Foreign Perspectives

Archive for the ‘Relocating’ Category

Yes, I know it’s not March 23rd, but on 2pm local time (1pm for you guys) on Tuesday March 23rd I will be in the hotel trade.

I’m flying over for the week to get the initial admin sorted out (registration with the chamber of commerce, the business bank account and the drinks license for a start). Probably flying back at the end of the week with a view to picking up the truck very shortly after that and doing the move.

Outside possibility of us driving over in the car & leaving Wendy there with me flying back for the truck.

Anyway, in theory we open very, very early in April (definitely before Easter!).

Arnold

Bonsoir mes amis:

I’m still too stupid to call it a day with the French courses so I am, of course, a month or so into L310.

Also, had a severe rush of blood to the head months ago and am in the final stages of buying a small hotel in the south of France. Yup, you read that right! Completion date was originally January 30th but, of course, it’s France so the actual completion will be March 23rd. Lots more on the hotel at www.mascamps.com or, if you don’t mind rubbish French, at www.mascamps.com/fr .

It’s about 15 minutes west of Perpignan (about an hour and a half north of Barcelona). If nothing else, all those French courses have at least been put to serious use though, laughably, hardly any of the existing customer base is French!

Anyway, what’s new with you guys? Haven’t heard from y’all in ages.

Arnold

Our move is starting to feel a whole lot like those telly ones.

Anyway, having arrived at the decision that we couldn’t go with the bank financing over the weekend we now find that there are “ways and means” in France. Net effect is that we think we are off though we’ll not know for sure `til tomorrow (Wednesday).

I will try never to complain about UK banks again! The French ones are unbelievably bad at administration which is how we ended up in the current mess.

Don’t let anybody claim my desk just yet though!

Arnold

21 days 2 months and 2 weeks, but who’s counting?

Anyway, slight update on the situation…

Seems that just about everything that can be signed for will be getting signed next Thursday morning. That means that I should be able to take over the hotel around 2 weeks after that (ie the 11th of March). However, due to the practicalities of moving over I’ll be shooting for the 18th instead.

Picked up another volunteer driver: TM As always, he’s gone into the project in extreme detail and has calculated that it’ll take 2 1/2 days driving each way in France so we’ll actually need about 11 days to do a round-trip.

Plan B (drive truck over next week full of furniture, then drive smaller truck over in a few weeks time) isn’t a runner: it’s getting on for £1000 for that option vs £200 for the plane + car option for next week. Seeing as it’s not much dearer to rent a slightly bigger truck and do the whole lot in one go, we’re planning on doing that.

However, there is the little problem of driving the truck back to NI after we’ve unloaded it in the south of France.

To get around this difficulty, I’d like to take along someone who could drive said truck (we’re not talking massive truck here: an ordinary driving license is more than enough) back after we’ve unloaded it. This would involve coming along with us on the ferry (probably Rosslare to Cherbourg, but possibly the Stranraer-Dover-Calais route), sharing driving down to the south of France, staying 2/3 days there and then driving back with an empty truck. In total, this would take around 8/9 days. This trip would probably take place in about 2 or 3 weeks time. To sweeten the pot, we’re throwing in a FREE weeks accommodation at Mas Camps at a time of your choosing (subject to availability, though, unlike most offers, we’ll get you fitted in if you give us enough notice).

Arnold