Riberac

[Graye]

We have lived in Spain for five years but are about to go back to the UK.  On our way "home" we will be staying in Riberac for several months.
I need to know bits of general information and wonder if there is anyone who can help?
1) We will not have a phone at the house we are renting but we run an internet business.  Are there any places there with WiFi facilities?  If not are there any internet cafes in the town?
2) Can anyone direct me to a decent online town map?
3) We will have our two cats with us.  Can anyone recommend a good vet, preferably English or Spanish speaking as our French is going to take a few weeks to brush up.
4) What is the town like?  Are there plenty of restaurants and things to do, concerts, exhibitions and so on?  Bear in mind we have been living in the depths of Andalucia where the visiting ice-van, gas-bottle man or potato seller is the highlight of the week!

[opas]

Not wishing to be rude, but you know have internet connection, why not do a search on the town for your entertainment, restos and fetes.

I am sure that in the same search you  could find out if internet facilities are available.

 

[Graye]

If you so wish not to be rude, can I ask why you then proceed to be exactly that?  I thought the whole point of a forum was to spread knowledge and pass on information.  As I will have many more questions to ask over the next few weeks and as I have received very helpful information on other parts of this site I think I will just ignore you, Opas.  I suggest you do the same when you see my posts and we will get along just fine.

I have neither the time nor the patience to trawl around the internet on the offchance I might find snippets of information and would prefer recommendations direct from people in the know. This is the whole point of a forum I thought - or do you have some superior knowledge I'm missing?

[Danny]

Opas is not at all being rude. It takes just as long to post on this forum as it does to look online for a town map, in english, french or spanish. No one here is unhelpful, but why should they do basic tasks for you? For particular recommendations, etc then I am sure someone here is more than happy to help, but this is not a tourist office. That should be your first step.

Please feel free to ignore me too,

Jane

[Miki]

Hers's some stuff for you to look through:

http://www.riberac.fr/indexgb.html

http://www.tourisme.fr/office-de-tourisme/riberac.htm

Personally I found that Riberac has no real beauty itself and is mostly

known by the locals and Brits for its Friday market day. The area

around it is quite lovely but remember, it is in the south west of

France in the Dordogne and basically that will often mean tranquility and

little excitement !!

Last March we used an internet place based in a phone shop just off the market place

Can't see the point of wanting a map of Riberac just yet, a short drive around will soon

get you au fait with the town, well  until you can get a map from

the tourist office. A vet will be easy to find once in situ.

There are several restos in town and around, not sure about concerts and don't expect Mick and the boys to  play there [:)]

It is a small town, your best bet for some form of life is either Angouleme or Perigueux.

[Suze01]

Here's another website giving details of concerts and other whats-ons in the area:

http://www.valdedronne.com/fr/sommaire.php3

[KathyC]

[quote user="Graye"]

 

I have neither the time nor the patience to trawl around the internet on the offchance I might find snippets of information

[/quote]

This is one of the cheekiest replies I've ever seen. Don't you realise that many people "trawl around the internet" to answer questions asked. That's fine when helping people who can't do it, but for people who can't be bothered?

[Graye]

