housesitting – Page 5

My Favourite Travel Picture Challenge

Published on December 5, 2019 by Donna2 Comments

I was nominated by a lovely lady, Rachael, to post on facebook, 1 of my favourite travel photos every day for 10 days. A photo which has had an impact on me, post it with no explanation and nominate another person for the challenge. It was great fun going through my photos and trying to pick the favourites. As I am traveling still, I dont have many years of photos with me, but I was creative with my searches and came up with these, with explanations!

Day 1.

Phnom Penh, Cambodia

We house sat in Phnom Penh for 1 month November 2017. Cambodian men dont seem to mind peeing anywhere! Usually it is up against a wall, so this was a bit out of the ordinary, but a common occurrence this all the same. I chose this as a bit of a cheeky shot for Jacqui who we met there. She noticed it too and said she would make it a game each day and count how many she saw in a day! Not sure what the most in 1 day was, but given what I saw, it would have been many – Jacqui was my first nomination. Check out her blog Jacq The Tripper http://www.jacquirawson.org/

Day 2

Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

A holiday in Vietnam August 2016. This is an incredibly vibrant city. Venture out on the city streets and its BOOM! Sensory overload! There is noise, colour, smells. There are motorbikes everywhere fully overloaded, zooming in and out of the traffic, total organised chaos! I loved these two, taking time out from their busy day in amongst the chaos. Always amazes me how much they can fit onboard, awesome!

Day 3

Cadouin, France

This is a new shot, only taken in November 2019 while house sitting in France. I spent a day with a dear friend from long ago, Tricia, and she took me to this stunning village. This could be my favourite photo of France, I fell in love with the Dordogne, the pretty villages and friendly people and this reminds me of a wonderful day, I feel peaceful when I look at it

Day 4

Ghent, Belgium

A holiday in Belgium July 2013. I have to confess I did not take this photo, Chris did. He had a trip to Belgium on a Kiwi Fruit boat and convinced me to come out and meet him. He sent me this photo to show how nice it was, so I went with 3 days notice. He took me back to this very spot a week later, we sat in the same chairs, under the same castle and drank Goliath, that was the beginning of a fantastic holiday!

Day 5

Old San Juan, Puerto Rico

We house sat for 5 months in Puerto Rico during 2017. Friends were traveling through Puerto Rico from Cuba onto a cruise ship. We left our island of Vieques and met them for 2 nights. We were so taken with Old San Juan. It is a beautiful old town. The people are super friendly, beautiful buildings, cobble streets, ceramic tiles, wonderful colours, GREAT music! Fantastic mini break!

Day 6

Rabbit Island, Cambodia

Chris and I house sat in Kampot, Cambodia for a month in December 2017. My dear friend Karen came to join us for Christmas. We left Chris looking after the pets and had 3 days on Rabbit Island. We stayed in a hut on the beach, it was freezing! We couldn’t believe how cold it was. These two cuties lived on the island, they were adorable, sharing a pair of jandals, too cute not to take a photo. We left the island a day early and booked into a good hotel in Kep, great fun!

Day 7

Waterford, Maine, USA

October 2017, after house sitting in Puerto Rico we ended up in Maine, almost by accident – we are so glad we did! Maine in the fall! STUNNING, the colours of the tree fall was out of this world. We spent 10 days with our wonderful Vieques Home Owners, Bob and Lou. We never expected to go to the States at all, and this part of our adventures has become a favourite and we are looking forward to going back one day. We met and got to know some wonderful people through this part of our journey, great memories!

Day 8

Lost, Scotland

OMG I dug this one out of the archives, yes there is a place called Lost in Scotland! I lived in Scotland for 8 years from 1990. My old school friend Sheryl came to visit in, around, 1992 or 93, she was staying in London at the time. I think we found this totally by chance. No GPS or cell phones in those days! Great fun and wonderful lifetime friendship which goes back to primary school. This photo screams to me – 90’s Kiwi OE! LOVE IT!

