My first French blog

Bonjour to all,

This will be my very first french blog.

The selling up of all our assets, properties, giving a lot to charities, selling furniture through Gumtree, selling a car, living in a crappy rental apartment and changing our whole SMSF structure, seems like a distance memory now that we are actually here in France.

The visa process and getting all the documentation together was stressful but the actual interview went smoothly and we received our 12 month visa within 3 days. They had told us to wait at least 15 days.

After the visa had been approved, travel arrangements confirmed, we spent a couple of weeks up in Mossman in Far North Queensland with my elderly parents (which was very hard to leave them).

We arrived safe and sound at our house in St Silvain sous Toulx in Limousin.

It was a very special moment as we had both worked hard to get to this point. All the trials and tribulations of the last 18 months that we had to endure was all worth the effort.

Just to make things a bit more interesting, the boot of the car would not open when we went to place our four suitcases, 2 backpacks and a computer bag. So had to balance them on the back seat for the 45 min journey to our house. Managed to get it open the next day from inside the car.

Thanks to Jim for picking us up from Chateauroux Gare and to Marj for supplying us with first days food.

We have had some minor building work completed and now the scaffolding has been removed. We are able to sit out the front and enjoy watching the french country life. Lots of bonjour and comment ça va?






We have been trying to have conversations with our French neighbours - there's been a fair bit of hand pointing and gesturing but I think they are understanding what we are saying. They seem to speak very quickly so it has been difficult to understand but I suppose it will only come with practice. Hopefully after 12 months we will be more fluent. We hope to enrol in a local french class for lessons - another great way to meet some people.



Since arriving in France we have had 3 lots of visitors, been invited to a lecture and to a picnic by a lake in August. Today we have been invited to a Chateau for dinner in early August.

The weather has been absolutely perfect bar a few hot days.



We will be starting our regular walking this week and hope to invest in a couple of bikes to ride to the nearest boulangerie each day for our baguettes - although there is a little yellow van that delivers bread to the village each day.

We have had to clear out the linen cupboard and start removing all the wallpaper due to mould. We also discovered woodworm. So after all the wallpaper removed then we will treat the wall and then use some antimould paint and just paint the walls and then we can place everything back into cupboard and start to get things more organised around the house. Hopefully in time for any visitors that we may get.












No travel plans as yet - only a trip to Portugal and Spain in late August to catch up with a work colleague and then across to Lyon for another work colleague catch up. We will plan out some more travel for Autumn but are just happy to work around the house and in the garden at the present time.

Au revoir pour maintenent

Wendy