MSL : Day 8 - 18 April 2014 continued..
En-route from Calais we found many familiar sights and I have to say that the chosen road to this site was (eventually) so much better than the Tomtom offered last time.
The site is just as nice as our memory of it. We have a family next door from around the Liverpool area who are very friendly.
Heading off to the on-site restaurant, hope that is as good as last year too. Plans for tomorrow will probably include a supermarche and Quend Beach at the very least.
HL Day 9 : 19th April 2014 :
Supermarche day!!!!! Spent the morning in Rue, the local town; it is beautiful; a typically French rural town with a Saturday Market selling everything from fresh farm produce to rotisserie chickens to clothes to handbags to shoes. The usual fare found at any open-air market. But the atmosphere in France, in Rue, is so much more enjoyable, more exciting and is unlike any you will find in Britain. It's warmer too, of course! ... and they speak French. Now that I think about it, they often do in Scotland too!
The Simply! supermarche is a chain that serves small towns, rather like the Cooperative I guess. We have stocked up as much as storage space will allow (+ a little more!).
It is sunbathing warm in the sun; slightly chilly when it goes behind the clouds but our suntan (or burn) is already developing nicely. The redness eventually settles down.
Our campsite (Le Val d'Authie www.valdauthie.fr
) restaurant meal last night was
fabulous. The restaurant was full, too. Two delicious main courses following a
starter of smoked salmon and crēme fraîche + a bottle of Bordeaux came to just
€45.00. My mussels picardie was cooked with lardons and leeks with a cream
sauce - devine! Margaret's langoustines in pastis was amazing. Our
experience of this restaurant last year made it the most memorable meal of our
2013 trip. Their standards have not dropped since then. 5 Bixie *****’s awarded
here and comes with an HL / MSL recommendation. Who needs Michelin?
Our first full day in rural France has been wonderful and we are so glad to be back.
HL DAY 13 Report : 22nd April 2014 :
We had a long drive yesterday (137 miles each way) to and from Croissy-sur-Seine on the west side of Paris but well worth the effort. We met up with friends Anny, Aline, Erin-Juliette and Mike at Anny's house (they built it in 1977). A beautiful area, near Versailles. Had a wonderful visit, enjoyed a lovely lunch prepared by Anny and walked it off in the surrounding streets and parks.
Erin-Juliette, 4 years old in May, had a fear of dogs before she met our two. Maya, predictably, overwhelmed her and made the wrong impression, but by the end of the day with Magan she was asking Mum & Dad for a dog, just like her.
We are always happy to meet up with this family and it was such a lovely surprise to find that Aline, Mike and Erin-Juliette were visiting mum / granny. A wonderful opportunity taken with pleasure, despite the drive.
A word or two on satnavs! You know how we love them so! The car's satnav
was programmed to take us from campsite to Croissy-sur-Seine and routed us through
villages and towns on D roads. Perfectly good roads but likely to have traffic
and tractors on them, as we found - just like ours in UK. It took us 31/4 hours
there, as estimated. On the way back, being evening (we didn't leave our
friends until 18:45 ~ a quarter to seven for those who have trouble with the
24-hour clock) I began to wonder why the satnav ignored the motorways. It is
possible it avoids Tolls, but I could not
find a routing setting to suggest this. Anyway, I decided to ignore the nice lady
on the satnav and took the motorway A16, which I knew goes to Calais via our
campsite area. I kept the satnav on, and it kept telling me to take the next
exit!!! You know what I'm talking about.
Of course, with my new resolve, I ignore the dear lady and kept on the motorway. Often when doing so, the estimated mileage and time reduced on the display quite significantly. Sufficient to say, we arrived 'home' in 2 hours 20 minutes; not the 3 hours 30 minutes estimated at the start. In spite of this, I will continue to use these devices because they will always get you there; more than we could on our own without maps!!
Today, Tuesday, has been sunny and hot for the most part. After the rigours of Monday this was a day of rest and relaxation; much enjoyed. Got some sunbathing under our belt; eh, on skin more like! We managed to trip the 10 amp electricity supply TWICE though. The staff here at the campsite are very nice and friendly though.
Just about to put the gas BBQ on for dinner. Moi est Le Chef; MSL the sou chef.
MSL 23 and 24 April
Here we are still in Villers-sur-Authie, intended to stay for just 4 days but we are too comfy here, it's a lovely site, an excellent pitch and the sun is shining. Think after the events of last week we needed to recharge our batteries. Seems there is a lot of rain about going South, so we decided to have another day in the sun, rain due here from tomorrow so we are just as well to make the most of it. So the plan is to drive as far South as we can whilst it's wet and hopefully we'll catch up with the sun as we travel (^_^).
Yesterday our aim was to replace the Thermos broken on Le Shuttle and to source an electric kettle, which would cope with the 6 amp, and 10 amp electricity supplies we are facing here and will continue to face as we travel. Should have put more thought into it when I bought the 2200 watt one, which is great for use in the UK - reminder to self, think ahead! Didn't find either in Rue, so after lunch we headed for the larger town of Berck-sur-Mer and found a large Carrafour Supermarche in which we were able to get what we needed and quite a few other things to boot! Supermarches! Berck has a truly magnificent beach, miles and miles of golden sands, and very populated given it was a Wednesday in April. We did manage to find a stretch all to ourselves so Maya was able to do some active Frisbee chasing, Magan was not so impressed, no rocks or rock pools to explore.
Maya slept in this morning, no early morning alarm woof. We awoke to a
morning of gentle sunshine and, having looked at the weather forecast, decided
moving today was not a good idea. We have had a lazy day, sitting in the sun,
reading our books. Until lunchtime, that is. I came inside to make lunch and
found Bixie's water pump wasn't working! However, that was eventually traced to
the 12V power supply being turned off. Another strange happening! We have had
two odd things happen over the past couple of days. A box of tissues which was
on the top of the right hand bench has vanished, as has Magan's harness which was placed
on there last night - Maya's was still there. Don't like mysteries when there
is no solution (^_^). Does Bixie have a ghost? <_>
So, it's been an interesting week and it would be very easy to stay here awhile, but when I look at the forecast for Playa D'aro we just need to get there. The plan (flexible) is to head for St George de Didonnes and continue to follow the coast, through Biarritz into the North of Spain.
The highlight of this week was going to visit friends Aline & Co; but imagine going to Paris and not even seeing the Eiffel Tower! Guess not many can say that!