Day 1 – Friday 9th March 2018
The big day came and we were up with the dawn chorus at 5:30am and we set off to Dover.
At Dover we were loaded straight on the Pride of Canterbury and we had a very smooth sailing to Calais. I was surprised by how few fags were on sale in the duty free shop; when I smoked they filled nearly half the shop.
There aren’t too many campsites north of the Med open in March so if we were going to take our time and see some sights we’d have to use aires or car parks so once ashore in Calais we programmed the Doris the satnav for Cap Gris-Nez. Naturally we stopped off at a Boulangerie along the way for some bread & cheese and we were sat in the aire at cap Gris-Nez by lunchtime.
During the Second World War the Germans built the Lindmann heavy batter on Cap Gris-Nez. The huge 406mm guns had 20m long barrels and they fired 1 tonne shells at Dover and other Kent cities 40km away. We had some equally huge cannons just west of St. Margaret’s at Cliffe called Winnie & Pooh to return fire.
During the Normandy landing in 1944 the Allied forced silenced the Lindmann heavy batter when 600 bombers visited the site one night and left it looking like a moonscape
Cap Gris-Nez is now a coastal nature reserve
After lunch I decided to walk along the beach to the local town I could see in the distance. Wissant was a nice 5 mile walk but the town itself was closed for the season. On the way back I noticed the tide was coming it at a fair rate and in the end I had to scramble up the dunes and walk the last mile or so over soft sand. I was fucked when I got back to Nelly and that night we were in bed by 8:45pm local time, 7:45pm English time.
Day 2 – Saturday 10th March 2018
I was up the next morning early and caught the sunrise. After Julie had had her breakfast we set off to find a supermarket to properly stock up on cheese and wine.
Along the trip back towards Calais we saw an obelisk on top of a hill with a few motorhomes parked at the bottom. The walk to the top was fantastic, great views and blowing a gale. It turns out this was Cap Blanc-Nez which is at the northern end of Wissant Bay.
The view from Cap Blanc-Nez
Back on the road we decided we’d go to cite de Europe for our shop and we soon stocked up at Carrefour. I even tackled the Font Bleu service point. We now had water!
Normally when you add pineapple to something it instantly becomes Hawaiian, not in France
Lille was our planned next stop but I had read there was a snail farm just north of the town where you could park up for €4 and get a tour of the farm. I thought it’d be fun to visit it, obviously Doris didn’t. We found ourselves in Belgium (the roads are crap compared to France) and even when managed to escape back to France Doris quickly had us back in Belgium as she insisted the snail farm was on a Belgium industrial estate!
After over an hour of pissing around I decided we would go to Lille anyway. We stopped in a theatre’s car park and planned to see the town in the morning.
Day 3 – Sunday 11th March 2018
From 4am it hammered down. I went for an early morning walk along the town’s river and visited the park with Lille’s Citadelle in it. Julie refused to leave Nelly as it was far too wet for her. That decision made we set off for Parfondeval which I had marked as one of France’s Beaux Villages
I’d marked Parfondeval up on a map one long boring night shift and now we were going to visit it. Or were we? Julie informed me Google had told her there are 2 Parfondevals in France. I hoped I’d got the right one.
Turns out I did get the right one and Parfondeval really is a charming working French village, the place is falling down with sections of roof missing and big holes in walls. I was surprised the watermill, Le Moulin, was still standing; this is the France I love! Off the beaten track,
Le Moulin
I couldn’t find a shop. What I think was a café was closed so we had lunch on Nelly and then set off for Reims.
We had an uneventful run to Reims and I pulled into a car park I saw had a motorhome in it. It turned out Park4Night highly recommended this place but I wanted to get closer to the Champagne House I planned to take Julie to so we set off for the town centre.
Getting to the car park was no bother but when we entered the car park it was rammed. There was a classic car show on nearby. Luckily I went in through the exit. I say luckily because the parallel entrance road was a muddy track. Nelly doesn’t like muddy tracks. She tends to cause all kinds of bother when she’s stuck in mud. Other drivers then lose their cool and I don’t know what French is for ‘I don’t have a magic wand so just calm down for a few minutes’. I only know ‘Calmez-vous branleur’ and they don’t generally react well to that.
