A castle and two children
episode one
The year-long journey
The morning of January 4th Jeff, Blake and I parked the car in front of the chateau. I was looking at Jeff’s sparkling eyes as we turned around to look at the building rising up behind the stone wall when I knew it. No more pitching, that spontaneous gasp coming from his heart only meant one thing:
—he was in.
Before opening the heavy wrought iron gates of Belebat, Monsieur Bertrand took us to see the lakes —yess! there are two lakes, bordered by two very narrow rivers in a 3ha plot of land across the road from the chateau walls. Although the picture wasn’t all that charming, the overgrown and rather empty landscape inspired a few ideas for the future.
The best part of visiting the lakes first, however, wasn’t imagining the two of us on a wooden dinghy boat calmly fishing on a sunny spring afternoon, no. the best part of it was the chateau’s majestic presence as we started walking back.
We couldn’t have crossed those gates any faster, even Blake was exited! On the other side of the stone walls that surrounds the property the scene was spectacular. We had all the information we needed to understand the property before we left London, but we missed one thing —big time, the scale of it.
There he was, right before our eyes. Grand. Abandoned. Silenced.
One fateful winter evening, back in 2003, a devastating fire ended up destroying the entire interior of the chateau -including the 16th century fireplaces, carvings and mouldings. The owners then replaced the damaged roof, reinstated the wooden beams and laid new concrete floors… but there were no interior walls, electrics or plumbing. No ceiling or flooring and there were some missing windows. In fact, what we had in front of us was nothing but a renaissance stone carcass.
We walked around the different outbuildings and explored the grounds. Everything was magnificent, open, quiet and peaceful. Apart from Blake walking through a bed of nettles that left him paralyzed, scared and in terrible pain, every corner of the property seamed just perfect.
We have driven back and forth between our pad in London and the Loire Valley many times, but a sequence of heavy silence followed by a stream of flickering ideas made that particular drive feel very short. However, it wasn’t all a restoration and landscaping affair. No, we also needed to come up with a plan (or two) to put together the required sum to buy that place to begin with. Now, although that was a whole lot of thinking to do, it was decided we will wait till march to hear what the next tax return has to say about our finances.
Back home there was another development waiting for us:
2 and 3 year old Tommy and Lucy.
After a year in the waiting room, we were finally getting kids! Could this be really happening? Are we actually going to start a family and pursue the fantasy of restoring a French chateau all in the same year? Really? HOW?
Well, one by one all the answers soon started to break through. HSBC was willing to lend us the money thanks to our long premier relationship with the bank and we have found a contractor that not only speaks good English, but also has the time to work with us —finding one that speaks English is not all that hard, but finding one available is a stroke of luck.
I will spend the following weeks drawing up floor plans and getting the kids bedroom ready. life is good folks!
…to be continue