The brocante (car-boot sale ) here in france

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Good evening folks,
Weather here today has been really nice, sunny and a little bit on the warm side,

Now i did say i was going to a Brocante “car boot sale” today and a few people asked me to tell them what it was like, !
So here we go,
It was a smallish sized brocante 40 stalls and it was in a little french village with two shops /1 post office and a public toilet (a proper toilet) not just a hole in the floor job,

A car parking area was on the field “all clearly marked & free”
The smell of chips and verious cooking was the first thing to hit you, plus a bread stall, and a french sauage stall once walked past these the brocante really started, stall after stall of second hand bits & pieces,
The french are great ones for not washing glass wear or plates, they’ll have them on the stall rotten dirty covered in dust & grime,
And you’ll see hundreds of ash trays, again in need of a wash, the stalls that really get me are the little kids selling off their out grown toys, the looks on their little faces if you happen to stop and look at any of the toys,

You really have to look hard at whats on the stalls if you want a bargain, my wife was looking at a lamp (small table lamp)

She said to me look at this modern day lamp shade,
“it was strips of material going from the base of the lamp up towards the top of the lamp just above the bulb fixing”,

What do you think “she asked me”?

Put it back quick i said, "but you dont know how much it cost ! she replied.

I said i know what the shades made of,

What she asked!

4 womens “G STRINGS” i replied!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yes the lamp shade was 4 x ladies “G” strings" tied around the lamps metal work,

As we moved on we came to a plant stall and a little old man selling his own home grown tom/plants lettuce, cabbage etc,
He was asking 1-50euro for 12 lettuce plants ready to plant out,
it really was a good offer so i bought 12,

We continued to see push bikes/prams/ swords/ more dirty glass ware,/ and then another plant stall, he wanted twice the garden centre prices for any of his plants,

Then we came to a stall and i saw a hosepipe holder
“one of those half moon shaped ones that fit to a wall and you hang the hose pipe onto it when you’ve finished using it,
I asked how much and the lady said it was old,
made of metal and all cast in a country scene and very strong.

She said 10 euro, !!!!

or i could toss a coin for it, if she won the call it was 15 euro if i won the call it was 5 euro,
By now a few people had decided to take an interest in the bet,

we tossed the coin and i won,
the crowd cheered and her husband gave it to me for 4 euro so i was really pleased with that deal.

All in all we had a good afternoon out and the feel of this brocante was good, the smell’s of food cooking, the people with little dogs waking along, the chickens from the farm down the field came to see what was going on
And one stall was selling french ’CD’s so we had french music in the background.

Well that was the “Brocante” and todays afternoon out
Hope you enjoyed the experience.

• 21 Apr, 2013
• 3 likes

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