Day 9

Ha’apai, Tonga

And there has to be a sunset! We have seen some stunning sunsets in different parts of the world, but this one is up there with the best! Chris sailed up to Tonga from NZ in May 2010. I met him off the boat in the Ha’apai island group for a weeks holiday. We were having a drink at the bar when someone said “man you should see the sunset!” We all rushed out and this is what we saw. I promise there is no filter or adjustment to this shot, this is exactly what it was like. Stunning!

Day 10

Hahei, New Zealand

Cant have travel photos without a photo of travel at home. New Zealand is a wonderful country and when we came back after a year of travel in 2018, we saw our own country with fresh eyes. We may not have the history of Europe or the speed of Asia, but New Zealand has the most wonderful people, stunning scenery and our own very special history, not so very ancient, but very special all the same, all wrapped up in a time package a long way from anywhere else. I am so proud to be a Kiwi. This photo is my home – it says “home” to me

Mont Saint-Michel

Published on December 1, 2019April 2, 2022 by DonnaLeave a comment

0600 the alarm goes off. We are staying at Saint Malo which is 50 minute drive to Mont Saint-Michel. High tide is at 0833 and the advice is to get there 2 hours before high tide so that you can see the tide rushing in. I am so fascinated by the 15 metre tidal range. They say the water comes in at 30km per hour, as fast as a racehorse. We are at the end of the spring tides so we want to go today to see it as high as we can. So we choose the morning tide as, being winter, the afternoon highs are in the dark. We intend to get there about an hour before high tide and see what we can see.

Navigating with Google Maps again, we find our way out of Saint Malo, and get to St Michel about 0730. Oh woops……. Its still dark – like really dark! We came to a barrier arm which needed a code or credit card to go through, its pitch dark and we don’t really know what to do. We reverse back out and find there are many many car parks. Only 2 other cars, not many other silly buggers here in the dark! We didn’t realise that the whole of the town/village was actually out on the “Mount” we really thought there was a village on the mainland before the access to the mount. But NO, there is a hotel and a restaurant and this car park – this HUGE car park, numbered 1 – 14. Google says it is still 3.5 km to our destination of the tourist office. We start walking and can see the majestic Mount lit up in the distance, but we are actually heading the wrong way, we are just heading to the far end of the furthest car park! We re assess and follow some lights to the road and make our way. We do get to the causeway and by now it is getting light, we make it onto the bridge right on high tide, so we don’t get to see the racehorse rushing in. We never would have though as we mis-calculated the darkness.

Yesterday the water was meeting in the middle

She is a beautiful site! We have had rain this morning and it is overcast, hence so dark so late, but still……WOW!! The end of the causeway was closed yesterday so we really are seeing her at her highest. A construction worker shows us the way in up a ramp, as the entrance was blocked by water, this is so cool! Legend says that the archangel Michael appeared to Aubert of Avranches in 708 and instructed him to build a church here. 1300 years ago! Then she was seized by Vikings, then, in the 10^th century, the Benedictine Monks settled here and expanded the church. The English tried to capture her during the 100 years war and the abbey was closed in the 17th century and used as a prison until 1863, she has seen so much! But now she can rest as she has been declared a Historic Monument, since 1874.

We stayed on the Mount for about 2 hours, wandered around all the streets, went up and down many stairs, took many many photos but I feel they do not do her justice! This is a spectacular place and we are so thankful we got here!

We may not have seen the tide racing in, but in the 2 hours we were there we saw the evidence of the tide receding, it is quite a site to see

A Trip to Brittany – or was it Normandy?

Published on December 1, 2019 by Donna4 Comments

I have just finished a book called “All The Light We Cannot See” by Anthony Doerr. Actually I didn’t read it as such, I had it read to me via Audible. I love reading on my Kindle, which is the perfect thing for traveling as you only take one small device and carry a whole library, but I also love using Audible when you need to be doing other things at the same time. So I have been raking leaves, mowing lawns, cooking etc listening to this wonderful story. It is set in France during WWII, about a blind girl who survives the bombing of her village of Saint Malo. So taken with this book, I wanted to see where Saint Malo was. It is on the coast of Brittany, only 4 hours drive from where we are staying. It is in the same area as another place we were advised to visit if possible, Mont Saint Michel. Great opportunity for an adventure, lets go.

