Monday, 17th October: Me again! – Big Harry’s gone to sleep! First stop, shop. Then they drove to the south of the island and found another forest picnic site right beside the sea.
The sea was calmer here so no waves to play with and at first it was a long way away, but the tide came in during the afternoon.
Later they went round past the ‘viaduc’ and watched the sunset from the harbour wall at Chateau D’Oleron.
An earlier attempt to photo the sunset (while HE was cooking) produced this picture:
The sun is reflected in the window and the silhouette is Carol’s shadow on the outside, not some strange activity going on inside!
THEY say the toilet block is worth a comment! It’s a unisex Palace of Ablution, where each cubicle contains both a shower and a basin. Sounds fine, but the shower wets the whole floor which then gets slippery, and there’s nowhere near enough hooks for your ‘stuff’. But the outstanding feature is the palm tree growing in the centre of the atrium!:
Linguistic / cultural note from HIM: every tap in that loo block, including those in the wash-up area, has a little sticker in three languages encouraging careful use of water. The French tells us that water is ‘scarce’ (=rare); in English it’s ‘precious’; but in German it’s ‘expensive’ (= kostbar)! Moreover, in French and English we are invited to economise or save, using the –ons, or ‘let’s’ forms, but in German we are instructed to help save it, using an imperative. What does this tell us about national characters or stereotypes, and which, if translated into your own language (if you were neither French, English, nor German), would make you think twice about leaving the tap running while you clean your teeth or rinsing the washing-up under running water? Discuss. Or not, as you wish.
Stephen's space 
Having spent the last week shouting aggressively in a bad German accent and goose-stepping around a stage, I don’t feel I can comment in an unbiased manner! It’s an interesting point though.I think I’d respond better to ‘Let’s save water!’ than ‘Save water!’, but I never did like being told what to do!