Sunday, September 25, 2011

Life's a beach- back to Soulac-sur-Mer


This year I was a little more together with my packing than last year, but I hadn’t prepared for rain so much of my time in the beginning was spent huddling in my pup tent with the big hairy wet Thabo pup reading, and cooking under an umbrella strung up under some pine trees.

But there is something about living under primitive conditions next to the sea that releases my free spirits and I have really had a great time. Perhaps I exaggerate the conditions. The campsite does have wonderful hot showers for warming up after a swim and on a bluff overlooking the Atlantic about 300 meters away is a restaurant with a terrace where I regularly bid adieu to the sun with a fancy cocktail decorated with little umbrella pierced fruit and whatnot.


The sun and weekend brought the crowds back for a last hurrah which was a bit of a drag because Thabo tends to be such a nuisance on the beach. If I swim out too far he either tries to drag me in using teeth and claws or barks hysterically and relentlessly. For awhile I try to feign innocence but soon everyone catches on that I am responsible for the beast, and reluctantly have to push off.


I recognized a lovely Dutch couple who were my neighbours last summer, and was able to light my stove with their flame throwing gadget. French alumettes were useless in the damp. This evening my corkscrew broke and I was about to go over to borrow theirs when I remembered a trick about banging the bottom of the bottle with the heel of a shoe to dislodge the cork. It works.

2 comments:

Sarah said...

I've never heard of the corkscrew trick. You just give the bottom of the bottle a whack with a shoe heel? Thinking of some toughie corks, that's quite difficult to believe. I'll have to try it some time.

peaches said...

Couple of whacks actually, but it does dislodge the cork enough that you can eventually pull it out.