T Stands for The Evacuation...and Wanderlust!

Hi everyone, this time last week I would have thought the last thing to occur to a couple living in a first floor apartment would be to be evacuated because of danger of flood!

Last Wednesday evening we watched the local news and heard that the nearby river levels were getting very high. About 30 minutes later one of our managers came to our door and asked us to prepare an overnight bag - just in case! 

At this time it had been raining heavily for two days but had stopped. We didn't ask any further questions and when she had gone had a little laugh about it not being very likely that any water would even reach our complex let alone the 1st floor!

About 30 minutes later we looked out to see snow, real big flake snow that was settling - exciting and beautiful and later in the evening we went from window to window taking photos!

The last photo taken was at 10.42pm and then we settled to watch one of our favourite programmes.

Just after 11.00pm our intercom system crackled into life and it was the voice of the manager (never usually around in the evenings) with the announcement that she regrets to tell us that the police had advised that we leave and to await further instructions - we have a small carpark and it would have jammed very quickly. We hadn't been told where we might go so when another Duty Manager came to our door we asked...there were two alternatives - a community centre where they were evacuating most of the village or to go to relatives....

A quick assessment by us both - one son starts work very early, another lives out of area and the other although officially in area was farther away! We gave our middle son a ring - fortunately still up and he told us to come along!

Our car, not used for ages, thankfully started first time and we set off out of the gate onto slippery snow. When we got to the main road gritters had been out. We had seen lots of police cars and police on foot going from door to door in the village. 

As we got on the motorway we saw a sign informing us that the motorway was closed from the junction before we wanted to get off. 

I got my phone out to find a detour route and then we had to stop, of course, lots of other vehicles were queuing to get off! We soon found our way to some familiar roads and finally reached our son's house!

He had set a bed up for himself in the living room and changed his bedlinen so that we could use his bed! By this time it was around 1.00am.

He had to leave to get to the school where he is working with key workers children by 8.20a.m so we didn't see much of him. Classroom assistants are in school while the teachers teach from home - he also has to use the computer to help the children at home.

This was our bedroom view

I was surprised to see how tall the stems on his Yucca plant had grown, but since then have noticed that some in a nearby garden have also grown.

We realised that we hadn't actually visited his home since we left our caravan!

We both had appointments for blood tests at midday and I rang to try and change them only to find that there was nothing else until 15th March so decided to drive back for them and hope that we were safe to return to our apartment!

One happy event to come out of our visit was the chance to chat with my Granddaughter...from a distance...before we left! Missed seeing my Grandson though, he doesn't get up very early apparently!!!

We reflected afterwards that we deliberately avoided visiting family all year but then ended up...with a more dangerous strain of Covid19 around...having a sleepover!!!

Since then we have caught up on sleep and we definitely appreciate the safety of our apartment!

We have completed another Wanderlust class together - which included making self portraits. Another few afternoons of laughter and enjoyment!

I used my word for this year. I used part of a map of France and a sugar wrapper from a cafe in Paris on my background 

Hubby chose one he felt appropriate  - I teased him that he wanted to give himself more hair! He used some Lion's eyes from a napkin in his background

As I am here to join Bleubeard and Elizabeth for T Stands For Tuesday I have a new drink we tried - Kefir fruit drink.

It was bit gloopy for me and I added some milk, but very tasty - we have bought more!

We also had more snow...

...but I still have some sunshine for you!

This was from when we went to Carcassonne in 2017 - we went for a day trip to Narbonne (I showed the cafe here the other week) This was by the Canal du Midi.

Thanks for looking, Chris