Smiley
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Posts posted by Smiley
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Hi Shelley, I regularly take my 3.5t wagon down to France and don't pay freight . I joined BF's home owner scheme( they ask what your carrying-private furniture etc isn't classed as freight) and with the 33% discount BF were as competitive as anyone on the Brittany routes. If it's Dover-Calais you want then Sea France Freight was the cheapest, but be warned VERY basic and unpleasant ship.
Good luck with your move.
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Thanks guys, I've passed on the info.
I know they have a max budget they wish to spend of around £250.00 for the week.
RobotPierre is the Forge gite available separately? This looks ideal for them.
Betmo can you give me your web-site/E-mail.
I am simply trying to pass this on to my clients and I will let them contact you directly.
Keep them coming
Thanks,
Tony
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Hi Mark, I pretty much agree with the rest, everyone has their own ideas of which part is best and it's all pretty good.
The climate can change dramatically the further south you are. I've been in the garden of my house in a T-shirt working one day and grabbing the thermals the next. The winter Ski season is relatively short and most resorts now extend them with snow machines. Best bet is to come down and maybe stop for a week in the North of the region and then in the South. Do a bit of touring. Try to narrow it down to a shortlist of what YOU want out of the area.
One thing I will guarantee you is that you won't be disappointed!!
Good luck with your plans
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Hi Helen, I'm going to my place at easter. If you can get them to me in the Mids before then I'll stick them on my truck for you. I don't have a lot of space but should be able to manage a few pictures etc. Can't take anything too big though I'm afarid.
Best wishes,
Tony
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Hi gang, I have a booking for my place in May 2007 from an Australian couple. They intend to fly to Pau Sat May 5th 2007, stay in a Gite near Pau till the 12th, then move on to my place in the Ariege.
They are having trouble finding a decent gite.
2 bedrooms required, 2-4 people variable at present (must be clean and tidy please- I'll be recommending you!)
If you can help let me know
Thanks,
Tony
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Hi gang, I have a booking for my place in May 2007 from an Australian couple. They intend to fly to Pau Sat May 5th 2007, stay in a Gite near Pau till the 12th, then move on to my place in the Ariege.
They are having trouble finding a decent gite.
2 bedrooms required, 2-4 people variable at present (must be clean and tidy please- I'll be recommending you!)
If you can help let me know
Thanks,
Tony
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Hello all, do any of you have a BnB at Pau?
I have an Australian coming to stay in my property in May 2007 and they are looking to stop one night in a BnB at Pau before driving down to my place.
Let me know if you can help.
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I know of someone who has done the trip from Falmouth to Majorca, St Tropez and Malta and back via the Canal du Midi over the past 35 years ( JamesG, Thumper!!) in a various yachts. He's in Benidorm at the moment but I'm sure he'd love to get in on this subject when he's back. He now lives just outside Carcassonne after falling in love with the area on his travels.
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I have just received a bill like this and as I don't speak French very well I punched the letter, explaining the reason for the bill, into my translator. It came up with this:
"Department of water and purification:
From the July 2005, The township of belesta delegated its expertise in water and purification in the SMDEA (Union Mixed Departmental of water and purification)
On this occasion, to get in conformity with the legislation, the township took a deliberation instituting a subscription purification of an amount of 50 euros for every subscriber indebted to purification.
This year, you received therefore:
An invoice to the first semester, including the following elements,:
- Subscription for water.
- Consumption of water (from the 01/04/2004 to 31/03/2005).
- Consumption purification (from the 01/04/2004 at 31/03/2005).
- The tax Adour-Garonne for withdrawal on the natural habitat.
- The countervalue Adour-Garonne for pollution.
- The FNDAE.
(this invoice is identical to those that you received before)
An invoice to the second term including:
Subscription purification."
Frankly I can't work out if it's a one off or an on-going thing,
If they didn't agree to it until July 2005 why invoice for 2004 ?
I'll pay it anyway and see what happens. I guess it's for drawing off water from the Garonne and purifying it but no-doubt someone may have a more detailed idea. [8-)][*-)]
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I've got myself sorted with a pool now, bought a surface 'Piscine en Bois' in a kit, just got to build it now.
Got a very good deal from http://www.maisonetconfort.com Very cheap delivery, 6.5m x 4.5m pool 4100 euros inc tax, del and all the accessories I need. Just have to see how good it is when I build it.
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Hello I am looking for a swimming pool supplier and installer in Ariege or Languedoc. Please e-mail me with any suggestions or just post them if you prefer.
Many thanks.
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Hello, I wonder if anyone out there knows of a good swimming pool supplier for Ariege. I am near Lavelanet and want to get a pool put in my house. I don't want to pay an extortionate amount and can't really have a sunken pool as I won't get a digger into the garden. I was thinking of the pools with wooden sides or alternatively above ground with a decking around it. I would prefer a fitted price rather than a supply only.
