En route

OK so I’m sitting here at Gatwick Airport typing on my laptop.... 6.10am flight out of Glasgow, with connecting flight to Toulouse not until 3pm – arrival 6.40, then a 2 ½ hour drive to destination. So a long day. Janice my friend from London fortunately is able to join me on this trip down – so that is taking some of the pressure off – especially getting into Toulouse when it’s late and dark, and then navigating out of the city in the hire car. And a helping hand to unpack all my worldly goods, should they arrive in the removal van on Thursday as planned! 

The removal van arrived early last Wednesday – stress levels gearing up for this move are not unexpected – sky high. I will be so relieved when I’m sitting in the house, surrounded by boxes, and whipping the cork out of a bottle of red. A positive side of the moving out day was that the two removal men were real gems – it’s a Welsh company that I’m using – so I had two strong Welshman doing a great job of loading my gear, only stopping long enough for a few cuppas and Scotch pies, pasties and sticky buns I’d got from the bakery down the road. And it is the same two that will be arriving on my doorstep in France in a few days. So I’ll make sure there’s some pastries ready, together with whatever the French equivalent of a Scotch pie is.

Hopefully that will happen this Thursday – though there’s no guarantee at this stage that it will. A small matter of a hiccup with the finance arriving from the currency dealer here in the UK into the Notaire’s account in France – nothing major there of course – just the funds to pay for the house! I’m waiting for a phone call here at the airport from Susie Walters who is dealing with the paperwork for me. Worst case scenario I guess is that it’s delayed for a day or two. Hopefully by Thursday – I’m not sure what I’ll do with all the furniture if I don’t have the keys to the house.

After the formalities, Susie wants us to have lunch then head straight off to Carcassonne to look for cars. She knows several English speaking dealers and I’m hoping to have found one before I head to Canada for Christmas on the 11th December. As I have a hire car for the next week, I’m hoping to just pick up the car from the dealer when I arrive back on the 6th January.

So, three night’s accommodation (in the same place that Nic and I stayed at in September) and then into the house. Assuming all goes according to plan, it’s signing of all the paperwork on Tuesday at 11am – a very formal affair with all parties present – the two owners with their Notaire, me with my Notaire, Susie and Bruce, and also an official interpreter who will interpret every word to me to satisfy all the legal requirements. Susie and Bruce are fluent, but they recommended I should get an accredited interpreter to be sure that everything’s done by the book – so important in France of course!

Ah, and this is just the beginning.