15. Languedoc village house purchased

The next morning we requested a second visit to the houses by the canal, and the one at Frasquenet. Sarah made it clear that she was determined that we should buy the house at Frasquenet. I think it was because she thought Barbie doll lived there.

I took the opportunity to pretend a greater interest in the houses, by the canal than I really felt. This was intended to create a negotiating position, for the house in Frasquenet, which I already knew we had set our hearts on.

However Mr. Puffin turned out to be a better negotiator than I was. After our second visit to Frasquenet, he had obviously detected our true feelings and announced that several other people were also interested in that particular house.

At lunch time we returned to Narbonne and sat in the town center, at an open air café, among the plane trees, beside the Canal de Robine, which coincidentally joins the Canal du Midi not far from Frasquenet.

‘We would like to make an offer’ I announced. ‘We will offer the asking price for the house in Frasquenet’. He paused for a moment, smiled and said, ‘In that case lunch is on me’.

‘First of all, what would you like to drink. I recommend a glass of shit’. We looked at him thinking we had misheard.

He explained, ‘Actually the drink is a lemonade quite like ‘Sprite’ or ‘Seven Up’, but has the brand name ‘Pschitt’. In French the leading P is hardly pronounced’. I guessed that offering this beverage to passing house hunters, relieved the tedium of having to visit the same properties day after day, in the hope of a sale.

Having ordered this delightful beverage and some pastries for us, he disappeared for half an hour, to talk to the owners of the house.

He reappeared promptly, to tell us that our offer had been immediately accepted. This naturally led us to conclude that we had offered too much, but what the hell, the house was priced in the middle of our budgeted range and appeared good value when compared with the others we had seen. We ordered cups of coffee and agreed our action plan for concluding the purchase.

At 5.00pm we were back with the agent, at the  Narbonne branch of the B.N.P. bank, applying for a French mortgage. The interest rates were fixed at 10%, a positive bargain compared to the 15%, being charged in the U.K. at that time. Also at that time the UK pound was strong against the French franc, the exchange rate being 10.5 francs to 1 pound.

Later at 7.00pm we were in a Notaires office at the village of Canet,  signing virtually irrevocable papers of intent and handing over 10% of the agreed price, as a non refundable deposit. We were informed that searches would be done, to ensure that our house was not in the path of a planned autoroute and as is the custom, the village commune would be offered the opportunity to purchase the house for its own use, before we could take possession.

Also in attendance  at the Notaire’s office were the house owner and his wife, who greeted us warmly. In fact the owner offered to throw in some land on the edge of the village, as part of the deal. I know that to decline anything offered for free sounds ridiculous. However, I  would have felt guilty about allowing a productive piece of ground, to become an unkempt, overgrown testament to my acquisitive habits.

I declined his kind offer, sure that someone else could make much better use of any available growing space than I could.

Mr. Puffin acted as translator and I had to trust that he was telling me the truth about what was being said and what the forms I was signing meant. He advised me that I must list all the items I wanted left behind, otherwise they would be taken when the house was vacated. This apparently, included, the kitchen sink, the washbasin in the bathroom and even the toilet bowl. I found this hard to believe, but I listed them anyway. We were told that December was the date anticipated for final completion.

The remainder of that holiday was spent idly on the beach at Narbonne plage, or stuck in the car, behind tractors, which were bringing in that years bumper grape harvest. Some tractors were taking away spent grapes which had already been pressed. I’m not sure why, but these smelt foul. Usually being stuck behind anything on a road, is to me  like a red rag is to a bull, but for now I was calm and happy to be inconvenienced for the sake of the local industry, in my newly adopted home.

Now that the Languedoc plain was to be our second home, I had to come up with a strategy to shut up Sarah, who was still calling out “grapes” at every opportunity. A tape of a nursery rhyme about a doctor, a nurse and a lady with an aligator purse, seemed to work best.

We returned to Frasquenet one more time to measure a few things and make an inventory of what we would need. We also took a few pictures of the house to show relatives and remind ourselves of what we had done.

Further visits to Narbonne had revealed among other things the excellent food market, which opens during the morning, seven days of the week. During one of these visits we discovered the tasty red seafood pies, Tielles, a speciality of the area.

Sarah started off by being scared of the sea at Narbonne Plage, but within a few days she loved it. Our worries about her getting sunburnt proved unfounded. I burnt much more quickly than she did. I guess that since Jane is Chinese, she has pigments which made her go brown instead of lobster red. Clearly Sarah had inherited these pigments.

Finally armed with a bag of goodies from Narbonne market, including Tielles, we started the drive home to England at about midday on the Friday of our second week.