France - North to the
Ferry
|
Leaving Hauterives we started our journey homewards following signs for
many miles to hypermarkets along the busy RN5 and eventually ending up
at an E Leclerc on the northern side of Valence. Then after finding a way on back
roads across the Rhône to Tournon and a very winding road through the
Gorges du Doux, following the route of a narrow gauge train touristique
to Lamastre where there was a large street market on the Tuesday and the
camping-car aire and borne closed on Monday nights so we wild camped in a
picnic lay-by we had passed a few miles back.
|
Our
route took us across the pleasant wooded and undulating countryside of the Parc
Regional Livradois Forez through St Agreve, Tence (where there was a new
unlisted service borne in a carpark), crossing the river Loire at
Retournac, the delightfully named town of
Craponne-s-Arzon and to Ambert where we looked for an internet cafe. It was closed on Tuesdays so we called into the library which had a
"Mediatheque". Much like in Britain there were lots of computers
but " sorry you had to be an adherent (member) to use them"! so we drove on to a pleasant overnight stop at an aire beside a large lake at
Aubusson d'Auvergne near Courpière, with a beach, boats for hire and a
nature trail around the lake. Judging by the size of the car park (500
places) it
must be a very popular base de loisir at weekends. A French
camping-car family turned up at teatime, parked two metres away
and proceeded to play football next to us so we relocated across the other
side of the huge empty parking area. In the morning there was more activity as a
huge artic arrived and parked in the adjacent field where it disgorged
various tractors and specialised farm equipment for the local farmers to
try out. After a pleasant two mile stroll around the lake we called in to
the bureau to pay our overnight fee of €5 before setting off northwards.
|
Base de Loisirs at Aubusson
Aire de parking Aubusson d'Auvergne
|
On our travels through France we noticed how different the styles of
gravestones were typically with sun shade structures near Aubusson and an
elaborate one with many plaques sometimes with photographs and masses of
artificial flowers at Hauterives. These must have been for important
families in the town.
|
Cemetery near Aubusson
|
Gravestone at Hauterives
|
From there we continued north west through more wooded hills passing
Thiers with its knife shops and on
to Lapalisse which we had visited the previous year, and a neat small
camping municipal complete with swimming pool in a tiny village of Bert, a
few miles north-east. The site had about six static vans, a Dutch
touring caravan and a lone backpacker - the village is on the
GR3 long distance footpath.
Camping Municipal at Bert
|
Bert near Lapalisse
|
Heading further north to Moulins where we called in to a caravan dealers
just out of interest. Many accessories were a lot dearer than in the UK and we had a quick look at a large Adria coachbult for €40,000 but
decided that we preferred our Autosleeper! We bypassed the town on the
almost empty ring road and drove through farmland to the region known as
the Puisaye famous for the many potteries and artisan industries centred
around St Amand-en-Puisaye, St Savoir-en-Puisaye and St Fargeau where they
hold an evening spectacular at the large chateau during the summer
(starting the day after we were there of course!). After spending a couple
of hours beside another Base de Loisirs at the Reservoir du Bourdon we
found a small municipal campsite at Saints-en- Puisaye, a small village where there
was a sign for a theatre which turned out to be a dubious night club
judging by the posters outside (admission single men €60, single ladies
free!) so we gave that a miss! The next morning after watching three
hoopoe birds a couple a yards from the van (we had only seen them in
southern Spain previously - a sign of global warming??) we put our camping fee of
€4.64 (the cheapest of the holiday) through the letterbox of the Mairie.
After driving to Toucy where there was another "train touristique",
only at weekends at this time of year, the weather had turned grey and
overcast so we decided to travel more
rapidly north toward the ferry at Dunkerque, stopping overnight at a dearer (€13.20)
2 star campsite in the busy town of la Ferté-s/s-Jouarre, an
industrial and commuter town for Paris, after discovering that a motorhome
aire listed in a nearby village of St Cyr-s-Morin was closed due to vandalism.
|
Saints-en-Puisaye church
Saints campsite
|
The last day of travelling through France was uneventful apart from one
incident of having to take evasive action as a car overtook a lorry coming
towards us on a bend, the only time in over 5000 miles that this had
happened. We decided to call in to a large hypermarket at the Centre
Commercial at Compeigne for a final topup, a mistake on a Saturday morning and we got
hopelessly lost on leaving, ending up in the back streets of the town.
Once beyond the villages of the Somme the towns tended to merge together
so it was a slow drive back to the ferry port where we managed to change
our booking for the 6am Sunday sailing.
|
Floral mural at Gravelines
|
With several hours to kill we
drove along to Gravelines for tea and a stroll on the beach. Since we were
there two months ago a new public toilet had been installed in the car
park where motorhomes parked (but no water tap or drain!) We returned to
the ferry port late evening to sleep overnight in the queuing lanes
together with many cars and other motorhomes. Although there were no
sailings during the night the ferries have their engines running
continuously but we managed a reasonable amount of sleep before the
channel crossing and the long drive back home.
|
<< Romans and roads north
|
Europe
tour summary 2006 >>
|