Cycling is out of the question for the next couple of days, since the summer weather of last week has returned to winter weather – very unfortunate because today our first holidaymakers of 2007 arrived.

They might not have expected tropical sunshine, but rain, hail, and a howling gale straight from the north pole probably wasn’t quite what they hoped for either.

Mrs B is always laughing at me and my fellow cyclists because we complain about a bit of a slight breeze, but even she agrees that 80kmh winds make the going a bit difficult.

Last time I was out cycling I got stuck behind a curious convoy – I think someone was having a village delivered because there was a long convoy of lorries each of which was carrying a more or less complete house. Upmarket chalets I suppose, but it was quite entertaining to see it being driven along the road.

Especially amusing was the queue of white vans being driven by french artisans desperate to get home for lunch, stuck behind this enormous convoy without the slightest possibility of overtaking. It made quite a good windbreak for me on my bike though.

Speaking of which we know someone here who was celebrating buying a mobile home for only a few hundred euros, until they discovered it would cost another 1000 euros to transport it the few kilometres to their house. Money not being something to throw around in these parts, they have said they are going to move it themselves, dragged behind an old transit van.

Well, this fully equipped mobile home weighs about three tonnes, and there is a steep downhill stretch on the way to their house, so I strongly advise you to avoid that particular route on moving day. Unless you have a video camera and fancy making a couple of hundred of euros selling a video of a particularly amusing incident to your local ‘video gags’ programme, showing a little white van being overtaken by a large runaway mobile home.

There is an alternative route, quite level, between the start and finish properties, but that one crosses a narrow bridge and then passes around a tight corner betwen houses squeezed against the edge of the road. Which route will they choose, I can hardly wait to see. Pictures to follow in a couple of weeks.