The Trees of the Canal du Midi

Yesterday, I came across some saddening news. Apparently the French are being forced to chop down all of the beautiful trees that line the famous, quintessentially French, Canal du Midi. These trees go hand in hand French waterways, offering shade during the day and a truly atmospheric light at dusk.

Photo by Yishac - Isaac Alvarez i Brugada on Flickr

The 200 year old trees are suffering from a fungal infection, which was introduced into France by the contaminated wood of ammunition boxes by American GIs during World War II. There is no way to prevent this fungal disease from spreading, which leaves the French authorities only one option: to chop them down and burn them.

Photo by Nirgal Ksi on Flick

The Canal du Midi is a Unesco World Heritage site status which it could potentially lose (though hopefully it won't) if all the trees are destroyed.

However, the French will be re-planting trees from the end of the year...but they estimate that it will take between 30-40 years to replant along the entire length of the beautiful 200km waterway. 

Moving...finally!!

Finally, after six months of waiting we are finally, finally moving to Haslemere. It's taken a lot of time, three different buyers for the flat - of whom two dropped out, and oodles of patience. And, of course, good stress management skills!

So, instead of working to tide me over for a few weeks, I ended up working for four months. I had an excellent time though, and I'm so pleased that I got to work that little bit longer - did some interesting work, met some lovely people and could walk in (...a long 2.7 miles walk in!). We move next week, so the flat is full of half packed boxes...boxes I'm meant to be packing as I write, but I'm managing to find all sorts of far more exciting - and less important - things to do instead!

Shortly, I am going to move my blog (which I have thoroughly neglected for the last few months!) over to the Camembert website, but it will still feature on Blogger too.

Over the next few months I'm really looking forward to a number of things: teaching a spot of French, adopting a couple of cats, decorating the new house and planning for our wedding next April. So much to do! Fortunately it's all pretty exciting and interesting stuff, none of your run-of-the-mill mundane happenings for me over the next year!

Right, well I'd best crack on with the packing. Next blog coming soon!