I do this every year, a sort of corny sum up of the past twelve months with all the highlights highlighted.

This was a great year , a really happy year , ending for us on a high of a new grandchild and an amazing Christmas straight out of a Hollywood set, but somehow this is not the highlight.

When we decided, many years ago, that we wanted to retire ultimately to France, it never struck us that we would run a chambre d’hote.

The chambre d’hote idea came from a lot of different places but chief among them was that it would be the very best way for us to maintain contact with our friends and relations in Ireland and elsewhere.

This has worked well.

Now our friends don’t have to wait to be invited but just contact us and tell us when they are coming and they troop out happily- for many of them we know that us being here has been the spark which has led to a love affair with the Languedoc.

The thing that has surprised us though is the many new friends we are making by running the business.
People we barely knew and often complete strangers arrive and live with us for a few days and depart firm friends.
A lot of this is the magic of France , it is hard to not be friendly eating dinner and sipping wine on a warm evening terrace , a lot of this also has to do, I admit to the fact that we are good at what we do – we both have been involved in the business for nearly forty years now, and compared to running a busy restaurant this business is way more relaxed, and more fun.

So this year I am awarding the highlight of the year to our new career.
To turning around our lives in our old age and loving it.

Lift your glasses folks !