There was nothing for it I would have to find an empty space and turn all 8m of Nelly around in a chock-a-block car park while keeping the front wheels on the 3m strip of tarmac while French people honked their horns. No problem.
As anyone who knows anything about reversing a wagon amongst expensive cars knows the first thing you need to do is get out and survey the situation. On my way I gesticulated to the bemused French woman who was first in the growing queue that I would be 5 minutes.
Satisfied that it was possible, I got back in Nelly. Julie was nowhere to be seen.
“Julie where are you?”
“I’m in the back I can’t handle it Tom!”
Julie always has kittens when Nelly is in a tight spot. The truth is she is better off panicking in the back at least then I can concentrate without her clutching her face saying “No… no,.. no!”
After a couple of minutes of calm shuffling while impatient French drivers tried to squeeze around me I was nearly done. A French bloke came and helped me with the last bit and we were free. Merci Beaucoup.
It would take Julie the rest of the day to calm down.
Back at the original Reims car park I grabbed the dash cam footage. Sadly for me but luckily for Julie the audio wasn’t recording so there is no recording of her panicking. I won’t make that mistake again; I have turned the audio to record now.
Day 4 – Monday 12th March 2018
It was a sunny morning when we set out to see the sights of Reims but when we came out of the cathedral it was windy and rainy. I was in shorts and a teeshirt. We made our way to the Vranken Champagne house to have a tour and waited outside for an hour for it to open. My legs were turning blue. When they did eventually open we discovered we’d have to wait a further hour and a half before there was a tour in English. We decided we needed to head further south to find some sun.
On the way to Dijon we came across the river Seine. There were signs pointing to the Source de la Seine and I thought that’d be interesting. Unfortunately they were logging on the narrow track leading to the source so I had to reverse the best part of half a mile. Piece of piss after the Reims car park incident.
We slept by the river L’ouche in Dijon. Always nice to wake up to birdsong.
Day 5 – Tuesday 13th March 2018
Oingt was another one of the Beaux Villages I’d put on my map one nightshift. From a distance it looked fantastic but it was full of restaurants and artists’ studios; a holiday complex for the rich rather than a genuine working village like Parfondeval. Parfondeval had 10 working farms and even though we went on a cold day you could smell every one of them. On a summers day it’d probably curl your shoes so it’s unlikely any yuppie would buy a holiday home there.
A little bit of Parfondeval in Oingt.
Next on the list off attractions was Mirmande. It was a long drive and to save time we hopped on a toll road. An hour or so later we got off to a €36 bill. I think they charged me for a coach and as we’d only saved an hour’s driving it’ll be a very long time before I ever use a French toll road again.
Mirmande was another Beaux Village and this one didn’t disappoint. On a hill between Lyon and Avignon this was a stunning ramparted medieval village. Absolutely immaculate kept. Park4Night rated the car park there as very quiet and it was. What park4Night failed to mention was the narrow twisting road up a steep hill you needed to navigate to get to it. Julie had more kittens.
Sainte-Foy at the very top of Mirmande
While the French do immaculately manicure their villages and it’s rare to see litter they don’t really like picking up their dogshit. The main drag in Mirmande is called Le Grand Rue and it’s about 10ft wide and beautifully cobbled. The morning I walked up this lovely street there was a steaming dog turd smack dab in the middle of it.
Day 6 – Wednesday 14th March 2018
After a very good sleep we awoke to a lovely sunny day and walked round the village again before setting off for Avignon. Avignon is a very swanky town; the Popes used to live here and it is full of history & posh shops. It also has the Pont de Avignon.
Le Pont d’Avignon
I asked for and got the pensioner discount!
Day 7 – Thursday 15th March 2018
Great start to the day, it’s raining and the fuckin’ awning won’t roll up. Decided to walk into town again and had a look around all the Pope’s palaces. As I passed a fritterie I realised it’d been a week since I’d had any chips! Soon sorted that.
Lovely
Walking around town looking at the places I stood in some fuckin’ dogshit. Brilliant. Then we got absolutely soaked on the way back to the van. Decide to write up this blog. Tomorrow Aix-en-Provence and according to the weather forecast sunshine.