Goodmill hunting

We are looking for a water mill to buy, with the intention of retiring to a life less hectic, and generating our own electricity, amonst other things.   We went to look at a mill not far away, at Auvers-le-Hamon.   Since it is described in the blurb as having a generator capable of heating the place in Winter, we were intrigued.

It has a proper water wheel, fixed to a gear chain capable of turning a generator at reasonably high speed.  The proprietor told us that it could generate about 15KW, a figure that seems about right to me.  The generator was no longer in place, since it had fried at some time in the past, and the water wheel wasn't turning because the flood water would make it turn too fast.

The mill is not for us; the land that would be the garden is too small and it can flood, although the mill house itself, however, is high up enough to avoid this problem.  The controls for the water supply to the wheel are situated across a road, which is a pain to get to, and the house is, to be honest, too big.

There is a viewing window so you can see the wheel from the living room, and I liked the timberwork in the roof space.

I thought the house looked ugly in the ads, but it wasn't too bad in real life.   It has an access for canoeists to the main river from the millpond, (via the tunnel), although I think the water is too high for that to be passable at the moment.