A Man With A Van

February sees John Lewis-Stempel solve his lack of transport by purchasing a Citroën Berlingo–the French farmer’s vehicle of choice

I’VE become a white-van man. Or, I suppose I should say, now we’re here in the Charente, un homme camionette blanche. We needed some farm transport. Lately, the skies have been the sheen and the colour of boiled fish-eye and the polishedfor-sale Citroën Berlingo on the forecourt of the village garage matched.

The van fitted the purchasing mood of the day, then I drove it around and found it fitted some more. A little white van is the French farmer’s vehicle of choice. Everybody locally assumes the driver of a 10-yearold Berlingo is local, so I was continually hailed down for a chat. On finding I was l’Anglais, the only Englishman in the village, they then introduced themselves. New acquaintance was made. The Berlingo has been social integration on wheels.

Apart from being a mobile introduction bureau, the van’s other job is carrying the posts and wire for thevineyard. I romantically imagined such kit would be purchased from a specialist emporium in the claret capital, Bordeaux.M. Gobinau, the local winemaker, smiled and directed me to the establishment he used himself: Bricomarché, the French equivalent of Homebase.

Odd, the things you can buy in Bricomarché. As well as vine equipment, I’ve come away with chickens, Marans mostly. I suppose about a quarter of the village (population 311, according to the noticeboard outside the mairie) keeps fowl. The morning alarm call is the competitive crowing of cockerels, a sound now almost gone from English villages.