Knowing that there was a lot to do, I managed to be at my desk and working by 7.55am so that I could fit in an hour and a half's work before tackling the first task of the day - going to drop off our broken hedge trimmers at a place that we hoped would mend them, and going to pick up our new car.
Stuart and I set off with the hedge trimmers in the back of the car heading for Capannori, having no idea what sort of place we were looking for - whether it would be a tiny, hard-to-find little workshop or something larger. It turned out to be a large warehouse selling all sorts of garden equipment, from ride-on mowers to automatic mowers, trimmers, strimmers, olive pickers, bat houses (yes), safety equipment and everything you could possibly want to manage your land efficiently. At the back of the warehouse was a workshop with a couple of guys working on what looked like a broken hedge trimmer, so it seemed we were in the right place.
The guy who came to serve us clearly understood why we were there, took a quick look and the Obi receipt and got on with writing out a docket for the broken hedge trimmers. He said something in Italian that we didn't quite understand, but I'm pretty sure it was something along the line of 'ah yes, we see a lot of these' (in reference to the brand and model of our trimmers). Anyway, we left the timmers with him, and should get them back in a week or thereabouts.
Next it was on to the car dealer - they had emailed on Thursday saying 'all is fine, please come at 11am on Friday'. So when we pulled into the forecourt and didn't spot the car (AGAIN), our hearts sank. The email had been so definite, and Stuart had double checked his messages before we left to make sure there hadn't been another saying 'no don't come after all', so we thought that maybe they had just hidden it away somewhere around the back...
On entering the building we were met with 'there is a problem with the methane' - so no new car for us again! They did, however, say that they would loan us a car for five days to tide us over. Since the hire car needed to be returned to Europcar Saturday morning, we agreed that yes please, we would have their loan car, thank you very much. They then proceeded to do lots of bits of paperwork, and finally presented us with a printout showing the insurance to cover us for five days - starting from 12pm. At this point it was only 11.40am, so we had to sit and wait for 20 minutes until they would let us leave!
Finally 12pm came around and we set off with Stuart driving the little Alfa Romeo and me driving the Fiat 500L - I had been dreading this part with the triple whammy of an unfamiliar car, with the steering wheel on the wrong side, and driving it solo. Thankfully I just about made it back in one piece (I had a bit of a hairy moment with the edge of the road and nearly ended up in the ditch just before I reached our gates, but we won't dwell on that...). As I was coming along the drive, our visitor from the previous evening put in another appearance. The deer was standing right in the middle of the drive looking at me. It scarpered pretty quickly, but it was a beautiful sight.
By the time we'd done with all of that messing about, it was lunchtime, so once again all five of us dined on bread, cheese, meats, tomatoes, boiled eggs and paté under the shade of the garden umbrella.
Lunch dispatched and cleared away, it was back to work. I'd decided earlier in the week that I would take Friday off office-work (with the exception of the hour or so in the morning) in order to concentrate on finalising things in the apartment.
Sheila started putting another coat of paint on the garden chairs that she and Kerys had put the first coat on the other day (it goes without saying that the painting was in between washing up and doing yet more cleaning in the apartment and tidying of the garden - it's easy to see where Stuart gets his work ethic from!)
While Stuart read through my draft of the guest information pack, adding a couple of details here and there, I went to start sorting through the kitchen utensils and crockery in the apartment. Stuart soon joined me and between us we cleared out some cupboard space so our guests will have room to store their food, topped up the soap dispensers and washing up liquid bottle, threw out a few items that really looked beyond their best, and generally tweaked things.
Come 4pm, we were still at it, but conscious of the fact that there were a few items we needed to buy for the apartment and for the guests' welcome pack, Stuart decided to head to town to do a supermarket shop and try to pick up the few odd items we still needed. Sheila and Kerys and Ben all went along for the ride.
While they were gone, I put the final finishing touches to the guest information pack, printed out some information on a couple of local events that we've found out about and finished tidying in the apartment.
The apartment was looking lovely, with just the fresh bed linen to put on, the welcome basket to fill, and a final vacuum and mop to be done in the morning.
The troops arrived back at the house at 5.55pm. We were due at Sue's (Hi Sue!) at 6pm, so there ensued a mad dash for everyone to change, freshen up and douse themselves in insect repellent, and then attempt to trick the cats into coming inside for an early dinner and lock-down.
We finally all piled into the car and rolled up at Sue's house rather late, but she was kind enough to say it was fine and promptly told us all to drink prosecco. Which we did. We had the most lovely relaxed and enjoyable evening. After an initial stand-off, Kerys and Ben soon became best buddies with the charming Henry and Erik and spent a while playing hide and seek, going to collect eggs, and having a tour of the vegetable growing area. Sue cooked a delicious curry and a heavenly tiramisu, and plied us with copious amounts of wine and limoncello while we chatted the night away. It was such a lovely evening that I was utterly gobsmacked when Kerys announced it had gone 2am! The old cliché about time flying when you're having fun was never more true!
Henry and Erik accompanied us with their torches back down the track to find our car, and we headed home, with Ben invited back to spend more time with Henry and Erik during the week.
On arriving home, Stuart had to go and seal the kitchen worktop in the apartment so that the silicon would dry overnight, and I quickly bashed out last night's poor excuse for a blog post before eventually falling into bed some time close to 3am.
What a wonderful evening!
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