France Part 7 - Sports Car Instead Of The Motorhome?
I wanted to start by mentioning a few differences when camping in France and the UK, as there are some noticeable differences. And let me start with the toilet facilities.
The first one is always checking there is loo roll in place; I think it was the first site we were on that nearly caught me out. My wife thankfully noticed first and told me, and my embarrassment was saved. I’d hate to have been phoning her to bring some loo roll and throw it over the door. Imagine if I’d forgotten and I didn’t have my phone – that could have been nasty and doesn’t really bear thinking about, so sorry for that introduction, but it's also relevant!
Also, a lot of the toilets don’t have seats, and I have never asked the reason. Is it cost-saving? Is it a hygiene issue, with fewer places for germs to hide? Either way, here on day 18 of the holiday, we have pitched up in a lovely little site at a village called Fougeres, and the campsite is beside Lac d’Eguzon, and it is called ‘Camping Municipal De Fougeres.’ As previously mentioned, I will always name the good ones. And beautiful it is too, with Lisa on reception being helpful and friendly, and with my translation app, once again we have overcome the language barriers. But again, after popping to the loos to suss them out, the warning went to the wife: ‘no loo rolls.’ Be careful!
We originally found a little aire, near the centre of the town of Chateauroux, which sounded lovely; however, as you can see, it wasn’t up to much, but then it was free. However, we got here at 1.00pm, and it was sweltering, too hot to take the dogs out, too hot to leave them in the motorhome, and not the nicest of places to sit with the deck chairs out, so we decided to miss the town and drive on instead - a pity, really, but hey ho! I am presently sitting in the motorhome on the site with a fan blowing cool air, because at 95 degrees it is too hot to sit outside!
Didn’t quite suit us today, even if it’s free, but another time!
Back to the toilets, and they are nearly always unisex, as are the showers, so don’t be surprised to find yourself walking in or out of a block with the opposite sex; it is often the same in bars and restaurants. And in all honesty, you have no choice, so you just get on with it, but here is a funny photo on the Huttopia campsite; there is no privacy here except for your body. Who's going to see anything through you, though plenty through a glass door!
I can see you, the reflection shows the glass door!
However, on another site there were urinals outside in the open, and if you were that way inclined, you would have been able to see things had you wanted; unfortunately, I didn’t get a photo, and I definitely didn’t get a look! But that’s how things are over here! Even walking along a side road to the bar last night, there was a small toilet block off to one side for the public to use, with a men’s urinal in full view. Fortunately, no one was using it!
We do love our little home on wheels, but one thing I find strange is that our waste tap water is disposed of by pulling this lever on the outside of the vehicle just behind the driver’s door, and it just flows out and into a drain. However, if I want to drain my fresh water tank, which we should all do when storing a vehicle, I have to get to the tank by lifting seat covers and boards, opening the screw-top cap, and pulling out a plug at the bottom of the tank, which is a bit of a palaver. You may be asking why I don’t just put a tap on and let it become wastewater to drain away, and maybe that is the idea, but then I couldn’t be sure the freshwater tank would be completely empty, and there’s only one way to do that (see palaver.)
But once again we learned the hard way; not long after we bought Mary, we were away for a couple of days, and we were filling up with water. Impatient me was outside, waiting for the good lady to shout that it was full, and it seemed to be taking some time. All of a sudden, she shouted. 'Stop, we have a flood,’ and the hose was soon out of the refill point.
On entering our motorhome, there was water all over the floor, and so a cleanup operation started, and so did the worry. We know we got most of the water out by sweeping it out the habitation door, but where else could it have gone? There are all sorts of little gaps, fittings of pieces together, and gaps near the driver’s seat, and you know how water escapes into all sorts of places you don’t want or need!!
Eventually I managed to speak to someone where we bought the vehicle from, and they said that if we had gotten rid of most of the water, we should be okay, and thankfully, two full habitation checks later, we are okasame;y. However, I am sure you know where I went wrong, because I mentioned the screw top on the water tank! Yes, some muppet - and not my wife, had opened the tank and hadn't screwed the lid on, never mind properly. It was just sitting there on top of the tank! So, any time you may need to access your clean water tank, just remember the muppet who didn’t screw it back on and the flood, and use that as your reminder and your trigger point!
