Day One, Thursday 30th March 2017; A steady drive southwards in Harry from Oakleigh Close, with an extended break at Peterborough services to make some necessary phone calls. 266 kms covered to arrive at Bearsteds Caravan and Motorhome Club site just off the M20.

By quill and by pen, I’ll stay here again! The feather was on the ground beside Harry when I parked up. I tried to think of a way to include it in a photo …

Day 2: Friday 31 March: Up in good time and saw the sun come up on Harry:

All jobs done and off site at 8am. A brief stop at Folkestone services and arrived at Dover at 9.20. A late breakfast on the ferry and off at Calais at 12.45 local time. Headed for Paris – slow as always, but it was moving. Carol was often irritated by my logging journeys, but it paid off this time, as I remembered a nice motorway lay-by not far south of Paris, but I couldn’t recall its name. It was in the logbook, though – Aire de Boutroux – and I found it again for the night (429kms from Bearsteds) – even had my own picnic table for breakfast, had I wanted it, but the weather was not conducive:

In fact, having left Yorkshire on the hottest day of the year and driven through temperatures of up to 22°, it got progressively colder the further south I went! An aspect of this lay-by which I had forgotten, if it was so last time I was here, is that the landscape is windfarms as far as the eye can see:

Enlarge the photo if you can and you’ll see what I mean …

Day 3, Saturday 1st April: No fooling! Using the log from July 2015 again, I knew there was a service area just 15 minutes down the road – BUT this one, like others in the sector, is currently undergoing major reconstruction and parking is especially challenging, even more so because this was the first day of the school holidays and the Parisians were heading south en masse … congested motorways are unusual in France, but this was so significant that for a while the speed limit was reduced from 130 to 110 kph. So the idea that I might have a comfortable café-croissant and use the wifi was a fantasy and I moved on after a loostop.

So we made steady progress through deteriorating weather – certainly not ‘gettinotter’! – and checking the rivers as markers of progress – the Loire, the Loir, the Cher, – white blossom dominating the hedgerows – maythorn or acacia, I couldn’t be sure – with sections of yellow gorse intervening, and cowslips in the verges, so that after 340 kms we got to the old favourite, Briance-Ligourd. It was only 4.40 pm and I could have done more, but I like this place, though Carol wouldn’t overnight here because the loos are awful. I dined on ‘lapin au van’ brought from Meltham and which had been defrosting all day, and enjoyed the changing weather aspects, including an interesting, partly double, rainbow, which had two ends, but no middle!

Day 4: Sunday 2nd  April: I was puzzled yesterday when I needed to look for fuel before reaching the ‘usual’ spot at Limoges. That’s till I realised that we hadn’t usually travelled from Calais to Limoges, but from Rouen – it does make a difference! So when fuel ran low, and not wanting to pay motorway prices, I put satnav to good use (which I’ve only recently learnt to do) and found a nearby Centre Commercial to go and fill up at. (OK, pedants – at which to go and fill up). Today, moved off at 8.45 just to go 15 minutes down the road to the Porte de Correze, where I did have breakfast this time and used the wifi, but not for long, because I couldn’t find a socket and I’d carelessly not charged the computer either at Rachel’s or at Bearsteds. (There were sockets for the purpose, but at ‘stand-up’ positions, not in the café where I was having breakfast …)

The drive becomes increasingly scenic, especially before and after crossing the Dordogne, but the weather was still not playing if the idea was that the journey south was leading to warmth. Leaving Yorkshire at 22°, you don’t expect 14° to be the best the south of France can offer! I had time to spare before meeting Rachel and Shannon off the plane in Carcassonne, and I was concerned by … unpleasant odours in the van (sorry, Harry, not your fault!) So I made time to find the municipal ‘aire de camping cars’ where, for €5 I was able to use the facilities and empty the toilet cassette (too much information? – sorry!, but that’s life!) Then to the airport, where Rachel texted me that it was ‘chaos’ at baggage reclaim, but they came through at about 5.45 and at about 7.20 we pulled into ‘Sunejo’ ….. 454 kms from Briance-Ligourd, 1,160 from Calais and 1,589 from Wakefield, that’s 993 miles … I don’t quite know how I did that!