Europe May to Jul 16. Week 1 - 29 May to 4 Jun

Sun 29 May.  We had planned to visit the western side of France, going through Normandy, Brittany, Ile de Re and down to the Spanish Border, but due to the typical French strikes and potential fuel shortages we decided to hug the Eastern border and have a better chance of getting fuel outside of France.

We were meant to depart on Saturday, but the useless turds at DVLA managed to completely cock up our V5c (vehicle registration document) and we had to wait for the replacement to arrive. To add insult to injury we had to pay £6 in phone costs to DVLA to chase up their errors! However, on Sunday we set off in very good time,  had a slow drive down and, because of the threatened fuel shortages in France, went to fill the fuel tank in UK. Stopping at a rammed Maidstone services we found that they were charging fuel at an incredible 15p over the average price! We weren't paying that so we stopped for fuel in Sainsburys Ashford, which was 17p a litre cheaper than the robbing bastards at Maidstone Services were charging. We had a pootle around the John Lewis home shop then moved on down to the Chunnel Terminal where we  managed to get on an earlier crossing. After noshing a burger in the very quiet terminal we found ourselves in pole position on the train. On arrival it was a good job I noticed that the staff had not removed the wheel chocks from the front of the bus otherwise we wouldn't have gone anywhere.

We arrived at the safe aire at Gravelines and parked up just before a massive thunderstorm. We set the new alarm somewhat tentatively as it was the first time we had set the occupied alarm in anger. I just hoped that I remembered to unset it before opening the door in the morning otherwise all hell would let loose!

A reminder to unset the alarm

Monday 30 May. It rained. It poured. It chucked it down - all day. We drove to Cambrai, had a look at the aire, hated it and moved onto a nice little aire in Marcoin where we settled down for the afternoon to watch the rain. Eventually, after dinner, the rain eased and we walked into the tidy, nice town, but there was nothing there and it rained again, so we got wet. We did like the vegetable and egg dispensing machine though, and the free electricity when the street lights came on was a bargain.

 

Veg Machine

On Tuesday 31 May we moved down to Charleville-Meziers which is a pleasant town with a nice aire by the marina.  

Charleville-Meziers

The bread man cometh

Wed 1 Jun saw us crossing into Belgium, where walked around the chateau in Bouillon, followed by a gauffre (when in Belgium), before driving on in the peeing rain to Luxembourg.   Luxembourg is being dug up, with traffic jams everywhere and when we arrived at our intended campsite we found it to be full. We stuck two fingers up at Luxembourg, filled up with fuel at 70p per litre and buggered off into Germany along a lorry-jammed, awful, motorway until finding a great site in Saarburg. However, we made the mistake of following the Satnav and not the directions and arrived via cycle tracks over the hills to the rear of the site. I bet they wondered how we managed to get a 7m motorhome through their security barrier - hee hee. I bet it's not often that the Germans had experience of Brits breaking into one of their camps!

Bouillon

Bouillon

Soggy Saarburg

The site sits on top of a big steep hill/mountain and has a chairlift between the top and the bottom. On Thursday we  took this chairlift (once we found it (you would see it if you came in through the front door)) to Saarburg. We had a walk around the town and castle and ate jaegerzchnitzel in a nice restaurant before heading back up to sit in the rare sunshine for a few hours.

Fri 3 Jun.  We took the train from  Saarburg to Mettlach to visit some nice factory outlet shops. We ate an excellent (and cheap) schnitzel in the Villeroy and Bosch shop served on posh plates. Another train back to Saarburg and then had beer and ice cream in town.  Back at the site we had a beer in the bar and were given a coupe of scratch cards. They were gobsmacked that we won the top prize of an Adidas German football shirt. We ain't German and we detest football so we  gave the shirt to the thrilled  receptionist in exchange for a bottle of wine.

Sat 4 Jun. We were going to travel along the Moselle but the forecast wasn't good and the heavy rains suggested that the river may well threaten the campsites and stellplatz along the river. Accordingly we decided to head through the Alsace to Lake Annecy, a place that we had long wanted to visit. It was a long drive along pretty scenery to Kaysersberg in the Alsace. The shop I wanted to go to was once again shut, but the town is always worth a look around and we had some delicious Rhubarb Meringue Pie and bought some pretty shot glasses, plus 2 replacement cremant glasses.

Rhubarb meringue pie - yum