Random

We've had really strange weather this year. We've had hot spells, so that some of our newly-planted trees, that haven't got much root depth yet, are struggling. But we've had so much rain that some of the tomatoes are rotting. And the Spring heat wave meant that the strawberry crop was poor at that time, but I have gathered a nice strawberry harvest today.




And the blackberries are also nice and fat and ripe, free for the taking from hedgerows as you pass.

















The famous cart has a new lease of life: notice the new strong cross-bracing. The first time I tried to take it anywhere loaded up with water containers, the handle snapped off. So I think I'm going to reinforce it with metal. It'll look like an armoured tank by the time I'm done.
















We were out on our bikes along the Mayenne recently. Many of the locks between Laval and Mayenne have little hydro-electric generators. Sounds like a good idea to me. Some have two side-by-side, some have only one. I wonder why the difference?















Also along the Mayenne river are some abandoned water mills. Except that they're not completely abandoned. Instead of a roof at roof level, they have roofs inside, even sometimes covering only part of the floor area. It's a pragmatic solution, I suppose, if you don't want to maintain the whole building.














It's village fête and car boot time again (village fêtes always seem to have a car boot as part of the deal). This time I bought a nice car battery charger at St Suzanne for 10 euros. You can get them on eBay for 12 pounds or so, plus postage, but here in the shops thy're upwards of 30 euros. Good bargain. At St Denis d'Orques there was the local wind band playing too. My friends Jill, Gabriel and Raoul from St Suzanne play in it too. Here's a picture. They're under the tent bacause it's raining. I guess you don't want to have the rain collecting in those tuba or baritone things, you'd be blowing bubbles in no time.