Montcigoux

I think that French TV is on a different satellite to the UK radio channels so staelllite dish has to point to the frnech one . You would need another dish for BBC. I can also get radio 4 long wave on cheap radio alarm clock but very crackly.

I have had the same problem with my german shepherd cross breeds. At 11 months a dog may still not be totally reliable this tends to happen around 12 - 18 months. You did mention that you let her out last thing I wondered if you actually took her for a walk rather than let her out. It is actually the walking which stimulates production of the poo and of course a routine. If she is let out then she may only sniff about for a bit then not stimulate her bowels enough so that later in the night possibly soon after you go to bed she performs. I find that if I try and rush my dogs on the walk and they don't perform then I will have a poo on the floor in the morning. Not much fun walking a dog at midnight in the pouring rain and the scary dark but essential. If you are not walking her I would split her meals as suggested by others and then take her for a walk last thing at night on a long lead and lots of praise when she performs. Alow about 20 minutes for the walk initially but you can get it down to 10 minutes once she begins to associate the walk with a poo. Even though she is no longer a puppy it may not be too late to associate a phrase with defecating such as "hurry up" or "be clean" or even the french equivalent so that she will go more or less on command. The idea of confining her to a bedding area is a good one. Also strict routine and dog only high quality food like IAMS or Royal Canin and no snacks to get regular solid poo. Don't shout at her when she does poo as this will increase her anxiety. My dogs hide under the kitchen table when they hear me coming down in the morning because I once shouted at them in exasperation on finding poos!

Yes wonderful compulsive viewing and I do so hope they are able to live the dream but the omens so far are not good! The most telling comment was the speed with which the french vendors scarpered never to be seen again. I wondered also why they paid full asking price when even if they could have got £50k off the price (450k I thought they said) it would have helped them. On another property development programme the one piece of advice that really mattered was "you make your profit when you buy the property" ie buy it at the right price. Still really gorgeous, fab chateau I can see why they fell in love with it but they are not used to the country or managing land having lived in the suburbs. I also worry about anybody with relatively young children attempting to do anything which requires more than full time work from both partners to make it a success. Unless they can get help, the pressure on them if they feel guilty about neglecting the children will be enormous. The children will also pile on the pressure and a construction site is not a safe place for them. The other problem that everybody has who makes the big move from corporate life is adjusting to the change. I hope they belong to this forum and can tell us all more and we can wish them well.

Hopefully you mean a few chicks scraping around in the farmyard to be sold on the local market. Please beware of chicken broiler raising on any scale. I lived opposite a chicken farm in the UK. Thousands of chickens intensively raised in a shed for meat. Every few weeks they put in day old chicks. After a few weeks men turn up at 4 - 5am in the morning in huge noisy lorries and catch the broiler hens and take them away for slaughter. Quite often they break their legs and wings when catching them. In the meantime the poor chicks grow up on their own dung including the trampled bodies of the ones that have died. You then have the noise as the chicken barn is scraped out with tractors and the manure piled up before the next lot come in. For a few weeks there is no smell and then as the broilers chicks get bigger and the manure deeper the smell is horrendous. There is also a permanent fly problem with any intensive animal raising nearby you will always have a lot of flies in your house. Please be careful and be sure you know what you are buying. You will I am sure also be aware that you will not be able to get planning permission to turn any buildings into habitation if they are within so many metres of buildings containing livestock. A sensible french rule to cut down on the associated health problems of living too near livestock.

