A Year in Villefranche sur Mer - Moving to France

  Day 1757 (Thursday) 31 st March 2022 It was lovely and sunny this morning bit still a bit chilly on Kisbee. Huw dropped me off at International House but I didn’t have time to go to Parc Mozart as I was running a little bit late. Jennifer arrived at the same time as me and I was pleased to see that there was a room for us. She has used her free hours so now we are working on a private basis so Romain doesn’t have to give us a room, but he and Jennifer are friends so he’s doing it as a favour for us. We had a five-minute break and sat in the sun in the Parc, which was as lovely as ever. Jennifer kindly gave me a lift to Ipag so I had time to eat my sandwich before starting with the group of 24. She used the GPS to get us there and I was very impressed by how calm she drives and finds her way around – it’s hard to believe she’s Italian sometimes. In the garden I recognised a lot of my old students from before Christmas and when I got to my room (Berlin) today it was lovely to see so m

  Day 1756 (Wednesday) 30 th March 2022 It was a bit overcast again this morning and it was quite chilly on Kisbee. Huw dropped me off at Odile’s and it wasn’t warm enough to sit on the balcony this week so we sat at a picnic table in her living room. The poor woman still doesn’t have a kitchen, she’s been ‘camping’ in her flat for weeks. The cat sat with us for the full 90 minutes. She is such a gentle giant.    I bought a quiche for lunch in our favourite boulangerie before Huw took me to Saint-Jean Cap-Ferrat. These cacti are in a garden outside  the boulangerie – Beaulieu has a thing about cacti. Oceane and I worked on telling the time in English and she has finally got it. Huw picked me up and we had to go up to the new villa for me to meet the owners again. It’s been five years since I saw her and she took us around showing where everything lives and what is required of us. They leave a small gift for the guests and she showed me the storeroom where they are kept. When I saw the

  Day 1755 (Tuesday) 29 th March 2022 It wasn’t as warm today but it wasn’t too bad and it’s getting slightly warmer in the evenings now. Last night we watched Dirty Rotten Scoundrels yet again and I still love this film. I can’t believe how old it is now – it was made in 1998, just two years before I arrived in Villefranche – it would have been amazing to watch some of the filming. This is Port Sante and there are still two men sorting out their fishing nets in the same spot. This is the seafront – you can just see our balcony – it’s above that red awning  Many years ago I saw Terry Wogan walking down this street and I whispered to my kiwi friend – ‘that’s Terry Wogan’ who loudly replied ‘who the hell is Terry Wogan?’ I was horrified. This is at the edge of Place du Marche outside the ice-cream shop.   These are the steps up towards the citadel This gorgeous yellow ‘pirate’ ship came into the bay this afternoon but it didn’t come in any closer so it’s not a great photo. So I got this