Lost in France . . . well not quite

La Turballe
Having arrived at the tunnel just thirty-five minutes after leaving Black Horse Farm, we were somewhat ahead of ourselves to say the least. It meant we arrived in France at just after 8am and were off.
       Our first intended stop was Neufchâtel-en-Bray, but as it was only 10am as we approached our turn-off we decided to carry on to Brionne. This was a mistake as it turned out, since the campsite we had intended staying, was closed – permanently. To make matters worse Peter reversed into a boulder whilst trying to turn around! We did, however, find a charming campsite a few kilometres away at St. Nicolas.
       On to Saumur – a long haul but we cheated and used toll roads, which made the journey quite easy. We spent 3 nights on the Aire Camping Car Park and had a couple of days sight-seeing in Saumur, where we encountered a band from Dorset playing on the forecourt of the Town Hall. Turns out they were guests of the Marie, Wimbourne being twinned with Saumur.

La Saumur
Then on to Aixe sur Vienne, where we met up with Liz, who had motored down from the Hook of Holland, having stopped off at Zell am Mosel to collect some 'rally wine'. The camp site is on the banks of the Vienne and has rail access to Limoges, the reason for the stop. The old city is quite charming with half timbered houses and narrow streets, but it's the railway station that grabs everyone's attention, an impressive structure built in 1924 with an adjacent clock tower named The Benedictins Station.
       From Aixe, we drove down to Vezac for the rally. After Vezac, we bounced and swayed our way across country to the west coast largely because most of the roads, as well as being fairly narrow, were either subject to chantier (road works) or chausee deformee (damaged road hardly explains it!). However, we eventually reached St. Georges-de-Didonne where we met several of the ralliers who'd also headed west. The campsite is situated about a 15 minutes walk from the town itself, and on our first foray along the promenade we were treated to a sort of 'regatta' type event, with windsurfers, boaters and paragliders. St George itself is a nice town, popular with the French and has lots of eateries.

From St George the plan was to head to La Turballe, via St Hillier de Riaz, which we did, but when we arrived found they were so busy we could only stay one night. However, the Campsite Manager recommended an Aire in Piriac-sur-Mer, which they were loosely associated with, and we headed for it the following day. We stayed on the Aire, which was actually once a commercial camp site and again it was a short walk from the town, which was very picturesque with a harbour, shops and quite a few restaurants. It also has 3 accessible beaches around the headland, we spent an afternoon on one, and whilst the weather was very warm there was quite a strong breeze, which played havoc with Liz's quite large parasol – at one stage we thought she was going paragliding!!
       We parted company with Liz after Piriac, when she headed off towards Germany and we headed towards Vannes, another campsite on a coastal inlet with a seawater bathing pool. Then on to Josslin where, after a walk around the town we decided to carry on to Dinan. Dinan is quite a pretty town and boasts a Clock Tower – the 'Belfry' being converted from the original municipal tower in around 1500 - which is worth a visit.

Caen

Honfleur
We then moved on to Honfleur via Caen, spending a couple of nights at the Aire by the harbour, which turned out to be free as the barriers weren't working when we left. Returning home on the Sunday we were hoping for a fairly quiet journey. In that we were disappointed, but we have come to the conclusion there is no 'quiet time' on the roads in the UK these days, unless it is around 3am and even then it's probably not guaranteed. Nevertheless, we enjoyed our time in France and will be planning our 2024 journey during the winter.