I'm sorry you find my reply to Opas cheeky.  I will take some time to elucidate because I  did not come on this site to either offend or to have people making unhelpful comments to genuine questions.  Perhaps you did not read my original post and his reply? That comment was aimed specifically at him in view of his "smart" response to someone who had asked some very polite questions and who, by the number of previous posts, was obviously new.  I genuinely do not have all day to trawl the internet.  As I explained,we run an internet business and this means I work a normal working week, nine to five, in front of a computer screen.  Once I have finished work I do not enjoy spending even more time using the computer.  However, prior to even coming on this forum I had spent some time trying to find what I did need and came up with nothing.
So to reiterate, I came on this forum to find out information because we will be spending several months living in France after living in Spain for five years.  I have no experience of life in France so the first thing I looked for was a forum.  The forum home page says that it is, to cut a long story short, aimed at discussing aspects of life in France.  Therefore I can see no problems with specifying the place we will stay, asking about the position with regard to internet cafes, a recommendation for a vet, an online town map or general confirmation that the town has such things as restaurants etc.  A tourist information office will no doubt fill me in on SOME of this information, although not all of it.  For instance could they actually recommend a vet?  Our tourist information office is open three afternoons a week - how do I know the one in Riberac will not be the same and it will be three or four days before I can even find it open?  I would however hope, if someone knew that this would be the case they would be so kind as to tell me.  I don't want anyone to actually plan our social lives, just to confirm the town is big enough to have restaurants and other cultural entertainment of some sort or other.  We are not a pair of twenty-somethings looking for the nearest disco for our two week annual holiday - we have lived in a very small village in inland Andalucia where eating out and general entertainment begins at 10pm.  I do know this is probably not the case in France as we have noticed every restaurant and bar firmly closed up at 9pm every time we drive through.  Would it be unreasonable to imagine someone might at least say no there are no restaurants there, or yes there are a few but they are all closed by "x" o'clock? I do realise the lifestyles are likely to be different but without asking I do not know how different they will be.
I am, and have been for a long time a member of a large and busy forum here in Andalucia which I'm sure you will find easily enough if you care to check for it. If someone came along asking for specific information like this I would ignore the post if I did not know the answer but if I did I would quite happily share any knowledge I had, down to directing that person to the Town Hall website (I can assure you they would not know where that is even if they had DAYS to find it) with a street map, telling them who my own vet is, with recommendation, his address and opening hours and also commenting on the local internet cafe or the free one in the local library.  I would probably recommend our local bar and suggest they called in for a drink while they were at it!  As I said, a person could look for days for specific information about the tiny village I live in and not find it online, especially if they do not speak Spanish.  What you would NOT find is people taking the time to reply to your post with rude remarks but contributing nothing.  If every time someone asked a question which is well within the remit of the forum and they are told to go and Google it there would be little point in having the forum in the first place.  We have people on the Andalucia site who see it as their job to come up with "smart aleck" comments.  I'm sure this keeps them amused and they are generally ignored in the same way that I intend to ignore people who make pointless comments on my posts.
I have received some very helpful replies from both this particular post and the two others I have made on this forum and I am extremely grateful to the people who took the time and trouble to find the information, pass it on to me and come up with other suggestions and recommendations.  No doubt I will have many more questions about what living in France, albeit it for only a few months (we will probably be there from mid-September to mid-January as we are waiting for a PET passport for one of our cats), will be like.  We both speak French but have mainly forgotten it after not using it for years and I know I will end up speaking a mangled mixture of Spanglish and French when we first arrive but we will do our best to integrate with the locals for the time we are here.  French people have always been pretty patient with us anyway and Spanish and French are not desperately disimilar so we will probably manage very well anyway.

So KathyC I hope I have at least managed to redeem myself a tiny bit?

[Miki]

I note you are now actually going to be in La Tour Blanche, much nearer

to Mareuil sur Belle for a vet than Villebois Lavalette, which is a

fair drive away but has the bonus of new resto which appears to be very

nice if their website is anything to go by. La Tour Blanche is a very

small commune and very quiet indeed.

You are fully aware that the eating times are miles out. I am

still  always amazed by the times many of the Spanish take lunch

and how much later they are for dinner than here in France. I lived in

Spain for long periods in the late 60's and early 70's and the cultures

are vastly different in many ways. Couldn't ever live in Spain again, a

month there in March didn't impress me, for many reasons but hey, we

are all different in our wants and needs.

[Graye]

Thank you for that Miki.  I do appreciate your input!  Yes, I did get the idea it will be a tiny place - in fact I looked on Google images and could see from an aerial view that there isn't a lot there.  No problems, we will enjoy ourselves no doubt and will look forward to finding the local towns and villages once we are settled in. The house we are renting has a substantial wood-burner so no doubt it can be cold there in the winter - something which often shocks people visiting us here too. I'd be interested to know what firewood is burnt there, we use olive wood but I doubt we will find that so far north.

Yes, Spain, particularly Andalucia does not have a lot to recommend it.  We are both glad to be leaving and are happy we had the good sense to keep a place in the UK - there are so many ex-pats down here who would secretly love to go home and can't. "A Place in the Sun" has a lot to answer for!

I'm sure we will soon work out the hours etc although we have rather fallen into the Spanish habits for meal times.  It will do us good to try a new regime and I know the choice of food is so much better.  I've been a vegetarian for 30 years but have had to give in and start eating tuna and prawns as the only option here in restaurants is omelette (usually with ham as, of course, that isn't meat according to Spaniards).  Vegetarianism is an alien concept to many inland Spaniards.  After I explained this to one local he mulled it over for an hour or so, then whispered to my husband asking how I managed to be a reasonable well -endowed lady if I only ate lettuce.  Poor chap had no idea at all but you  have to love them.  We will not miss Spain one tiny bit but some of the locals are endearing when you take the time to get to know them.

