France - Argentan

Patricia drove us back to Le Corbon, near Putanges pont Ecrepin and  we met John and some family pets; an adorable pug named Quark and a big fluffy dog called Hyacinth. We enjoyed a nice meal with them and then retired to our beautiful cottage.  We were a bit tired that night after our wee sprint and not having a proper seat on the train, so it was off to bed for us.

Our three story cottage.

Dinner by ourselves one night.

The following morning we were looking forward to seeing these exotic cats called Savannah's.  John and Patricia bred these cats using the South African Servil for a stud and breeding them with a domestic cat.  The markings on these cats are stunningly beautiful.  Caramel in colour, with dark brown to black spots and stripes.  The male cat was quite big in size and had a long body, very sleek looking and graceful, and so quick.  The female cats and kittens were all different shapes and sizes and you could clearly see the ones who had more Servil in their genes.   Our chores were to clean cages and feed these cats and also the very flash chicken coup.  The kittens were cute and playful.  The older cats all had different personalities; some friendly, some kept their distance and some were a bit flighty.  It was very cool to see all these cats in outside enclosures, which met their every need.

Penelope

Xzibit

Francie in a bucket.

The Servil  -Tetrarch

Tetrarch

Tetrarch sitting tall.

The nearby village of Putanges Pont Ecrepin was pretty small, but only a 10 minute walk so we walked there often for something to do after work.  It had a few shops, supermarket, couple of restaurants  two bakeries and a butcher and a pharmacy.   The Orne River which winds itself around the village, was pretty full and almost lapping over the bank.  Each day we went back it seemed to have dropped a bit.  Another day we went for a big walk around the village and found a new subdivision and a church and a couple of kids who were keen to chat but our French wasn't that good!

The River Orne

Village corner with a busker playing the baguette.  

Typical village house

Another gorgeous day after work.

Putanges Pont Ecrepin Church

Little village walkway

John and Patricia offered to take us to the D-day landing beaches.  These are on the French Normandy coast towards the English Chanel.  The beaches used in that period stretch around 80 km of coastline.   We visited Omaha Beach, which is around 8 km long.  During world war II, when the Germans pretty much occupied France, the taking of Omaha beach was to be the responsibility of the United States Army Corps.  Very little went as planned on that day in June 1944,  difficulties in navigation and the unexpected strength (by share numbers) of the young German defenders,  who inflicted heavy casualties on the landing Americans, proved devastating.  But the Americans soldiered on (excuse the pun) and did achieve a couple of footholds later that day.  And of course later working with other countries over the next few months to take over Caen and Falaise which is very near where we are staying at the moment, then eventually across to Paris and finally into Germany.  Unfortunately 3000 American soldiers lost their lives that one day on Omaha Beach.  The memorial to them and others is set on 172.5 acres of park like grounds and contains the graves of 9,387 white headstones. A really gut-wrenching experience to see so many crosses.  We were able to have a quick look in the museum which was really interesting.

9,238 Latin crosses and 149 Star of David.

John (in yellow jacket) and Murray looking at one of the six massive display boards,
showing attack and counter attacks during that time.

 We then drove around the coast a little to another beach were they cleverly built a man pontoons out in the sea to make a make shift harbour/port, so that they could easily get there supplies onto the beaches for distribution to the soldiers.

Not such a good photos, but we could see what was left of some of the pontoons.

Little bit clearer, all the black bits in the water are the pontoons.

The beach from the top of the hill.

Some other helpxers arrived from Italy.  Guido, who was Italian and his wife Toni who was English.  We soon got to know each other as we went about the daily chores and at breakfast and lunchtime both of which we had in our Gite.  Our evenings were spent firstly by cursing the internet while we checked our emails and then laughing over our choices when it came to picking one of the many DVD's.  Lets just say, we never had many 'great movie' nights.  But the company was enjoyable anyway.  The two boys got stuck into some serious work,  they put railings up the side of some garden steps and cut down some trees and built a cat playground in the big cat enclosure - called Makasi.

Measuring up, looking towards the third storey of our Gite

It took four of us to carry this heavy oak post up to the cat enclosure.

Francie loved to hang out with the boys while they were working in Makasi.

Just the thatched roof and pole platforms to go.

Guido and Murray

Guido and Toni invited us along for a drive.  We ended up in Falaise, a nice little spot with a market which had some cheeses and nuts and pretty much anything you needed in the produce line.  Outside there was seafood and pumpkins galore!

We had a nice lunch and tried some local steak and beers.  Then we went for a walk around the village to see the castle La porte a Chateau de William de Conqueror, where William conqueror was born 1027.  Lots of restoration of the castle and grounds including the surrounding walls are being done at present.  We went through the fortified medieval gate of Cordeliers and out and around the pond.  there were some gorgeous old houses in this area.

The medieval gate

Our new friends Guido and Toni

Had to be there moment really - but gee it was funny as!

Spectacular view of the autumn colours in the valley.

Work continued on as normal, cleaning the cats and dodging the geese on the way to the chickens, turkeys and pheasants, adding some bank clearing and house cleaning to our repertoire.  Afternoons off were spent either walking into the village or another day we went to Argentan, and had a quick look around and got some groceries too.


Murray and I went into the village one night and ended up by getting a pizza and beer at one of the local pubs.  It was nothing flash, but the pizza was nice and we found out about Picon, which is a liquor from citrus, they put in their beers.  It is delicious.  And I was drinking a beer with some kind of berries in it.  Very nice!  We got talking to a local guy who was a small scale farmer in the next village, and were invited to visit on Sunday.  we were pretty keen to do this, but it was raining and we had to walk for about 7 km, so we didn't, besides that we were feeling a bit lazy that day!

Our two weeks, went quite fast really, it was a nice place to stay and a nice area to explore a little and also to just blob out a bit.  Our next helpx spot sounds like fun too and will hopefully be a little warmer.  So goodbye and thanks to the Frencken family, Guido and Toni and also to Normandy France.

Au revoir