Bush fire ready for summer

I’ve just come inside for a cup of tea. And to remove grass seeds from my socks.

We are in full on Good Citizen mode this month.

And hurrah for our new helper Romain who has stepped up and wielded the mighty strimmer for us on our lower and upper terraces.

The middle bits I can do with my mower.

It was that moment of utter serendipity. Friday 4pm in town is when the little Arbre à Pain co-op shop opens to sell the most amazing bread and local produce. They open Thursday market day, Friday afternoon and Saturday morning only. And you can often find mates also waiting outside the doors.

By chance our former garden guru Nicolas was dangling outside and we had a great catch up.

I know he has retired from hard physical garden landscaping work and is now an artisan boulangère . It’s even more hipster around here than opening a micro beer brewery.

We have three competing artisan baker teams who supply the organic supermarket and the co-op and all the other markets around this region. Nico’s bread ‘drops’ on a Wednesday. And another team does the Friday sesame bread which we are keen on devouring.

And yes, this is so Ardèche… they grow their own ancient varieties of wheat, mill the flour, fire up the bread oven in their rustic farmhouse, and churn out the loaves.

So combining good gossipy catch up with mates and great bread… but also a tip on who is looking for the hard hot strimming work of summer. Romain. Lives in the next village from us.

Nicolas was thrilled to pass on his number. And stop me begging on my knees at his feet for ‘just a few days work’.

Romain is a refugee from the outskirts of Paris who is an eco botanist and forester and looking for a steady income stream in the region.

Yay!

I called him Friday. And he agreed we could have four days this month. And he started 0715 Monday.

Positively Australian tradie hours. But mainly because we are having a heatwave and he needed to not die of heat stroke while attacking our brambles.

Especially on the first day.

And here is the result of his work.

You can even see the stone walls at long last.

And yes, there is my not finished project of major weeding below the mulberry. I can see my buckets still lying like a disappointed abandoned good idea…

He has advanced the project with the weed strimming.

Now all I need to do is go back there and shove that dirt…

And another reason why we are so thrilled it’s clear? The local fire brigade team are visiting farms and checking we are complying to the law.

Law? Oh yes. I love how it is called an OLD – obligation légale de débroussailler.

So to avoid a fine and reduce the risk of a catastrophic bush fire roaring up our mountain we are neat and tidy.

Farewell black oat grass. You did your job of being glam and interesting in April and May and even June.

Hello summer ready and safe.