Life under French Lockdown

Its been a while since the last blog......our main excuse is that we have been doing up the house. And to that end we have had alot more time to do it than we thought!

It could be much worse of course. Being locked down in France or confinement is stricter than in other countries like the UK or Germany with every excusion being accompanied by an attestation or declaration of what you are going out for. The gendarmes have been both thorough and pleasant to deal with in these tough times. The supermarches have been calm places to be - les Domfrontais (local people in town) are polite, humourous & socially minded. As for food , we are in the best place to eat well & healthily & accompany all dishes (except breakfast.....🥂😁) with a glass of wine to help the French economy of course!

Jakey (my 9 year old son) & I have camped out in the warm April weather enjoying a midnight feast (at 10pm so that daddy can get some sleep). We experienced frogs en mas (croaking), crickets chirping, the cows rubbing their backsides on the metal fences (loud) & next doors cat playing with the guy ropes (sounds like a tiger when its dark😂). Aside from this it was great fun & felt like we were properly on holiday!

As a triathlon coach, I am still involved with my UK club Ocean Lake Triathlon and coach the turbo trainer (ie a static training bike setup) on a Thursday via the Zoom app. It's been great for all of us who use it for excercise, the social element & developing my coaaching style. We will be running training camps for triathlon & HIIT conditioning here at La Bouyardière so am very happy that people are enjoying it!

Finally, like everyone else we are cooking more (having to work out more to prevent the obvious!!), drinking local wines from the Pays de la Loire, trying to stay in touch with friends & family, working out on line with Joe Wickes (well Amanda is!) & just enjoying the calm before the storm. Who knows when we can open again but we are looking forward to welcoming our first