We walked the 3 kms to the walled city from our Hotel. Beautiful walk along the beach just as the sun is starting to go down. The mandatory “beer on the beach” on the way. We are so taken with the huge houses built all along the waterfront. The beach is really deep and there is a wall which must be 3 metres high going up to the footpath. Infront of the wall in one area are tree trunks set in concrete, about the same height as the wall – interesting. So many people are out, its windy and only 9 deg but so gorgeous. Surfers are out, just crazy!

We get to the old town and walk around part of the wall and explored as much as we could as it was dark by now. We will come back tomorrow and find the street which features in my book tomorrow. As we leave the old town we go to walk along the edge of the path but the water is splashing up a bit. Ok cool, don’t want to get wet so we will walk on the other side. As we get further along the waves and splashing up higher and higher. There is quite a crowd forming and the water is washing right across the road, the drains and gutters of the road can only just handle it. We keep walking and it really is getting bigger and bigger, as the wave comes up to the wall, the water flies right up in the air, sometimes up to 10m, it then goes back out and crashes into the next one coming up. Now we understand the reason for all the tree trunks! We meet a lovely Moroccan family twice as we made our way home, stopping to chat and compare our amazement of what we are seeing. There were so many people out, all in awe of the show. The road is getting covered with seaweed! We half expect to see a fish flapping around. We wonder how on earth did they build this wall in the first place with this tidal flow. There is a restaurant which is right on the wall and looking through from the road side we see the water foaming right up the windows! Wow how do they not break! This is quite amazing.

Well, we think our night will not get better than that! But wait – there’s more! We arrive back at our Hotel and they have 1 other couple at the bar so we order a drink. The couple happen to be related to the owner and are there on business for the night. 6 in the bar, 2 owners and 4 guests, and the bar gets closed to public – never been in a “lock-in” before! We have another drink. Then food arrives! Prawns, langoustines, fish, spring rolls, chips, and 6 plates! We are being included in with the family – this is amazing, such wonderful people. It didn’t matter that none of us were truly fluent in each others language, we still had a great laugh and a really fun night. We finally went up to bed thinking – did that really happen?

An interesting fact came out about Saint Malo that night, they have conflict over their province. Some say it is in Brittany and some say it is in Normandy, and some say it is neither, in fact some say it is not even France – it is Saint Malo….full stop. So funny, What a great night!

It was a different sight here last night!

A bit on the slow side the next day but still able to get on bikes and explore. As we head out we check the information sign and while we are figuring out which way to go a lovely old French Monsieur stopped to see if we needed help. No English! He understood we were from Nouvelle Zealnde and when he saw the world cup shirt Chris had on he did an imitation of the haka! This made us all laugh and he seemed delighted! He pointed to the fort as if to say we should go there, up the Avenue John Kennedy. We said we would then we all shook hands and he headed off, but not before saying “vive le Rugby” – long live rugby!! friend for life! We have had some amazing interactions with some beautiful French people!

We found the Fort de la pointe de la Varde, so many remnants of the German defences during the war, it was so much top of my mind from reading my book. The book was so well written, I could picture this place in 1944.

Back into the old town and we found the address from my book – 4 Rue Vauborel! WOW. We walked right round the walls and around the outside. It was low tide now so we walked out to the Grand-Be. We knew That Mont Saint-Michel had a huge tidal range and should have known it would be similar down the coast at Saint Malo. 13.36m here, but unless you see it, it is hard to picture.

When in France……Eat Crepes!!

Alarm is set for 0600 tomorrow – we are off to Mont Saint-Michel in the morning!

The Story Of The Hurricane – Part 1

Published on October 5, 2019February 18, 2025 by Donna3 Comments

Chris and I spent 2017 house sitting, 5 months in Puerto Rico and 5 months in South East Asia. House sitting exposes you to many wonderful experiences, the people, the food, cultures, language etc etc Weather is one we don’t think of so much. We have never felt so hot in Puerto Rico for example and later this year we will possibly have snow as we are currently in Europe. It is all part of the experience of traveling around our amazing planet and you have to embrace all of the above. But, we have experienced a severe weather episode, not 1 but 2 hurricanes back to back – Irma and Maria, September 2017 – Puerto Rico. So while we get ourselves settled into life in France, I would like to share our Hurricane story. Pre Irma, Post Irma and Pre Maria, Post Maria then Our Evacuation, I hope you enjoy our story.