AGA 's do not provide heating. An AGA can possibly heat hot water and one radiator with the right fittings. If you want an AGA to provide central heating you have to buy an additional AGA boiler which is quite substantial in size which matches in style and is usually fitted alongside the AGA. A RAYBURN from the same company can provide central heating for a limited number of radiators with a back boiler but they do that at the expense of the heat going to the oven agian you have to get the right model. An AGA is a cooker and is always on and maintained at a static temperature so that you don't have to heat up the ovens or the hot plates  befoe you cook on them. There are in fact no hob or oven controls you  choose the appropriate hob or oven depending on the cooking temp. you want eg hot oven for roasting cool oven for long slow cooking. To cook on an AGA you can also learn techniques like putting a cold shelf in to cool down the hot oven. If you intend to cook on an AGA and you can afford it and have room for it get the 4 oven model the 2 oven is fairly inflexible. Note that there is no grill at all on an AGA and you have to learn a different cooking technique as an alternative. A key problem with cooking in an AGA is heat loss from the oven and hot plates once you start to use them. Second nature to an experienced user but difficult for a novice as you have to plan carefully for cooking for large numbers and for safety's sake need a back up normal cooker. A RAYBURN is also always on but you can in fact turn up the oven at the expense of any heating and it takes a long time for the oven to warm up. Rayburn's are not that good or flexible for cooking but you can get used to them again no grill. You can turn the overall thermostat on an AGA down but if you do this then the all the hotplates and the oven will no longer be at the correct temp and there is no way you can turn them up without turning up the thermostat and waiting a couple of hours for them to heat up again. Because an AGA gives off a constant dry heat they make large old kitchens feel lovely and cosy. I also think they look great. Whether you would need to turn your off or not depends on whether your kitchen is south facing or not and how thick the walls are and how big it is. South of the Dordogne you would defnitely have to turn it off between June and September but in the Limousin they would be great. That means you will need to buy and find space for an alternative cooker for the summer months. New AGAS now have matching and v expensive electric cookers which act like a conventional cooker ie you have to turn them on and set the temp to cook. Some points to consider Size  - your AGA has to fit and it needs a brick build plinth ( they are very heavy) and the plumbing has to be fitted exactly to the specification. There is no getting around the size specification double check carefuly that it will fit before ordering.Remember to allow for the thickness of plaster, tiles etc if you are still renovating. Ideally you want the AGA tight fited into a chimney breast or against units. Once fitted you can't ever move them out to clean so avoid any gaps at the side or back that you can't access for cleaning where food will drop down and lots of fluff and debris will collect Ideally if you can make sure you have a surface on each side of the AGA to put very hot pans and dishes down. Flue it must be flued to an outside wall except for an electric AGA and the kitchen will need an adequate external ventilation source difficult to fit in thick stone walls Annual maintenance one or two services per year and even in the UK they are eye wateringly expensive over £100 if no parts are needed.  Again parts are expensive. I would check before ordering one how near your nearest French agent is and how much the services  and parts will cost Fuel costs again always on although insulated -so expensive to run and not very green they will add substantially to your oil bill. Depending on the separate location fo your central heating boiler they may not work properly if they have to share the same oil tank seek advice from the supplier re this Overall cost around up to 10k or more for 4 oven version if all the installation costs taken into account eg construction of the plinth, pipes back to your oil tank and so on. Beware of second hand AGAS make sure you have seen it working and look at the service record and bills. Difficult to enforce a guarantee if there is one once you move to France. Dust and dirt even the oil fired ones need constant cleaning and the solid fuel Rayburns like my one here in the Uk are horrendous  - film of dirt everywhere in the kitchen. There are some excellent one day AGA cooking courses if you are an AGA newbie and some very good cookery and hints and tips books especially by  Amy Willcox and Mary Berry. I would definitely have one in France if I could afford it even if it had to be turned off in the summer.  

Hi out of interest what exactly does a signalling designer do? Is this something to do with railways or electronics?  I wouldn't necesarilly assume that these skills wouldn't be transferable to a similar field in France especially if you are aiming to live in Paris and not in the sticks. You may find that if you know of UK commercial companies in your field they may have french equivalents. Your work contacts and the internet would be a good place to start. As other posts have said especially if you are young, try and avoid "immigrant" type work for long hours and low pay. As temporary work to help you get fluent in French, hotel and catering work might be OK for up to 6 months while your are looking for a job. It could cause all sorts of strain on your relationship in the longer term and problems like low status and poverty not always attractive to the opposite sex! Try to think of a move to Paris as a move to another city in the UK. Would you take low paid hotel and catering work in the UK instead of the job you have now? If not why not? Those reasons will be the same when you live in France. Bon Courage    

Hi, You should definitely try and claim from the UK authorities as unlike in France they do pay child benefit for the 1st child and it can be paid to the father. They can only decide on the facts as you put them before them. I would ask for a claim form and read the leaflet carefully on eligibility. In fact I would advise that it might be better if your husband claimed it. When I moved to France in January 2002 I dutifully officially immediately notified the UK authorities who stopped my child benefit. I then missed out on over a £1000 by trying to claim in France 18 months benefit for 2 children until I moved back to the UK. Although I have two children both then under 16 the eldest was at boarding school in the UK but his home was in France with me. I made my claim to the CAF but after over a year of form filling obtaining evidence etc from when I first made my claim the French CAF decided that I should be treated as having only one child and therefore my claim was disallowed. This is in spite of the fact that child benefit in both countries is non contributory. The UK authorities only allow a short period of claiming in arrears around a month. In fact my ex husband is a UK resident and the childrens' father and he could have claimed for my son during this period so we lost out. Don't delay claim in the UK today!    

Have you already got a house there or are you looking for a school before selecting a house? Are you looking for a recommendation from other english people? Once you have your house the local Mairie will tell you what the secondary school is for your commune and will arrange bus transport if necessary. If you go to a school that is not the local one you may have to get permission from the Mairie. If you look on www.pagesjaunes.fr under the relevant department and town it will list the state and private schools.

