82:Hot, Hot, Hot! Voter Registration and Insurance updated

Welcome to the 82nd weekly post of our Baby Boomers Move to France blog.

We are into our 54th week in France 8/9-8/15/26 having spent 3 months in Duras and then roughly a month and a half in St Germaine de Confolens before settling in Chabanais.

We have been in our home in the village of Chabanais in the Charente department of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine Region of France since the middle of December 2025. You might remember that we actually closed on the house on Thanksgiving Day, but it took a couple of weeks to get fully moved in.

Our home in Chabanais, France

Things on the agenda this week:

• Apero/game night with the boys on Sunday night
• See about car service at Dacia dealership
• Veggie patch weeding
• Confolens festival
• Meet insurance agent in Confolens to finalize home insurance paperwork/car and mutuelle insurance
• Total solar eclipse and meteor showers (August 12 around 9:30pm for us)

Weather forecast:

Mostly cloudy for the week except for Thursday which has a forecasted high temp of 38C (100F). Overnight lows around 20C (68F). I can hardly wait for fall weather. hopefully our air conditioning project will be done by the end of this month. I’m not sure how much benefit we will get from it this year, but we will be ready if September is as hot as I remember last year was.

Why this Blog?

Long story short, we are Mark and Elizabeth Beiley, “Baby Boomers” that have moved from Venice, Florida to the beautiful French countryside as retirees. After a little over a year of planning and fretting we sold everything in Venice and made the move on 1 August 2025.

We publish a brief update of our adventures every Sunday to share our experiences, tips and mistakes.

If you are wondering what got into our head and inspired us to make the move, check out some of our earlier posts. Again, if you have questions about our adventure, drop your questions in the comment section below.

This Weeks Daily Update

Sunday: Nothing much going on, but we were looking forward to game night at “the boys” place.

Coffee in the coop then just chill for the day.

We did set up another shade sail to block morning sun from blinding us while we have our morning coffee in the coop. EB roughed it in and I put a couple of anchors in to finalize it. We decided not to get too carried away as we anticipate we might want to be able to move its location as the arc of the sun changes. WE will see how it goes over the next few weeks.

Russ invited us to their house for game night. Ron and Michelle couldn’t make it as they already had other plans. Maybe next time. All of the other neighbors were away as well so it was just the 5 of us and Rosie.

Of course, Russ had some heavy snacks already prepared so we all indulged in really good spicy meat balls, deviled eggs, watermelon and feta salad, cheese, sausage and cake and ice cream. The cake was a rich chocolate from Cafe Lillian. I think it is one of Ian’s specialties.

Damian treated us to one of his magic tricks. Man, I don’t know how he did it, but he had us mesmerized by one of his card tricks.

We talked about the boys’ upcoming cruise and unfortunately, they will be gone when Don, Cindy, Rhonda and Dan are visiting us.

We played a round of Cards Against Humanity and a round of Marbles and a fun game called Dixit. It is funny how different people have different house rules for games. All of the games and conversation was so much fun that we lost track of time, and we didn’t leave until after 22H (10PM). Luckily, I had my phone with me and could turn on the flashlight app as after 22h all the town streetlights are off and it gets pretty dark and quiet in town.

Monday: Cool morning with a little rain overnight but it warmed up quickly.

After coffee in the cocktail coop, we had a light breakfast and planned our day. EB was going to work in the veggie patch, and I was going to test my French language skill and see about an appointment for getting the car serviced. I’m still not comfortable talking on the phone so I went to the Dacia dealership in Confolens to talk face to face.

Woo-hoo! I did it, I managed to get an appointment for late September. I admit that my French wasn’t perfect and the lady at the dealership didn’t speak perfect English but we made it through and the car will get serviced in September. Not bad for a little old man.

Vacation Month

As usual August is the month for vacations in France so the Dacia dealership will be closed the rest of August. I guess I was lucky that they were open this morning. They have an opening during the first week of September, but EB and I will be on vacation then so late September it is.

