the beginning

At last!
caught up with the 21st Century - we are on broadband well, all 500k of it anyway.

Where do I start? Well, this is me, the tall, slim handsome guy, munching his way though a kilo or so of mussels.......



This is Dawn, the better looking of the crew enjoying the same.








Picture the scene, a hard working, career couple, being taxed to the hilt for not having kids, enjoying wine & beer, driving a sports car and having a company beemer. We were working long days and barely returned home (when not staying away) and it was bed time! Things had to change.

We decided we had had enough of the daily grind and sold everything - house car, furniture the lot & bought a camping car to tour France with and look for somewhere to live and something to do.........Brave or stupid?


We came over in April 2002 and spent a couple of months looking round for a house we could call home. We looked at ruins, mud floor barns and decided the Dordogne was too expensive for us - we have friends near Eymet and love the area. We decided that we would look in the ever-so-slightly-cheaper Charente area, but stumbled on a little cottage in a Tiny Hamlet near Vieux Mareuil, called Lecoussey, in the North of the Dordogne. It had a new roof and was 1970's modernised - it even had Central Heating, brown wallpaper, brown bathroom suit, you know the sort of thing, but it was dry & warm (ish)