Which reminds me, I have to find part of the site to enquire about the possibilities of shops selling Linda MacCartney etc.  Hope I can keep out of trouble!

[KathyC]

Sorry if you feel I overreacted, but I think you must agree that your comment about not having the time to do it yourself was not a good idea. I do think that people respond better when they feel that people have made a bit of an effort themselves. I also think that some people would have searched on the internet to find you a vet etc. rather than replying from their own direct experience.

By the way, what did you dislike so much about Spain? My husband and I battled over France v Spain for years. The fact that I post on this board is the clue to who won!

[Graye]

 Yes, you are probably right - I should have explained first that I had already looked and could find nothing useful.  Still, I feel better now!

I don't think there is any one thing I could say we particularly dislike about Spain.  It's a culmination of 5 years of little things.  There are now far too many Brits moving inland with the attitudes which might be appropriate to the Costas but which do not go down well in small villages. This includes insisting in bawling at waiters in English or running around wearing next to nothing all day.  Some Spanish are beginning to resent the Brits, sometimes justified and other times not.  This applies particularly to the youngsters who have large chips on their shoulders, because by and large the older folk are charming.  Bear in mind I am talking about inland Andalucia and things will be different in different parts.  There is a lot of corruption at Town Hall level and you can only deal with things sometimes by knowing the right people.  Thousands of acres of olive groves and orchards are being sold to throw up shodily-built off-plan homes (which are at the moment not selling), there is no consideration of the infrastructure needed to cater for these homes and in the meantime every inch of the villages are littered with building cranes, dust and dirt.  It is rather a grubby nation on the whole; they produce more rubbish per capita than anywhere else in Europe and they think nothing of dumping at the roadside.  It is absolutely sweltering in summer and freezing in winter too. Saying please and thank you is seen as rather offensive. This confuses Brits no end given that we sprinkle these two comments everywhere - partly from politeness and partly from habit.  Add to that their attitude to animals and I could go on and on...  There are good sides to Spain too but I think, for us the bad outweighs the good.  Seeing things such as the Alhambra in Granada or the Mesquita in Cordoba are amazing but cities, other than Madrid and Malaga, are not attractive either. 

We have loved the cleanliness and serenity of France when we drive through. We like the food and when we remember to get to the restaurants at a sensible time we enjoy eating out there.  Generally speaking the French people we have met have been charming although a bit bemused by people in a Spanish registered car speaking to them in dire French with English accents.  I for one CANNOT stop myself saying "Si, vale" (which roughly translated means, "Yes, OK") when I should be saying "Oui, merci". I'm sure we may well be arriving with rosy-coloured specs and find it is not all we expect but after five years here I'm also sure we can handle it. I think you probably made a very wise choice.  I know when we buy abroad again it will not be Spain but perhaps we would consider France too.

[opas]

He is a She! I have a profile which I took time to complete.

[Graye]

Miki, after some toing and froing with our new landlady we have established that the house is actually in Mareuil sur Belle after all.  Apparently she way being coy about it's exact location - something to do with estate agents etc.  I know you mentioned this town anyway so is the vet you could recommend actually there?  It would be great if that was the case!  I feel I am going back to the drawing board every few hours, first Riberac, then La Tour Blanche, now Mareuil sur Belle... Anyway she is now pretty confident that it is there and I can actually see the house on an aerial view of the town so I feel reasonably happy that we now have the proper location. 

[montagrier]

Jesus.... what a set to...  glad she wasnt heading for timbucktoo..

[Tresco]

Oh Come on. [8-)]

Montagrier isn't that far from Montagrier (I'm making a big assumption that your user name means something

You probably know (and can fin out) more than I do about that general area.[:D]

[opas]

deleted post.

[Miki]

Mareuil is a sleepy little town, slightly larger than La Tour Blanche.

The Vet, from what I can remember, is on the edge of the town. Anyone

will be able to tell you where it is. The Vet may have changed, so I

can only say it was a good practice, what it is like now, you will have

to hope someone else will let you know. There are quite a few Brits in

and around that area, so I am sure one of them will be able to help you

in that respect. Do try the vinnery of  Jean Paul Besse for your

wines. He is opposite the post office and supermarket in the centre of

town. He and the staff are a mine of info.