I think it is a well presented and designed site and also very interesting. As one who bears the scars of a renovation project I am impressed by the amount you have achieved already. Good luck for the future

Ideally they should be fully recorded in the sort of child care book that some health authorities issue but otherwise names and dates on official looking and stamped paper is fine. She will need a TB vaccine as well as the normal UK child immunisations. You will also need school insurance available at very low cost from any insurance brokers office in France. You can just go in and buy it there and then. The school will want to see evidence that you have the insurance as well as the vaccines. You have mentioned elsewhere that she will be living with your mother for a few weeks. I am sure you already have thought about this but going from my own and others experience do think carefully about the risk of not being with your daughter at such a critical time. At her age there is no need for her to start in September as it is not one of the important transition stages like 7 or 11. She will be the new girl in the class regardless of when she starts and you can start at any time in the school year. Although she may be very very close to her grandmother it is still not her Mummy and Daddy and she will need your close support. Children are to an extent resilient but there is a risk she wll feel emotionally abandoned. She will have to cope with a different main carer, a change in routine, meals and bedroom and a new school away from her friends a bit like being evacuated in the 2WW. I know friends of mine did this and although the two girls seemed OK living with their Granny the children have made odd remarks to me since about various things that made me feel that it wasn't a good idea. They didn't really understand why their Mummy couldn't be there and it made them very clingy later even though they had always been close to their Granny. When your daughter is new the children at school will point her out to the other parents and if Granny is there initially it will be harder for the other parents to work out later who you are. Some people think that it is important for children to actually experience the packing and the move out as part of the transition. Children worry about what has happened to various things that were part of the home and if they see them being sold or packed up it helps them settle later. I am not being critical just offering a different perspective. I hope the move goes well.

Any chance of a(not too expensive) advertising column in LF for those of us who would like to meet somebody who would positively like to live in France or are passionate Francophiles? Is this a really bad idea? Jeanette

It depends of course. If it is a two part system it should also have a bac a graisse located just in front of the tank. The bath, showers and all sinks but not WCs should empty first into the bac a graisse. This traps the grease it simply rises to the top and then the dirty water goes through into the fosse. The bac a graisse with the minor occupation you are planning will need to be skimmed of grease probably only every two years. A thick crust of solid grease forms and basicaly you take the lid off and scoop it out - lovely! You will need to find out if your fosse has or will have one. Turning to the fosse itself the size is important and what condition it was in when you took over the property if you are not having it installed. Normally it should not require emptying for three to four years. They only really need to be emptied at the point when they stop working properly. You could ask the vendors to have it emptied. Depending on the type of fosse(and there are several types) it may never need emptying. You may need to check the weeper drains from time to time where the cleanish water flows out of the fosse and then is dispersed along a normally herringbone or rectangular patterns of drains. You will also have to find the small circular inspection hatches for the weeper drains. I managed to set one of mine on fire by putting a bonfire on it! If it is the latest sand filter type again it may never need emptying. Finding out what type it is is the problem. In France everything including the hatches for the fosse and the bac a graisse tend to be buried under soil. If you can't find yours the mairie should have the original application, plans and the name of the installer. Check with the installer as he may have changed his plans on the type of fosse when he dug down. Mine did on the second house where I put one in because he found pure sand. The previous owners may have taken photos so ask them. If you are putting in a fosse take photos and hang onto them. It is surprisingly annoying when you have been digging for a while and you can't locate the exact position of the hatches

This site has plenty http://www.safer-garonne-perigord.com/ and if you haven't heard about them as yet it is as well to understand the role of SAFER (societe d'amenagement foncier et d'etablissement rural)in french farming as I think they may have to approve your farming enterprise. I know they have the opportunity to intervene in the sale of any farmland. Lots of info on the web about them. Bonne Chance

All the answers here sound very sensible and realistic. One other thing to consider is the time you actually have available to work if you have children. I would also think about the impact on your family relationships. As well as sitting down and using the spreadsheet for the finances it might be worth also working out realistically how much time you can each contribute to running the gites and part time work. I have observed that those who make a success of their gites tend to have either no children or their children have left home. Even then the childless couples tend to last around seven to ten years before they sell up because of the sheer hard work. Another important factor is the boy-girl split of the children and how well they get on together. The ideal is two well behaved girls who will happily play together for hours while their parents get on with things. The worst combination is a reckless older brother who can torment the younger children or lead them into danger. The peak time for visitors is when the children have school holidays. With a family of school age children a great deal of time needs to be expended on caring for the children and keeping them happy and safe, socialising with other families with children and the sheer volume of washing, cleaning and cooking that a family demands. Some families I know running gites have children who dislike having the visitors around. Adding in the demands of a major renovation to getting the gites up and running can break some families either the children or the marriage suffers as a result. One partner usually the husband putting in long hours with the renovation while the other ususally the wife looks after the children and feels that her time is just spent on routine household tasks. One or the other may actually be homesick, miss family and friends and even miss the structure and regular change of scene that their job in the UK gave them. It is worth thinking and talking about these potential pitfalls and working out if realistically at this time in your life you can give the time that a gite complex demands. The availability of free or low cost full time nursery care if you have very young children in the commune that you buy in will also be important and the Mairie will give you information on this. Fortunately France is generally better provided with this than England. Bonne Chance

