24. 07 .07 Took a taxi to Stansted from Windsor at 2.45 am in order to catch the 6 am flight to Montpellier. The flight was 1p but the cab was £75! However not a lot of alternatives at that time in the morning. Usual chaos with Ryanair but eventually arrived in Montpellier at 9 on a warm sunny morning. Picked up the new Clio and drove west to Clermont-L’Hérault. Arrived around 10 to find the street blocked by a front end loader with the Pierre and his mate installing the shutters to the house. I knew that that was all he had to do but didn’t expect him to be doing it on the day of our arrival! However, the new roof was on, the new guttering installed, the new façade was complete so it was just the shutters. 
Of course there was dust everywhere but the work was finished that day. The best thing though was that the bill was exactly as the estimate. What with reputation of French and other builders this came as a great relief. Carole immediately took charge and after a visit to the Hyper U for solvents etc and a vacuum cleaner the house was slowly reclaimed. Wednesday, I went to my bank’s ATM only to discover that the “code secret” no longer worked and after an animated conversation with the lady in the bank who with much shrugging and useful comments like “mais ce n’est pas Paris” etc informed me that the new secret code would have been sent to my address in Canada and there was nothing she could do about it. She did allow me to withdraw some cash though! This problem has since been resolved by changing my address on my account to here rather than Toronto thus allowing the bank here to send me my new “code secret” which should arrive early next week.
Thursday, we decided that we deserved a break so went to our favourite beach between Marseillan Plage and Sête. Perfect day, hot, sunny, clear blue sky, warm water – now I know why I am here!
Friday, to Ikea in Montpellier to pick up some furniture, lights etc. Same experience as TO even down to subsidized food in their restaurant – they do some terrific beignets – 3 for 1€! And the cheapest bottled water anywhere! Spent Saturday assembling various pieces of furniture – discovered that Daisy has a real aptitude for this and is much more logical and patient about it than her grandfather!
Sunday, another glorious day at the beach!
