A Year in Villefranche sur Mer - Moving to France

  Day 1997 (Saturday) 26 th November 2022 We went to Le Phare last night and heard this awful story so Huw looked it up this morning and found this…the English isn’t so good but you get the gist  Two people died on Friday in the crash in the town of Eze of a civilian helicopter providing the link between the city of Lausanne, Switzerland, and the principality of Monaco. The helicopter, registered "3A-MVT" and which exploded into a thousand pieces in a wooded area, was a device of the last generation.  "At this stage of the investigation, no element concerning the circumstances of this accident can be pronounced", indicated last night the company Monacair, which operated this type H130 T2 helicopter which was to join the Principality from Lausanne, in Switzerland.  It was the "Rescue Coordination Centre" based in Lyon which gave the alert on Friday around 2 p.m., indicating that an "aircraft was potentially in distress".  The Civil Security helic...

  Day 1996 (Friday) 25 th November 2022 It wasn’t quite so sunny this morning but it did brighten up a bit in the afternoon. I found this rather disturbing article in the Local France… Floods, shellfish and wine: 7 ways that the climate crisis is impacting France The ongoing climate crisis naturally affects the whole planet, but there are some particular risks in France. From declining grain supplies to unreliable wine harvests, coastal flooding to heatwave deaths, shellfish shortages to wildfires - here are 7 of effects already being felt. Published: 10 November 2022 12:11 CET Droughts are now common in France. Photo by LOIC VENANCE / AFP France has just recorded its hottest October ever, while across Europe 2022 was  the hottest summer ever recorded  ‘by a substantial margin’. Climatologist Françoise Vimeux, who works at the Institute of Research for Development (IRD), said: “We can see very clearly that temperatures are rising. “In France, the temperature is increasin...

  Day 1995 (Thursday) 24 th November 2022 It was another gorgeous morning 28 degrees in direct sunlight and I spent a few happy hours sunbathing on the balcony.  Our bougainvillea is looking good – I know it’s not much but it’s the best we’ve seen since we bought it four years ago. I am also happy that it’s red – I bought a red plant but the following year it went pink – now it’s red again. Huw found this beautiful photo of Saint-Jean Cap-Ferrat on Facebook this morning.   Emmanuel Gautier What are some mannerisms that are unique to French people? La bise , of course! We greet people in social occasions by giving them a series of light kisses on the cheeks, changing cheeks for each kiss. Well, most of the time, we just barely touch each other’s cheeks while giving a smooch to the volume of air sitting right next to the person’s ear. Weird, right? Now, this is where things get complicated. We don’t engage in bises with everyone Usually, up until the age of ten to fourteen...