My daughter was aged 9 years and 9 months when we arrived. She had the additional problem of being an only child in France as her older siblings had all left home or stayed at shcool in England. There was a positive benefit for her in that I have always worked and I din't work in France so unlike her life in England I was always there to take her to and from school. The kids need a positive reason for the move as it is tough for them. Of course children are flexible and will eventually adapt. If for example you can have pets you couldn't have in england or a bigger garden this all helps. Initially her French was slow to come largely because she came home for lunch as part of settling her in. As soon as she chose to stay to lunch her french improved rapidly. We both had one to one french lessons once a week for about 5 months which also helped her. We arrived in January 02 and by the following April of this year she was pretty fluent and making friends and getting invited to tea. By the time we left (we moved back to the UK in July this year after 18 months) she was very well integrated with french friends. However, she chose to go to secondary school in England as she didn't like being a foreigner at school. She has settled very well back into school in England and as a bonus her French teacher has said she can take GCSE Franch this year at age 11. In my view 9 is a good age to make the move as a 9 year old won't forget her english whereas much younger children will.

The first step is to inform the DSS in Newcastle that you are moving to France. They will then send you a form to fill in and a booklet about claiming child benefit abroad. The purpose of the form is to determine whether or not they should continue to pay you UK child benefit. You need a certificate from them to say that they have ceased to pay UK child benefit before you can claim in France. I am at this first stage myself and I am awaiting the certificate. The booklet seems to imply that you can still have UK child benefit or opt for French child benefit if it is higher. I will add more as I find out!

Further bit of info there are three support groups for women having babies in the Paris area who I am sure will be able to help they are under support at http://www.expataccess.com/france/SocialClubs.shtml

Further bit of info there are three support groups for women having babies in the Paris area who I am sure will be able to help they are under support at http://www.expataccess.com/france/SocialClubs.shtml

There is some info at expat info they have a special page on having a baby: http://www.expataccess.com/france/HaveBaby.shtml I would advise you even if you are not going to be living anywhere near Paris to find out if there is a branch of the National Childbirth Trust there. Some years ago I had a baby in a French hospital in Brussels and the NCT Brussels were a mine of info. The NCT in London can probably tell you of any branches in France and you can contact them by phone. Perhaps also buy a Having a Baby Book and magazines in French they will also give info. and some vocab. I have a list of French vocab for attending the ante natal clinic and the delivery and post partum. If you require it put a post on and I will get it to you. Be prepared for different practices at the ante natal clinic and the relaxation classes which are totally different to the UK. Needless to say a lot of emphasis is placed upon recovery of the figure after birth. ( Sadly it didn't work in my case). At the clinic you may be referred to by your maiden name even if married. In case the baby is early be totally geared up from an early stage to having the means to prove that you can pay when you arrive at the hopsotal in labour. This means that your birth companion will have to be ready for production of correct papers, health insurance /mutuelle details, ID etc. Hope all goes well!

There is some info at expat info they have a special page on having a baby: http://www.expataccess.com/france/HaveBaby.shtml I would advise you even if you are not going to be living anywhere near Paris to find out if there is a branch of the National Childbirth Trust there. Some years ago I had a baby in a French hospital in Brussels and the NCT Brussels were a mine of info. The NCT in London can probably tell you of any branches in France and you can contact them by phone. Perhaps also buy a Having a Baby Book and magazines in French they will also give info. and some vocab. I have a list of French vocab for attending the ante natal clinic and the delivery and post partum. If you require it put a post on and I will get it to you. Be prepared for different practices at the ante natal clinic and the relaxation classes which are totally different to the UK. Needless to say a lot of emphasis is placed upon recovery of the figure after birth. ( Sadly it didn't work in my case). At the clinic you may be referred to by your maiden name even if married. In case the baby is early be totally geared up from an early stage to having the means to prove that you can pay when you arrive at the hopsotal in labour. This means that your birth companion will have to be ready for production of correct papers, health insurance /mutuelle details, ID etc. Hope all goes well!

Does anybody know if any areas in France particularly the Limousin/ Dordogne borders have a problem with radon gas accumulating in properties and presenting a health hazard as in parts of the West Country in the UK. I ask because part of our French property is built directly onto granite type rock and our basement is chiselled out of the rock. Has anybody any knowledge of a French web site with this info? I have done a search but not found much of relevance. I will ask at the Marie of course.