Week 12 & 13. A journey in France.

We had a long way to go today so we set our alarms and got up early, very early, seven thirty - well that is early for us.

It’s moving day and the sat-nav says we will be travelling for over six hours. Well Desmond is the most optimistic sat-nav I know so we know he will have underestimated by a couple of hours.

When the alarm went off I thought I had gone blind it was so dark. Dark enough and rainy enough to make trying to pack up impossible so we waited till dawn then packed up in double quick time so we were only 40 minutes behind schedule when we pulled away from our first and only French site of the trip.

At over 500km today’s trip was always going to be long so we had decided to make it as short as possible by taking toll roads something we very rarely do.

We arrived at our destination Le Cormier Camping eight hours later. Also €53.10 in toll charges poorer.

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“. . . that’s a French site . . .” I hear you cry. Well it is in France but it is owned and run by a Welsh couple Mike and Cath. They are the most welcoming couple you can imagine. We arrived in pouring rain, Mike came out with a large umbrella for us to shelter under while he gave us a tour of the site and told us of the relative merits of each pitch then helped us set up while Cath made us all a most welcome cup of tea.

We have been here for two days now and it stopped raining a little after lunchtime today.The first night was interesting with a thunderstorm as close as I ever want to get. The thunder started while the lightening was still daylight bright and was so loud it rattled the van, you could actually feel it moving. We discovered next morning that the site electrics had all been tripped.

We hid from the rain for the next day and a half, Sue was going stir crazy so we went for a drive to an area close by covered in many lakes large and small but we were disappointed that the lakes could rarely be seen from the road and many of the bird hides and other observation points seemed to be closed.

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|t was market day in Loches today so while Dicky recuperated from a foot problem Sue and I went for a look see. Markets in France seem to be different from those in the UK where the  object is to be as cheap as possible, here the price seem to be largely irrelevant. Is is quality that counts, some of the goods being sold are damn’d expensive but all were top quality and although we didn’t try any the street food looked particularly yummy.

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Our last full day here and we have elected to visit Chateau de Chenonceau. It seems that with a plethora of local chateaux this is the one. It was a little unfortunate for us, not for the chateau that today was a public holiday and the whole world and his brothers children had chosen today to also visit. It was packed but still a intreating and interesting place to visit even if you could not take pictures because of the crowds.

On our way back to Le Cormier we stopped in Loches to use the cash machine, double parked behind some cars properly parked. The traffic prevented Sue from getting out so I jumped out and went to the machine just a few steps away unfortunately there was a short queue and so it took perhaps five minutes to get our dosh by which time a bus was trying to get past the car giving increasingly irritated hoots on his hooter but when I ran back mouthing “désolé” and waving my dosh he gave a very French shrug and smiled as I jumped in the car and drove away.

Last Updated - Sunday 27th April 2014.             © Seve  Ghost 2014