chris & anne jackson

Winter into Spring 2012

In these pages, we hope to show you, the reader, a little of our lifestyle in rural France, what we have, and what us attracted to come here, and what we found and what we enjoy.

If your are reading this in the month of February, then you may have also been concerned about the cold weather. Unusually for the Creuse, the low temperatures are well below the seasonal normal. For the last week, temperatures of -15C have been recorded, and we have that and uto 40 cms. of snow. Hopefully this trend will end next weekend with temperatures just about hitting positive for the first time in a month. Considering we were in the garden in January, preparing the new vegetable bed for the Spring. We are saying "Enough already, bring on the spring!"

We have been resident for over four years in the Departement of la Creuse, which is one of the three departments of the Limousin. Limousin consists of Haute-Vienne, Creuse and Correze. The capital of the region is the well known city of Limoges, famous for its porcelain.

We are 340 kilometres south of Paris, on the plateau de Millevaches (trad: thousand sources), which is in turn part of the lower slopes of the Massif Central. Our principal town is Guéret 50 kilometres to the north. The commune in which we live is Royère de Vassivière, one of 260 communes in the departement. Royère has a population of around 500 people, scattered around several hamlets and the bourg. Royère and nearby Bourganeuf, our nearest town are situated in the south west of the Creuse. Royère is also a chef-lieu of a canton of several communes, that border the neighbouring departement of Haute-Vienne.