Back home EB finished her French lesson and was working in the veggie patch. I got home in time to pull out a weed and have a beer in the coop with Elizabeth. Actually, I had a couple of beers and then headed in for a late lunch.

I got my DuoLingo French lesson in and practiced my banjo a little. I need to do that more often. I keep letting banjo practice slip and it is crazy because I really like it.

EB is reading a ton of books. I think it is about 3 to 1 (maybe 4 to 1) the number of books she reads as compared to me. When it is so hot outside, we tend to hibernate behind closed shutters and windows so the house stays cooler like a cave…..so reading it is!

EB’s cooking experiment

EB’s veggie patch is producing so many tomatoes that she has decided to learn how to stew tomatoes and make a sauce for chili. I’m sure glad that she did this experiment. The chili was delicious and she made enough for leftovers on Tuesday.

We tried a new game that Damian loaned us called Quarto. It will take us awhile to get used to it and decide if we like it.

Tuesday: EB volunteers at the CSF shop and I go to Saint Junien for a visit to Brico Depot and E.Leclerc and its hot as heck.

I went to Brico Depot hoping to find an outdoor fan that I could attached to the rafters of the cocktail coop. A little air circulation would make a big difference on these hot days. I didn’t find a fan, but I found an extension cord with an on/off switch, some insulation tubing for the new water line that Simon installed and a set of ratchet tie downs, so it wasn’t a wasted trip. I got home in time to join EB having a Stella.

The CSF shop had a REALLY great morning. They sold something like 175 euros worth of stuff. At 1 euro per item the ladies were pretty busy. EB said that one lady and her daughter bought most of it and they will resell it all online.

For us, our next task is to start planning our route for the drive to Aix les Bains in two weeks. It will be roughly a six hour drive as we will probably stop for lunch and give Rosie a break along the way. More on this later.

We took Rosie with us to Cafe des Sport. We sat with Julia and her friend from Australia at an outside table. I bought a bottle of Rose and shared it with the ladies and the conversation kept going. The ladies left and Stewart joined us. The weather cooled down a little so when we got home, we went up to the terrasse. Russ texted wanting to know if Chez Beiley was open. EB told him, “yep”. I filled the carafe with red and we talked politics and retirement accounts with Russ until the sun went down.

Wednesday: Cool in the morning but whew, it heated right up. Laundry day.

After coffee in the coop and a light breakfast EB had a little errand to run so I did my DuoLingo lesson.

We got the laundry going and hibernated in the house. EB got some reading in, and I practiced the banjo a little.

I’m working on getting our absentee voting ballots arranged. I need to get a full-size envelope to mail the documents.

French class was well attended once again. More French this week than English. We are all getting better bit by bit. It was uncomfortably hot in the classroom, but we all survived. After class Daine, Joel, Elizabeth and I went over to Cafe des Sport for a beer. Our Air Conditioning contractor just happened to be there, and he updated us on our AC project which is that the equipment is not in yet, so not looking good for installing BEFORE the family arrives. Fingers crossed that most of the heat waves are done when they are here 🙂 . Then Stewart joined us. I’m actually starting to understand his English even with his thick Scottish accent. Well, a little bit better.

Meteor showers

We left Cafe des Sport with a plan to get ready for the meteor shower. We took a carafe of wine up to the terrasse, played some marbles and EB prepared a charcuterie plate. We laid down on the couches and gazed up into our patch of the sky. We saw a couple of meteors fly across the sky from left to right at about 23:00 (11pm). I saw a few more, but we were falling asleep so gave up our meteor watch at 24:00. It was a pretty night for star gazing and I’m glad we did see a few meteors streak by. There were a LOT of meteor movement, but not a lot of the streaking.

Thursday: 38 degrees C (just over 100 degrees F) so we pretty much hibernated again. The house stays relatively cool and the fans help tremendously. But still too hot to sleep comfortably.

After coffee in the Cocktail Coop, I walked over to the boulangerie for a baguette and EB picked some tomatoes for Michelle. I had texted Ron to check up on golf. I wasn’t sure if the heat would shut down golf. He got back to me and said yes, it is hot, but he is playing golf. I said that I would bring water. Alan was going to be there too. None of us had a stellar round but as always, it was fun.

