I’m quite prepared for you to think I’m a wuss or call me Betty 
but I’m not greatly enjoying the heat. Has anyone installed clim and, if so, what sort of cost would I be looking at?
As I’ve got older i can’t tolerate the heat either, but I’ll sit in the coolest, shadiest place I can find, maybe with a cold 
, rather than fire up aircon in the house (if I had it of course). Car is a different matter 
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Large standing fans can do a lot to cool you. My neighbour has installed large, variable speed ceiling fans in all his three bedrooms. Last summer, during the worst of the canicule, he said that it made a huge difference at night, and wasn’t intrusive noise wise at all. So, invest in some good quality ceiling fans to circulate the air and keep your South facing shutters closed. It’ll be a lot cheaper to install, a lot cheaper to run and probably be just as effective.
Edit: We have clim, but don’t use it much. We have several standing fans to keep us cool and they work quite well. Next year, going to look at ceiling fans, although our ceilings aren’t that tall, so my be a problem.
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There are lots of thoughts going more towards passive building cooling rather than just going for clim, as the world moves up a few degrees if we all get AC units we’ll push up the temperature a bit quicker.
Desicant based evaporative cooling units are around and can work very well and cheaper to run. Mostly industrial units are the ones I have been involed with but might be some smaller units in the EU?
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Are there more passive approaches you can take to stop your house heating up in the first place? We lived like moles during the hottest bits of last year - but cool moles as the house didn’t get above 23 or so.
We also heat hot water with an air source heat pump. So unhooked the outflow and had that cooling the garage to create a nice place for the dog.
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I would think of that as quite warm, particularly at night!
We’re in rented accommodation at the moment, and it’s not really set up properly (two or three windows have no shutters at all), but I think we’ll explore the fan idea.
Also
if I had any idea what they were! 
(I have a dehumidifier which is desiccant-based, so I imagine it’s a similar principle.)
Yes similar, I would google but you’ll get different responses in France than I get in the UK.
Of course the old adage, fabric first still applies, try to improve the building first. Multifoils are very good at reflecting the heat away from roofs and atics
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It was around 39 outside, so felt beautifully cool! Most times it is 21 or so. Today it is 27 outside and am wearing shorts. So now sitting with my coffee indoors with a blanket!
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We have one of those so called “portable” air conditioning units on wheels - we used it on occasion in out offices - but it only appears these days when we have a particular friend to stay in the summer. She has serious problems breathing when it’s very hot…
Otherwise, there is always somewhere in the house that is reasonably cool. Not like the first (Wimpey) house I had when first married in Cheltenham - even following all the advice about closing windows and curtains etc etc, I couldn’t cope with the heat at all in summer. Dashing off to the bathroom to run cold water over my wrists helped though!
Me too, at work I had to buy a couple of mobile units, the new ones way outperform my older one 10-15 yrs old.
This looks like an interesting small unit. Will read up more later.
https://boatworld.co.uk/totalcool-air-cooling-system-3000-portable-evaporative-air-cooler
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We would not have managed decades in Asia without air conditioning but here in France I have reverted to an old North African trick.
Hang wet fabric curtains in the open windows. Breeze passes through, cooling the room. The easiest thing I found was to buy IKEA Aina white linen curtains with eyelets. (I think these are now no more in ready made curtains but they still sell the linen by metre for handy souls.)
Easy to hang in existing poles and take down for daily wetting. A water spray bottle for between hours. Washing machine cleanable.
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I’ve just h think and need to add that the wet curtain solution works in a dry climate (less good in the tropics) and best if you have an actual breeze.
Putting a fan outside the window to blow cooled air inwards would work technically but might be a bit fiddly to set up.
@Susannah sounds an interesting idea…
Last year I pressed a cool, damp flannel to my face… felt wonderful, but before I’d got downstairs, my face was prickling all over and completely dry… 
The curtains would takemuch longer to dry… and presumably they wouldn’t feel prickly… 
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I have a mobile evaporative fan unit in the bedroom which I can control with a remote. It’s at head height when I’m in bed and I set it to switch off when I am asleep. If really hot maybe dangerous weather threatens in the bedroom, I put ice in its water compartment.
I have found that being well-hydrated during the day helps so much in trying to keep cool.
I looked into a proper mobile bedroom air conditioner, but it was a lot noisier than the fan and would keep me awake. That and the fact that it needs an evacuation kit decided me in the direction of this type of fan unit. Feel reassured by its presence.
Costs in the region of 200 euros.
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How do you extract the humidity this puts into the room?
I was more conscious of the overwhelming humidity of the weather. I felt the better from the cooling effect of the fan unit, with ice, which I programmed to switch off after 2 hours. Any additional humidity over 2 hours from the fan was I think minimal.
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(l) I have used linen shifts (must be linen). soak them in a basin of cold water, wring out by hand, put on. Rewet and wring as necessary. Can be 1x refresh needed per day, to every 45-90min if it’s really hot. Heavy linen best and no mixes not even cotton-linen (which annoyingly Lidl promotes as “linen” as well as linen-viscose).
Older heavier types of silk would work the same, not the modern types of taffeta barely-there silk.
Coolmax clothing works as do some specialist outdoor fabrics sold as “wicking”. One of my ExOfficio tops is fully covered, high neck, long sleeved, does not need wetting and cooler than wearing nothing - worn it in Florida (humid) 95 degrees Fahrenheit and very comfortable.
The Australians invented a cloth necklace with evaporative crystals inside - soak it, put it on and it evaporates all day making head and neck feel better. May be still sold in camping shops or possibly by the Tilley hat website. When I couldn’t find mine that was what made me dig out linen shifts and tops and wear them damp as above - my favourite method as it doesn’t immobilise you.
(2) 2 fans from 90-160 degree angle can work better than 1, even small ones. Putting some ice in a bowl in front of a fan can help a lot. The new Lidl 8W device (cube about 6.5 inches) similar principle gets ok reviews. Aldi have a 5W one I have but haven’t tried yet - fill with ice cubes or freeze the insertable water container with its water in if removable, if you want. Amazon had similar last year low price but not a fan of AMZ and wasn’t desperate so didn’t jump - just acquired the Aldi last week.
(3) Quechoisir.org has done a recent report on home portable aircon machines, electricity consumption is a big issue with a lot of them.
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With the industrial units I have had contact with its two stage, cold as you say put into the space and then a hybrid passive or low power extract fans to remove the humidity as its a lot easier to cool the dryer air. Together that works really well and although it wasnt my area of usage the company is able to bring temperatures down to 15c easily and with larger units in a food preparation factory down to 7c. All at a fraction of the running costs of AC and additional benefit is filtered fresh air, unlike AC. 2x more efficient than AC I seem to remember.
We do have reversable air to air heat pumps which are very effective in the summer, but now I have allowed a canopy of tree branches to join together over the south-western terrasse which shades the salle, things are much better. Even sitting out on that terrasse as the sun passes over is pleasantly bearable.
My bedroom is adjacent and opens onto the same terrasse (which is roofed) so with a permanant mesh screen and the windows thrown wide, I have no problems with heat at night. Can’t shut the shutters because of the screen but never have needed to.
Fran, with her medical bed, is on the south side but absolutely loves and needs the heat (in winter she has 2 duvets and a heavy blanket on her bed) but I expect we may (?) persuade her to have the windows tilted at least if it gets hotter. A wet curtain is something to keep in mind though.
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