Back on the Road - Year 2

After a relaxing 2 months back in the UK catching up with family and friends (after our 11 month tour around Europe and North Africa last year), we are back on our motorhome travels again.  We had planned to set off earlier, but we had to arrange some repairs for Sonny (our motorhome) from damage he had incurred last September whilst in Croatia.  Leaving a Croatian campsite, he got into a bit of a fight with the corner of a toilet block and suffered damage to the awning.  Our initial thoughts were that the repairs would only cost us a couple of hundred pounds to fix when we got back to the UK in December.  Luckily, we informed our insurance company at the time as having got it assessed back home, it turned out to be nearly £5,000 of damage, which includes 50 hours of labour - ouch!

Sonny's damaged awning and the Croatian toilet block!

The parts have taken longer to come than anticipated so with the approval of the insurance company we are going to get the repairs done when we come back to the UK in July (for a wedding), to save us hanging around.

We left Darlington on Friday 27January, had a weekend stopover in Stamford to see my 2 brothers and their family then we were on our way once again on Monday morning.

With the weather being wet and windy we opted for the channel tunnel rather than the ferry and booked our Eurotunnel ticket for Tuesday morning, 9:20am. so spent the night on the Aire at Dover, Marina Parade (N51.12350 E1.31710).

The Aire at Dover

There are no facilities here but it's fairly quiet and comfortable.  Being a cold night (2°C) we put the gas heating on, however it decided not to work!  Mel did a quick check of our Gaslow tanks and worked out that having had the habitation check last month they hadn’t been opened up fully.  PHEW, problem resolved and we had heating!  Like last year, I am sure we are going to encounter some more of these little problems along the way but the main thing is trying to figure out the problem calmly.

It’s only a 20 minute drive to Folkestone, so alarm set for 7.30am, we were up washed, dressed, fed and watered and on our way by 8.20am.  Leaving Dover, parked up all along the road to the ferry port were lots of French lorries.  Mel said he had read something about a strike in France over something that would affect lorry drivers – the French seem to love a strike!

Getting the Eurotunnel is a very quick and easy way to get across to France and relaxing too as you can just sit in the comfort of the motorhome enjoying a cuppa!

All aboard the Eurotunnel!

Thirty five minutes later we are in France!  It was 3°C and sunny leaving Folkestone and when we arrived in Calais it was still sunny and 10°C – so that was a bonus.  First stop was the Carrefour, which is just a couple of kilometres from the Eurotunnel.  Once stocked up with delicious bread, cheese, wine, cakes and some other necessities we were on our way.  We were in no hurry but for ease took the motorway most of the way, it was so quiet and on some parts we were the only vehicle on the road.

A deserted motorway heading south from Calais

A bit of a boring stretch but was made easier by getting out the quiz book to pass the time and keep those little grey cells working!

We parked up for the night on an Aire at Le Sap (N48.89525 E0.33249) about 30kms south of Rouen.  It’s a free Aire beside a little lake that includes water, waste disposal and electric – thank you France!

Not only that we didn’t have to level off using our ramps as it was perfectly level front, back and sides!

Our little motorhome spirit level showing that we are perfectly level

Parked up next to us were another Brit couple from Scotland, who were heading down to Spain and around Portugal for 3 months to get away from the wet and cold winter of the UK.  This seems the norm for a lot of people with motorhomes these days.

They set off early this morning, but we had a lazy one and finally hit the road just before noon. It was raining by this time and didn’t let up all afternoon, so we decided to do a short stretch to a place called Arnage, just past Le Mans.

It's a small free Aire by the side of the River Sarthe that only takes 2 motorhomes, with free drinking water and toilet and waste disposal. Our neighbours for the night are a French couple in a camper van. There would be a picture, but it is raining ‘cats and dogs’ so I will hopefully take one in the morning and post it on the next blog!

Sally x