsieur '.