Have you been affected by les blocages where you live?

[mint]

Unusually, I haven't been near the shops for about a week.  Went today and found that half of the shelves in Lidl were empty.  In particular, hardly any fresh produce to be had.  For example, no potatoes, no lettuces, tomatoes, etc..

Then called in at Aldi and bought all the fresh stuff I needed.  The manager told me I was lucky today as he'd had a delivery yesterday.  Said he had a colleague (I think he meant another branch elsewhere) who had not taken delivery of anything.

Just wondering have les blocages had an impact on your life?

Have you bought more food and other things than normal "just in case" and, if so, do you feel anti-social and guilty about it?  My answer is yes and yes......aaahhhh!!

 

[NormanH]

https://www.midilibre.fr/2018/11/20/beziers-le-smur-prive-de-carburant-a-cause-du-blocage-des-gilets-jaunes,4870219.php

[richard51]

Certainly beggars can't be choosers Sweetie, but

1. We actually find Aldi veg in our french area rather naff. Is Lidl same? Or is fresh delivery OK?

2. Are your fellow ramblers etc having the same problem or are they the yellow jackets?

NB Aldi is super for most things in France and UK but larger ones have more varieties.

NB2 For several years we have used Aldi for buying wine for the return journey. This year we have found the offerings are pretty much from the same suppliers as previous years and, to be frank, not as good quality as equivalently priced wine from other supermarkets.

Confit du canard 4/5 tins, whilst still being cheap cf other places has crept up to 10 euros.

NB3 We really find it bizarre that for a wine growing region there is so much very expensive wine bottles on the supermarket shelves. Are they that much better?

I'm sure that normal delivery service will be restored soon. Yellow jackets have to eat too, as brother WB will confirm.

[suein56]

We have .. as we live in an area with lots of roundabouts .. and no way of avoiding them as small roads have been blocked up over the years .. reducing potential accidents (according to the highways authority).

Monday morning OH couldn't get to his 9am French lesson, about 25 kms from us, as there were significant blockages at each roundabout. He finally gave up and returned home .. no hope of making progress .. so his lesson was missed.

Today after giving my English lesson (locally) I made a visit to a local supermarket .. to find notices on the doors apologising for the lack of produce .. both fresh and prepacked due to blockages.

Then people queueing (in November, at the seaside !) to buy petrol/diesel .. looks like low-key panic buying to me.

[woolybanana]

Quite a bit of activity, I am told, round the motorway, Boulogne was blocaded which meant fisherman’s catches were lost, right in the middle of the herring season. Calais kept clear by the gendarmes.

Otherwise giletsjaunes on roundabouts but closely wAtched by the boys in blue. The roundabout chosen because it was near a nice little bar, I suspect.

Bad in Belgium, oil tankers burnt and oil storage depot shut off, but by flying French pickets in a coach.

[woolybanana]

For those of you like dickduck who are affected by blockages, either cascara or senna will get things moving again, so I am told.?

[Lehaut]

Youngest had his bus cancelled to get back to Uni on Sunday, took him to the train station instead, two blockages within 200 meters. I got out of the car and asked the man stopping me at the second one if he thought he had the right to interupt my son's education by making him miss his train. He opened up the barrier.

[cajal]

Autoroute travel in our area has become 'gratuit' as the exit barriers at the peage are permanantly raised and a representative of the 'gilet jaune' collects the ticket, presumably to pass on to Macron to enable the companies who operate the autoroutes to reclaim the fee.

[Judith]

If we had travelled on Saturday in one direction, we would have been affected, they blocked a cross-over roundabout, happily the other way, and the way we went, was OK.  Have not bothered travelling other than for medical appointments this week, and shopping, but that is "across the way".  But the shelves of fresh foods were severely depleted, no deliveries, and I understand that the weekly market was poorly attended by punters and sellers alike (I had a medical appt, so did not go). I passed the nearest fuel station on Monday afternoon, queues, so gave up.  Tuesday lunch time, on the way back from second medical appt, I tried again.  No queues, but no diesel which explained that one!  However, it was petrol I needed, which they still had, so happy bunny here!

They seem to be still blocking some roundabouts now, on routes mainly used by heavy goods, and where there are "crossings" plus the airport exits from motorways and rocades.  I do not think the blocquages now are the same as Saturday, they have become violent intimidations rather than peaceful demonstrations, so they no longer have my support.  One day to disrupt the journeys of those they are supposed to be helping is one thing, what is happening now is totally out of order, even here in France.

I do hear that many people have been much affected around here though, especially those who need to travel to the cities and airports. 

[idun]

 I know that there have been some 'manifs' over the last few years, but this feels like the biggest in donkey's years.

Have any of you lived through the wagon driver's strikes that we had. We just got on with it, but they made life very complicated.

[mint]

If emergency vehicles (NH's contribution) cannot do their job, those gilets jaunes are soon going to lose the public's support.  Nastiness and stupidity will not be rewarded.

Hope my VSL for 2 hospital appts can manage to get me there next week.  Yikes, as you see, I have very quickly developed a siege mentality......[:-))]

[alittlebitfrench]

Nothing happening around here.

Good job really as I would not be very polite if I got stuck.

Seems to be happening mostly in rural France. LOL

La Chasse and the Gilets Jaunes.

I think I will give rural France a miss. (Insert winking yellow thing)

[NickP]

On our way to Tours today, we came across some protesters at the Chateau Renault roundabout. Nothing untoward was going on and they looked quite friendly, so I gave them a toot and a thumbs up as we slowed down at the roundabout, in return they offered us biscuits, nice touch.

[suein56]

Double post .. somehow .. don't know why that happened.

[suein56]

ALBF wrote : Seems to be happening mostly in rural France. LOL

No nothing here in our bit of land stuck out in the sea .. but many important roundabouts and major petrol stations blockaded in our nearest big conurbation .. through which, or around which, all traffic has to flow.

[Gardian]

I steered clear of our biggish local town (popn 30,000) last weekend when seemingly things were quite difficult. During the week, its been fine, with no ‘gj’ activity. Fuel was a problem if you needed it (I was OK), but that problem seems now to have stabilised.

Today though, I was heading to the hospital and came round a corner to find the roundabout 100m away in a mass of yellow! I thought about doing a quick 180, but was beckoned forward by one of the blokes. So I did.

Window down and was addressed in a quite friendly manner by this somewhat ‘salty dude’. “Where are you going?” Now normally, this would elicit from me something along the lines of “Booger off and mind your own business”, but (unusually for me) I instinctively felt that discretion was the better part of valour. I told him where I was headed and with that slightly charming nosey-ness of the French, he wanted to know why. I gave him the full sp and he waved me on with a “Bon courage”.

There were probably 200 of them there, most of whom were tucking in to grillade from a massive bbq on the central reservation.

No gendarmerie nor local police around and in truth not many other drivers.

BTW, I read in today’s paper that the price of crude has dropped by 30% over the last 3 months. The price of fuel at the pump has gone the other way. Maybe ‘les gilets jaunes’ have a point.

[mint]

Yes, they do have a point and even the more widespread disenchantment (beyond merely the price of carburant) is valid enough.  However, without any sort of organisation, I believe it will all fizzle out.

[alittlebitfrench]

It will never fizzle out Minty.

The disenchantment in France will always remain regardless who is power.

It will manifest itself in another strike next year and the year after that.

Nothing will change.

This is not Macrons fault. You got to feel sorry for the guy because he is trying fix things.

[mint]

I don't mean the disenchantment will fizzle out, ALBF.  I mean that this particular gilets jaunes thing will die the death.  Good as social media is,  they cannot carry on without any proper leadership driving things forward.

BTW, approval rating for Macron is now under 30%

[BritinBretagne]

That’s still higher than for ALBF.

[mint]

BinB, that's made me laugh!

[richard51]

Not quite according to forum rules and not even a swipe after another comment so not funny to me.

[Judith]

One of those interviewed today (BBC News, sorry, but it's what was on), said that they had been struggling with price hikes etc etc for 30 years, and I thought, well it's not all Macron's fault then, so why blame just him. 

[idun]

That is a rather odd statement about prices.

Personally I found it all going to 5h1t after the euro came in. I don't care what INSEE says, I know that money did not go as far as it did prior to the euro....... and all my french friends came to the same conclusion. Maybe we had all actually lived for too many years with steady prices, but that was what changed and that is not 30 years ago.

So I reckon they are wrong, life got harder in the last 20 years and people are struggling.

[alittlebitfrench]

Idun is right.

It all went downhill after the Euro.

My sister in law with her family earn lets say 2500 euros per month and they have to dig into there saving each month to survive. And the majority of families in France earn a lot less. I don't no how these people survive. Well they can't which is why they are protesting.

The cost of living in unsuitable in France. We hardly shop now on the high street. It is all amazon. We don't employ artisans as well now. Too expensive.

How many times do I say to those looking to move to move to France that France is too expensive. But they just look at the price of houses and think wow...look what I can get for my money. What does ALBF say...they are not cheap !!!

Another thing, if Brexit does go ahead then France will have to pay more to the EU in terms of budget. France can't afford so taxes will have to increase again.

Now that is going to be interesting. Also methinks, that could result in a backlash against the British in France.

It is going to get messy.

So in conclusion, methinks the EU and in particularly the Euro is partly responsible for all ths. Ironic innit.