A Busman’s Holiday

Isn’t that a spooky looking building?

We were walking on yet another lockdown loop this week… the Tour of Talaron. We chose it because it sounded quite Lord of the Rings.

And also it was located inside our 10km radius permitted in this third lockdown.

As we walk (plod, stride, depending on the mood) I do like to have a good inspection of hamlets and farms. That’s the busman’s holiday part.

This one, I think called just Arbre (tree). Quite the fortified hamlet.

And then, after about 12 kms we came up to this spot on the map – Haute Vialle.

A ruin.

Beautifully situated right on the summit of this region.

From below it looks fascinating and complicated and huge.

And from above…

in bits.

The farm nearby seems to have used it as a cattle paddock. And there doesn’t look to have been human habitation for decades.

Naturally when one sees this it screams ‘Project’. An exciting and amazing opportunity to restore this beautiful ruin and turn it into a lovely home.

We actually walked past a group of young people taking a break during another huge restoration project further down the mountain. Their hamlet was called (I think – I was in plod mode) Extremianoux. Or was it Nicolaux?

But they had that shiny-eyed look of people at the beginning of a marvellous adventure.

‘Bonne continuation!’ They called out as we walked passed. And it make me realise that we started on that shiny-eyed adventure fourteen years ago next month.

We have come a long way.

A long, long way.

And if anyone is planning this massive change of a life and restoring stone farmhouses in a rural location and creating acres of garden….

Might I recommend you start when you are fit and strong and around 30 years of age.

My only advice.

I am so wise!