Living in Brittany

I had to go flat hunting in Rennes with Max as he and Bas are studying there at the university next month. I left the arrangements up to Max and he had 2 rendez-vous organised. The first was on a purpose built block modern Ok if you like fitted carpets on the walls and one of the bedrooms  wouldn't have taken a double bed, so it was small,but it was passable and then the agent at the end of the visit said the owner didn't like students, so it was a waste of time and for the second appointment we waited  and waited and the agent never turned up and Max didn't have his/her  number, but fortunately we ventured into an immobilier at the centre of Rennes and asked if they had any thing on offer and we  were offered a first viewing of an apartment which was in the process of being repainted so we had to return a couple of days later ( its only a 2 hour drive to Rennes ).However the apartment was great just a 5 minute walk from the centre, it was slightly old fashioned with a squeaky wooden floor but spacey 68msq and going for 690€ a month.Its great for Max as his uni is just 2 streets away whereas Bas is at University2 which is on the edge of Rennes so a half hour walk,15 min on a bike it seems to be very bike friendly or he could take the metro. Rennes is a very interesting city,very old centre with the newly restored parliament building  ( the fishermen burnt it down in 1994, Paulien used to know a fisherman he had a few fingers missing as he had let go of the Molotov too late ) It also houses the appeal courts and has exhibitions in the assembly room and is well worth a visit but I guess small children wouldn't find it too interesting. In the centre of Rennes is the " rue de soif " a wide street flanked by restaurants and bars ( also the Webb Ellis )  the centre of the night life.

Here at Coat Aillis we have our "happy family " week with lots of regulars back and we are in the middle of our annual pool competition sponsered by Npower,CMB and Super U. Fortunatly the Aussies lost the ashies so the Npower memorablie has some meaning otherwise it would have to have been binned. For the juniors Iz has to play Emma but for the seniors it looks like a three way final between Ted, Bas (former junior champion) and Pete (07 winner ) or Xav (a 4 times winner of the juniors )Will post the winner next blog.

On the seaweed front the beach of course is looking very clean  and last week the French PM ,Fillon visited with 3 minsters ,agriculture,health and the environment with the usual pledges of money to throw at the problem when the real solution would be effective policing of the rivers and closing down any dirty units caught polluting

We have recently come in contact with our immediate neighbour's ( Etienne )  sister  during the EDF chainsaw massacre  ( 24/05 post ) as she was doing a dossier  on the damage they had done. She is a very formidable short woman with incredible energy when you think she is 84yr. She explained she had a grandson  staying in August who wanted to improve his English so we arranged an exchange with Teddy who is staying with us before his parents arrive.During her second visit she explained that her deceased husband had hid in the loft of the gite "les Etables " from 1942 onward as Coat Aillis was the communication base for the local resistance in the last war. During our renovation of that gite we found a Lee Enfield mk2 rifle hidden in the gables

The story that led up to her late husband hiding was he was a "de Staint Laurent " and lived in the local chateau   a few fields away  and an allied airplane crashed on the beach at St Efflam and the 2 pilots were hidden at the chateau then passed on to escape to the UK , but unfortunately the gestapo  came and took the mother away and she died in the camp Ravensbruck in 45 and all the children  ( 10 of them ) were dispersed as they were afraid they would be deported as well, so my neighbour who was a couple years old was put in a monastery where as Jacque ( her husband ) who was 17 and good at telecommunications/ morse code hid in the  loft of les etables while his older brother escaped to England.

I went to a meeting /demonstration on the " toxic beach" at St Michel en Greve last Sunday where there was hardly a trace of seaweed in fact it was the cleanest I have ever seen no doubt due to the presence of the TV cameras and the national press. The consensus seems to be that there should be better policing of the couple of intensive units inland  plus a change of husbandry by the farmers to stop growing maize which is very shallow rooting and leaves the fields bare from November to April  ( unless the farmers put in a green manure crop ) and to grow lucerne a crop with a very deep rooting system. The statistics show on average after the maize is cut there remains about 140 units of N in the ground which then leaches into the watercourse. The other consensus was that the entire team of bureaucrats at the prefecture should be sacked!

There was a bizarre story in the press 3 weeks ago of a horse rider who's horse fell in a hole next to the a river and it died allegedly with its head in the seaweed of a toxic gas given off by the seaweed decomposing in the sun. The weed is known as sea lettuce and would be the equivalent of taking a walk on a pile of rotting garden lettuces which have been left in the sun for 4 weeks, something you just wouldn't do.However it being the age of litigation and no one takes responsibility for their own actions now adays the owner is suing the local mayor in St Michel who already has an action pending against  "X" who are local farmers ( not identified ) for pollution of the water course ( use of excessive nitrates ).

So a week ago the French press did a blitz on  the story and a week later its on Sky news so it must be true. The problem with the English press is objectivity like the swine flu "with the streets of England cluttered with dead bodies due to this deadly menace" so now its too dangerous to open the window of the car at the beach to " sniff the sea air filled with toxic gases " The reality is in the last 20 years there has been 3 or 4 incidents one involving a person the others being dogs and a horse these facts are then taken by the Murdoch press  and sensationalised regardless of the true facts. The beaches are as popular as ever and to my knowledge none are closed, there are signs where its "interdite " to swim but those signs have been in place 30+yrs. The excess nitrates is a long going problem with local authorities  reluctant in the past to take on farmers but the "tide is turning " and the environment is being given a higher priority.

Previously I lived in Cornwall and the answer there to their sewage problems was to build longer outlets and pump it further out to sea.