The Moulin de Fontbouillant close to Monguyon is a fascinating site and we were very impressed with the one gite that has been completed. The style is an interesting mix of the latest minimalist fashions and restored antiques. We thought it had been done to a very high standard, a view endorsed by the entries in the Visitor's Book. It is a good thing that it is not our project, as Jack would have found great difficulty resisting being diverted into getting the water wheel working the electrical generator again.

The Mill has its own website, so to find out even more click here

It was lovely to meet "Dog", who features in the book and got on very well with our three dogs - and a new addition "Tiny", a miniature Dachshund with a big personality, that Eric found abandoned in a ditch as a three-week-old puppy.

Another very lucky resident is a Black Beauty look-alike trotting horse that they saved from slaughter in May. Eric and Louise were sitting having a coffee outside a cafe opposite the abattoir in the local town when they saw the terrified horse being brought in and being moved inexorably, with a consignment of pigs, along the pens to eventual slaughter. She had had an accident in which the trotting cart behind had overturned, slicing into her hind leg and she was of no further use to a her owner (who they subsequently found sends a horse a month for slaughter - nationally a third of all trotting horses are slaughtered each year when they don't win or get injured). Louise asked a vet friend to look at her and he said that as she was young she could be cured. They then entered into a concerted campaign to get the horse "redeemed" before the deadline for slaughter the following morning at 6am. Louise managed to cajole/charm the head of the Public Health in the Charente into calling for a stay of execution until 9am and agreeing that the horse could be bought for the price that the abattoir would have paid for its meat. The owner was extremely unpleasant about it all and couldn't understand why anyone would want to bother with the animal, which he saw just as a commodity. However, when they eventually agreed to pay over the odds for her, he sold her. Now she lives in the old mill stables, with lots of tender, loving care - although they are having to do a great deal of remedial work on her leg. Fortunately the vet charges the minimum. They are becoming known as gullible "rescuers" of needy animals and now have two more horses which have come to live with them in retirement!

When we spoke to Louise in mid-October 2002 we were very pleased to learn that the wound on the horse's leg is improving. We're sure that there is another book being hatched there...