It was hot overnight, and not great sleeping weather, so I got up early and did some work on planning permit research for our new house at Taggerty, trying to answer some of the questions posed to us by the planning officers at the Shire Council after we submitted our application. After a few hours, I had done as much as I could, so I emailed them my responses and will now wait for their response. I then watched the replay of the AFL game against the Fremantle Dockers, the only game we have won convincingly all year, 100-48.

In the afternoon, we drove out to Auvillar where Rita wanted to see an Art Expo. But when we got there, all was quiet. Enquiries at the Tourism Office showed that it was held last weekend, but had been held on this date, August 4th, last year. Close, but no cigar.

In the late afternoon, we drove across to Saint Antonin Noble Val, where Rita was playing with Valerie and a bunch of others at a traditional ball. The evening started well with some local Ratz artisan beers.

It turned out that this group of musicians had mostly not played together before, but had been at a workshop in St Antonin for the previous week, and this was their chance to pull it all together. So they spent about 40 minutes on a sound check and getting to know each other musically, before the dancers arrived. While they were doing this, I went for a walk around town and got this photo of the moon rising over the cliffs on the other side of the Aveyron River,

I also got this shot of the donkeys going home, after a busy day taking kids for rides around St Antonin.

Soon the musicians were ready and the first dancers took to the floor.

Rita mostly played on her big flute, while for this number Valerie was playing the spoons on her knees.

The group also intermingled a few Occitan songs into the instrumental menu.

After about half an hour the floor was full of dancers. This continued on for the next two hours until the band ran out of songs, then they played a few for the second time (nobody noticed) and then called it quits, and got stuck into their pizzas which had arrived two hours ago. All in all, a very enjoyable night for all.

Around 2330h, it was time to leave the last of the packing up to those who were staying locally, while we drove home to Moissac with Susie as an extra passenger. One thing I learned from this drive is that if it’s late and you’re already a bit tired, stay off the Motorway and use the secondary roads. The Motorway has a way of lulling you to sleep, with its gentle curves and high speeds, whereas the secondary roads keep you doing things and staying awake.