Pre-Irma

Vieques, beautiful Island to the East of Puerto Rico Main Island. 34km X 5km.

Written early September 2017. We are good, getting our heads around preparation for Hurricane Irma who is destined to cross our path in a couple of days. The Island is in preparation mode, the ferry service is being suspended on Tuesday and all the ferries will be taken around to San Juan for safe keeping, the airport will probably close as well. We don’t really know what we are in for. We are being advised by locals to be prepared, get food provisions in and collect/buy lots of water. The power will more than likely be turned off, before it gets cut off by the weather – this is less damaging to the system apparently. The supermarkets get stocked up on a Tuesday and often by Monday it is slim pickings in there anyway, so with this mass “buy lots of food” there will be nothing on the shelves. Also heard though, that they start giving frozen/refrigerated stuff away, like ice cream etc, if it looks like the power will go out. Happy days!!

We may get a bit of water in through our back door so we are going to make some sand bags up and Chris is going to dig a trench in preparation. At the moment they don’t know for sure if it will hit us directly. Some of the predicted paths show her coming right at us, some have her tracking North. Even if she tracks north, we will still get some impact being on the fringes. We will be ok here. we are in a really solid house. We know enough people here now too that if it is total devastation, we have places to go and people to take us there. We are certainly not alone.

We have a water collection drum from the roof for the garden, so that will be great. We have stocked up the freezer. We have gas cooking both upstairs and downstairs in the apartment. Our gas tanks are a bit exposed, if they blow away we have the downstairs ones as back up, we have loads of candles and vodka! We think we are ready. So funny though, we are off to the beach today! hard to believe what is coming.

Facebook post:
So we are in the path of hurricane Irma. She will hit in about 18 hours. Cat 5, record wind speed recorded with Jose right up Irma’s bum. 185 mph winds gusting to 225. We are well prepared – as much as hurricane virgins can be! Got the food, water, candles, torches, grab bag for evacuation. Our house is very secure, the power will be turned off, maybe even as soon as tonight. I will try to keep updated here for as long as I can. Xxx

During. This Hurricane was predicted as cat5, and they said it is the biggest in the area ever. So we were very concerned, in fact we are really scared. We have done lot of prep, we had several days to get prepared, so we feel we were in a good place. The wind started at 4am and got stronger and stronger. At times the wind is gusting so strong it makes us hold our breath… stop…. And wait… BREATH!! but it really isn’t as bad as we thought it would be. We have no power, so no news on what is actually happening out there. We have lots of food, we even have a roast chicken cooking, bottle of wine, candle light – its only 3:30 pm!! Giving us something to do to keep our minds off the howling wind outside. We cooked the roast in the oven downstairs as it has a manual temp dial. The one upstairs is all electric controls. We can manually light the hob, but not the oven. So Chris is the brave one! Up and down, in the rain, trying to stay on his feet, carrying trays of roast dinner! Late afternoon, she was getting a bit less intensity, or maybe we were just getting used the sound of the wind. We have been watching the palm trees and they are now blowing in the opposite direction – she must be passing! Blowing East, then North then West. When she swung around to the north we got water in the front doors and were on mop up duty for about an hour then she swung to the west and hammered the other side. We knew then that she was on her way! It was really fascinating seeing the change of wind direction as she progressed.

The house across from us has lost their veranda roof, it is still just hanging there from one corner, very lucky it didn’t go flying. There is no one home which is just as well, one of the uprights went through a window and they will have a lot of weather in there being on the west side.

So that was a Cat 5 hurricane – or was it? We didn’t know it at the time but there was worse to come, and…… is it the hurricane or the aftermath that is more dangerous?

Part 2 – Post Irma and Pre Maria – Next Week

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