After a relaxing morning out with Elise in Belfort, she walked me to the train station to meet my newest WWOOFing hosts, Robi and Peter.
Up until our meeting, Robi and I had always communicated in English. When he saw me with Elise, we spoke French, then he told me that he and Peter are Swiss, so Peter started talking to me in German! I'm new to multilingualism, I can't just switch from one language to the next and, for me, German and French are unfortunately mixed in a 'foreign languages' box in my head. Although my German is pretty good, when I tried to speak German with Peter not a single German word came to mind! The Catch-22 of the situation was, once the German came back, we didn't stop. It was a very lazy French-learning month.
WWOOFing life at Robi and Peter's horse-retirement farm was like nothing I had experienced before. After having come from having the family dry toilet behind a curtain in my bedroom in Plougasnou (yeah, I forgot to mention that), arriving at their place was like arriving at a hotel. Their stylish blue wooden house, defying almost all architectural norms, with a large balcony overlooking the private lake, fully equipped with a jetty and sauna, surrounded by a golf course. It was too gorgeous.
My work on the farm was mostly done on weekends and was mostly made up of shovelling horse poo from the stables. On their farm, though, the horses live out in the fields for most of the year, we let them out onto the fields in the last few days I was there. Before that, they had been in smaller paddocks over Winter giving the grass time to grow.
The work during the week is done by a man named Christian. He and his wife, Amandine, live on the farm too. Such a lovely couple! It was great to spend time with them and also to stay in touch with my French.
Robi was kind enough to give me some horse riding lessons to refine my rusty skills. While I was staying with Lucille and Nicolas in November, I had an incident where I had to jump from my horse because the saddle had come un-done. I was grateful to be able to slowly rediscover my confidence in the saddle.
More photos of the farm to come. I seem to have lost them!
I did odd jobs around the farm during the week, one of which was painting new signs to place along the roadside. It wasn't always the easiest place to find.
Even managed to get sunburnt: the weather got nicer faster than I could buy sunblock!
Peter and Robi's pets, Snoopy the dog and Karuzo the cat, were spoilt rotten. They claimed Karuzo was 'muscly' but he gave Yahel's fat cat in Rennes a good run for her money. Snoopy lived a better life than most children - these pics say it all.
I was treated to several day trips out with Robi and even the occasional trip to Switzerland. I got to catch up with Steffi in Zürich and even go hiking in the alps, near Amden and in the Vosges mountains. Unfortunately the snow hadn't seen it's last days, so my feet were a little chilly (and wet) in my runners.
Near Amden, Switzerland.
Overlooking the Zürichsee, Switzerland, and relaxing by the river with Steffi.
Hiking up the Grand Ballon in the Vosges mountains.
A 700 year old oak tree. Incredible! Just think what this tree has lived through and how many times it changed nationalities at the ever-changing French-German border.
At the former French-German border, overgrown in the forest.
While staying at Peter and Robi's I had two much-needed visits: first Anna and Stefan came along with their brilliant news; and then Winnie, Lena, Verena and Sarah came for our girls night away in Colmar!
I am so grateful for everything Robi and Peter did for me, but to be quite honest my stay with them wasn't at all what I had in mind when I arrived. I didn't feel that a WWOOFer was needed, I was more like a personal helper who followed along like a puppy. I had expected to speak French (with a native speaker) and in the end I felt it was just silly speaking French when we both speak German and English. I really wouldn't advise any germaphobes or perfectionists to buy a farm - enough said. Life is one big learning curve.
A few days before I left, another WWOOfer arrived and my last day on the farm brought a breath of fresh air in the form of a lady named Danièle. Danièle is a friend of Robi's and she kindly welcomed me to her home in Solothurn, Switzerland. So off I went.
No comments:
Post a Comment