We are Martin, Amanda and Andrew (the grown-ups) Robyn and Alex (the not so grown-ups) and our leopard spotted Bengal cat, Amber (quite the delinquent).

Maybe it was our mid-life crisis, maybe it was working all the hours we could, totally caught up in the rat race, (Martin was a CNC Programmer/Engineer and Amanda a Human Resources Manager for a large teaching NHS Trust), who knows, but we decided to leave England and take a step back. Having always loved France, we felt that this is where we would like to make our home.

We've only a few small obstacles to overcome, like learning the language, making a little money go a very, very long way and becoming expert jack-of-all trades in a very short timescale while getting our luxury apartment in the 17th century wing of the Chateau up and running for the end of May 2006.

We plan, for our amusement (and no doubt your amusement too) to have regular updates, so please tune in from time to time to see how we get on.