And for a minute back to driving in France, we have been on our first country lanes with hills and bends with chevrons, but in France, they are blue and white! I’m still surprised, as there are still no hills on the horizon as such, certainly not as expected, but my trusty co-pilot tells me that will be soon, by the end of the week (it’s Wednesday as I write,) and we are officially ‘winging it' as of today. With the first two weeks planned and booked, that is no more. So, we shall see, but it is how we found this lovely municipal site in Fougeres.
And for the record, most of the roads are still the same, to the extent I believe one straight road must have been 5/6 miles long with no bends. One was about 3 miles long, round a simple bend without taking your foot off the accelerator, even in a motorhome, and another 2 miles straight, and not a police car in sight.
Now I would never encourage people to break the law, and please don’t. But if I were ever to come out here in our little summer two-seater convertible runaround, I would be breaking the law, probably at about 2.00am with my music turned up loud. Yes, I still get a buzz out of speed, and there’s still a bit of an ‘old man racer’ in me. I know the car can do 120mph, because someone told me!! But if I were here, I would want to see if it could go any faster than that, as I believe it can, especially on these roads, but please don’t ever speed.
Who knows, maybe 140mph?
I have come across more traffic lights that seem to be there for no reason, more 100-meter 30 km/h zones, when there was no reason for them to be there bar a couple entrances to houses. There will be a logical reason, but my logical head can’t quite work it out; maybe there isn't one, so maybe I never will!
Another thing I noticed today was that on the outskirts of a small settlement, the triangle indicating a pedestrian crossing was flashing, and good too, as it is a good way of warning drivers, but I wondered why in such a small settlement and on such a quiet road. It doesn’t happen that often in the bigger towns? Is it to make sure we are alert when we are out driving in the country and maybe not concentrating as much? Because it does draw your attention to it, and maybe it's not such a bad idea at all. In bigger towns, are we more alert to the fact that there are more people and therefore more crossings?
There are also digital displays for your speed, and I thought I had broken the code. Green with your speed displayed is obviously good, and my speed was lighting up in green every time I came across one, doing the speed limit or under.
When I approached it going over the limit, it would come up in red, and by slowing down to under the speed limit in time, it would turn to orange. As if to say you were going too fast, you’re okay now, but be warned. Quite sensible and logical in my little world. But that theory went out the window today when I approached the digital display, travelling under the speed limit, only for it to come up flashing in orange, and so now, after two weeks driving, I am back to square one, but I’ll try to get it right without research before I go home.
That aside, folks, the roads still run through thousands of acres of arable land, and while my descriptions have been the same for most of these first two weeks, it is far from boring; in fact, it is lovely countryside to be driving through. It is different, sure; if you travelled it every day, you may get bored, but as a tourist you won't; it’s very nice!
One thing, though, I have mentioned the lack of potholes, and that is still the same. Let me also tell you about the lack of laybys. On an A-class-style road, a good old-fashioned parking place where you just want to pull over, check your route, have a coffee, hide behind a tree if needed, let the dogs out, and check you’ve still got enough mints. That kind of layby, but for miles after tens of miles in France, you normally won’t find one. But then within ten miles you’ll find three, although the last example is rare, and often there are none.
It’s kinda similar on dual carriageways and the toll road we were on; there are not as many service stations that you will find in the UK. Sure, they are there, but not as many, so it's just something else to think about when you’re planning a trip. Some pull-over places on main routes are just that, pull-overs, with no fuel, maybe toilets, and a rest area, but signs will indicate what is available to you. Some will be the rest area, and the next one will have everything, so just be careful if you’re one of those ‘orange light car needs fuel’ people.
I would recommend you don’t do that in France; use your quarter tank level as your refueling marker. Now I mentioned in a post about FOMO, the ‘fear of missing out.’ Have I just created a new acronym, FOMOOD? Fear of missing out on diesel? I can't see it myself as the new generation would use FOMOOEC. Fear of missing out on electric charging, or maybe FOMOOU, fear of missing out on unleaded!
Diesel is so me - old-fashioned!
Okay, the dogs look hungry, so best I go do the doggy daddy bit here.
Thanks for reading
DJ