One episode of Ted Lasso and we were ready for bed.

Friday: Meet with Alexandre in Confolens at the AXA insurance office in the center of town and then walk around the Confolens festival.

We met with Alexndre in Confolens. He reviewed all of our insurance policies including home, auto and health and explained our new policies to us. In less than an hour we felt like we had made some good decisions.

Afterwards we took a short walk around Confolens and stopped at the Cafe des Sport for lunch in Confolens. We sat under a big shade and watched a Brazilian quartet play a little music. The festival doesn’t really get going until after dark. We decided that it was way too hot (41C that is about 106F) to wait so we headed home.

Saturday, we expect cooler weather and tentatively plan on going back to the festival in the afternoon.

Saturday: Another hot day and no rain forecasted. EB volunteers at the CSF cancer shop and then grocery shopping. Also, it is Assumption Day in France

EB volunteered at the cancer support shop. Nothing much going on so they closed up a little early.

We jotted down some items needed at the market and headed to Saint Junien where we planned to eat lunch at Signorizza restaurant and then shop at E.Leclerc. We didn’t realize that today is a national holiday, so we were surprised to find E.Leclerc closed. Luckily the restaurant was open so we each had a Chicken Caesar salade and a Coke. The salad is always good there.

HyperU was open so we were able to get our shopping done then headed home.

I got the absentee voter paperwork complete and printed envelopes to send everything to the States. Let’s see how this goes. I did not get it in on time for the midterms. I’m a bit disappointed in myself for that. I’m glad to have everything in process for anything else that comes up and the federal elections.

By the way it is still too hot to venture to the festival in Confolens.

So that was our week.

We got some chores checked off of the list. enjoyed our new terrasse, went over to the Boys house for game night, attended French class, chatted with fellow students at Cafe des Sport, watched a meteor shower, played golf, prepped our absentee voter ballots applications and got all of our insurances updated too.

French Lifestyle and Culture

Assumption Day

I did a little research and from frenchmoments.eu I learned that France is a secular country but has kept Assumption Day as a public holiday and for practicing Catholics there are masses, pilgrimages and processions. It is known as l’Assomption and commemorates the Catholic belief that the Virgin Mary was taken body and soul into heavenly glory. This holiday is celebrated every year on 15 August.

If you are a Protestant, you probably reject this holiday as it is a Catholic tradition from the early church around the time of St, Augustine. Catholics pray to the Virgin Mary and other saints while Protestant do not because, as I understand it, it takes away from the primacy of Jesus.

Evidently the 15th day of August is the day of the holiday as a result of the vow of Louis XIII when he declared that he was placing himself, the royal family and the kingdom of France under the protection of the Virgin Mary. He ordered processions to be held throughout the kingdom on 15 August. The tradition remains to this day.

I am not particularly religious, but I thought the history is very interesting. I must admit I like history, and this specific holiday is pleasingly old fashioned.

frenchmoments.eu By the way you can learn more about the history of France and its culture at frenchmoments.eu. It is a blog that has been posting for years and is a wealth of knowledge. I just found this blog this week and I think that I’m going to like getting into it. It is more than history this blog has tons of information about points of interest from a French person’s perspective.

Next Week (la Semaine Prochaine)

• A long list of to-dos to get ready for our family visit
• Lunch at Cafe Lillian on Monday
• Pick up the van for the family vacation in Bordeaux
• French class
• Golf?
• Clean house
• Pack

Weather forecast for next week

Woo-Hoo!! Definite cooling trend is forecasted for Chabanais. Forecasted high temp of 34C (93F). Overnight lows getting down to 15C (59F). Slight chance of rain and a little breezy.

Signing off for the week

As always, we sign off wishing you all a good week and remind you to take care of yourselves and your family.

Keep in touch and leave questions, suggestions and comments below. We really enjoy hearing from you all.

Wishing you a good week (Bonne Semaine)

Mark and Elizabeth Beiley

Babyboomersmovetofrance.com