Pleas e-mail me if you have any ideas,
Many thanks,
Tony
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I'd recommend a matt tile, I don't know why but they seem to feel warmer to the touch. Laminate will expand and contract much more and won't take spillages any where near as well. I have just installed immitation slate floor tiles to our bathroom and just the warmth of the cental heating pipes keeps the floor warm ( I ripped out expensive 'waterproof' laminate that had only been down 2 years-it was rubbish) The tiles act like a storage radiator, absorb the heat and then stay at a comfortable temp. The matt finish makes them far less slippy. As for cleaning, the tiles are much easier
At the end of the day it's down to personal choice.
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Hi Pepsimax, We have a place in Belesta, 10 mins outside of Lavelanet on the Perpignan route.
www.midipyrenees.co.uk
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Hi BJSLIV, will this throw up major complications?
I pay all the bills through my UK accounts an all income will come to the UK, I have also paid out to renovate the property over the last 2 years.
Can I claim for furniture, renovating costs, the caretaker, gardener, electric and heating costs etc. etc?
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Hi there I wonder if anyone can help me.
I own a property in France which I purchased 2 years ago. I have been using it solely as a holiday home for my family. I got a lot of interest from family / friends that wanted to rent it and so I have decided to let it for some of the weeks to help cover the running costs. I plan to extend this beyond just family and friends and have started to advertise it. I live in the UK and will be receiving any payments in the UK. Obviously this will have to be declared over here for tax purposes. My Insurance broker is arranging international letting insurance for me so that's all covered. My question is do I need to declare anything to the French authorites, I am paying tax in my own EU country so I don't think that's a problem but is there any other legislation I don't know about?
Many thanks in advance.
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Well Arnold I've took your advice and stuck a dead weeks on e-bay, done it as a daily price as you recommended, I'll watch my hits and refferals with interest. I'll also see how the renkings go.
P.S. you can't put visit my website etc, it comes up as a violation.
Many thanks
www.midipyrenees.co.uk
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Hi Arnold, tell me then, how do you go about doing this? Should I put an ad on for a really quiet week ( I have a house to let) at a low price and hope that the cheap looking deal attracts people or do you just put it on at a 'buy now' price?
PS. getting referals already from www.ourgites.org.
Just looked at your site, you're not a million miles from our house. We often go to the beach at Canet Plages, It's on the D117 at Belesta, just inside the Midi-pyrenees border, so about an hour or so away from you.
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Thumper, thanks for that info, will look into it and try and learn something!
As for posters I agree with Arnold, although I'd say if you get 1% you'd be doing well. I have got friends and family to put brochures up anywhere they can and I've had just 1 enquiry and no bookings in 4 months from them.
The web site is definately a better method.
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Ok, point taken, maybe standing at the front of the queue complaining is not the way to do it and as I said in my previous posting, we should read the Terms and Conditions but we're not all perfect.
As sharing weight has been a standard procedure with all airlines it will catch people out. I fully accept the 15 Kg rule and understand this-less weight, cheaper flights, no problem. What I can't understand is WHY no pooling, it would seem to work against them not for them.
As for using some one else - I do.
The problem is not unique to Ryan Air and please don't think I'm singling them out. The previous incident with the fishing rods was with Flybe, I had the terms and conditions with me, which I printed at the time of booking, and they did not mention additional charges. The check in girl sent me to customer services but all they said was that they were now posted on the web site. I'd have to pay and appeal later.
On another airline I travelled on people were being told they could not fly because they had sold the seats twice, again common practice, as airlines expect so many people not to turn up. If they do tough luck. Is this fair?
That is why I feel that many of these budget companies change the rules so frequently. They have to make the money up somehow. This does leave a bitter taste though.
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[quote user="Croixblanches"]
Am not "bitching", as I don't think this will ever affect me in any negative way. I invariably travel alone if flying, and after spending most of my working life on planes I learned how to do a 2-week business trip to Africa on hand luggage many years ago. If someone's prepared to fly me to France, or anywhere I want to go, for less than it costs me to fill up my car with a tank of petrol, then I'm prepared to put up with a fair amount before I start to ask if it's worth it.[;)]
However, am I being dense or isn't it true that if you can't pool your baggage allowance the chances of this saving weight (and hence fuel) for the airline are minimal?? After all, if you have 1 suitcase (say it weighs 2-3 Kg: I've no idea of the weight of an empty suitcase) plus 28Kg of clothes for 2 people, that's 30Kg. You might even take less than this because you can't physically get 28Kg of clothes into your big suitcase, hence by sharing a case you are actually forced to take less and reduce the amount of weight carried by the airline. I'm fairly convinced that 2 suitcases (even if smaller/empty) will have a combined weight of MORE than 1 suitcase, so logically this will increase the total by a small amount. On top of this, let's factor in human nature, which says that whilst you might sacrifice a bit in order to cram all your belongings into a shared suitcase, you'll take that extra jumper/pair of trousers if you are having to pack a separate suitcase and it's not quite full. Where this does begin to take the p*** is that the "main" baggage allowance is slowly being eroded from the 20Kg that most scheduled carriers allow for a normal tourist class baggage allowance.
Smiley, loved your post, even the bit I misread (at least I think I misread: did you mean that your kids were likely to have aged 9 years whilst scenarios 1 and 2 played out? I know I often felt like I'd aged by at least that much when flying with my kids!![:)].) Not sure that making a fuss at checkin with the budget airlines is always a good idea..........anything which delays their schedules is usually dealt with by them bumping you off the flight altogether!![/quote]
CROIXBLANCHES - NOT IF YOU'RE AT THE FRONT OF THE QUEUE!!!
The kids only aged 9 yrs -I aged 20!!!
These are some of the shirty things that airlines try to do to you. If you turn up on time, or before time , it's very hard for them to kick you off the flight. If people treat me right I don't get stroppy with them but when you've got kids your stress levels go up anyway. Thankfully these days my big kids don't want to holiday with us (we're boring and the village hasn't got any night clubs etc.) so they do their own thing-normally Spain or Greece. but when they were younger it was hard work. The last thing you need is someone trying to screw more money out of you.
As for the logistics of number of suitcases over weight, I'll bet they don't enforce it in the summer months when their holds can't take 300+ suitcases, regardless of weight! Imagine the extra work for baggage handlers and packing staff.
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Let's follow better scenarios, one that I can relate to. You've got 4 kids, travelling abroad they are 6 months, 7yrs, 11yrs and 13yrs in ages, you and your partner , stressed with making sure the kids stay together , get to the check-in:
Scenario1
You are told by some over made-up wannabe air hostess that your 3 suitcases (between 6 of you) are overweight because you can't share your allowance. So you pay the excess luggage fee. While you are arguing the toss, your kids are wandering about the check-in area bored stupid. Either you or your wife are trying to keep control. You have to find the right Credit card or cash to put the excess (that you shouldn't have to pay) on, while other people behind you are tutting and moaning that you are keeping them waiting. (IF YOU HAVE A CREDIT CARD OR CASH ON YOU) - GREAT START TO THE HOLIDAY
Scenario 2
You turn up at the airport, having read the rules, and have 6 suitcases, spread correctly for the journey. What do you do when you land at the other end (already stressed from making sure you stay together)?? Because IF you can get a taxi to take 6 people they certainly won't be able to take 6 suitcases +hand luggage so you'll have to split up again. OR if you've hired a car to take 6, again it won't take the luggage. These companies have worked out all these scenario's.- That's why I drive if the kids are with us.
P.S. they're now 21, 19, 15 and 8
This is just a con aimed at the people who need cheap flights the most. We must keep complaining about this. (This is not a Brit thing). The best time to complain is at check-in. The time when airlines can least afford the delays and when you cause them most embarassment.
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Previously if a husband and wife travelled together they could take 1 suitacase no problem, I have done it myself with my case weighing 25 Kilo's, no problems.
If you are entitled to 15 kilo's each, and can pool your weights, then that's fine but under the new ruling you'd get charged.
If, like most people you just book without reading the small-print you would now get fined the excess baggage. I think you are right Baz, it is just a way to snare unsuspecting travellers.
For years I used to go fishing in spain, my rods would go through as normal luggage provided I stayed within the weight restrictions, suddenly they are now classed as ski's, we got caught out last time we flew and got charged £25.00 each person each way.
I know we should read the small-print but this is how they make up the difference.
As for complaining if we don't do it, we get ripped off even more. If you think the Brit's are bad you should see what the yanks would do. Why should they get away with this kind of scamming. It does work too, when speedferries started charging fuel surcharges at the docks it caused mayhem wiyh complaints. The MD eventually issued a grovelling appology and has vowed never to let it happen again.
Would you just prefer to be ripped off on every occasion John?
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Chezshells, I agree with thumper but I would have charged up front and then rebated on completion of the other sites.
I know this thread will make strange writing but we got an e_mail before you amended your posting!
Thumper, with regard to your posting spell it out in Dummies language for me will you. I post my link wherever I can in the hope of bumping the search engines, are you saying we should go for something like pay per click?
I am not fantastically genned up the way the searches work, that's why I get my web designer to do the optimising !!!
I do understand the concept of reciprocal linking though.
Where did you move to in SW France
in South West (Aquitaine, Midi-Pyrénées)
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A tiny hamlet with just 21 houses on the Sault plateau between Lavelanet, Ax and Quillan. It's a beautiful area.
Meduse
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Hi Meduse, whereabouts on the Plateau are you? I often tour round Espezel/Belcaire/Axat etc. Love watching the birds of Prey up there.