The last dregs of summer, 12 October 2022

It is already Wednesday, and only one week left, so we must start heading north and bid a final farewell to summer.

The sunset last night and sunrise this morning were pleasant, but not spectacular.

We didn't see our nice pig farmer this morning to bid him farewell, as we could hear his tractor some way away. 

We drove into Alès and went for a walk. It is pleasant, but not very photogenic, as most of the old city was razed and rebuilt in the 1960s,with predictable results! The Cathedral is lovely, though,

as was the cup of coffee we fortified ourselves with before returning to the WoMo and heading on towards Mende.

It was mostly a lovely drive, very scenic, if a bit sick-making. We managed to get diesel, which was a relief, and hope we will find some more but might just make it without. 

Shortly before we arrived, the heavens opened and there was a terrific hailstorm! This aire is a bit out of Mende, by the aerodrome, but we were not sure whether the town would be worth seeing except the Cathedral, which looked formidable! 

The last dregs of summer, 11 October 2022

The Swan Whisperer, having said he wanted to go to Gap, changed his mind up and decided to go to Mende via Ales instead. However, as we had spent two separate nights within spitting distance of Brignoles but only visited a supermarket on the outskirts, we decided to visit the town itself. A guidebook of ours helpfully suggested that if you park up in the Casino supermarket car park, it is only a short walk to the mediaeval town centre, and so it proved. I did a small shopping, and then we headed on. 

We had a lovely walk around the town

- there are loads more photos on Facebook - and then headed back to the WoMo to set off on a long drive, mostly on the motorway (I dozed an awful lot of the way, I have to admit!) to a tiny pig farm outside the village of St-Just-en-Vacquieres. 

There was nobody around when we arrived, but the France Passion signs made it clear where one should park, and the owner - very friendly, but with an incredibly strong local accent I found difficult to understand - came up on his tractor to say hello when he arrived. I am not sure if it is a residence or just farm buildings.

Anyway, there is a simply glorious view

on both sides of the motor home and, the owner said, glorious sunsets in one direction and glorious sunrises in the other! Still another half an hour or so before I can attest to the truth or otherwise of that assertion. The Swan Whisperer has gone to look at the pigs!

The last dregs of summer, 10 October 2022

The wind got up in the night and blew the rain away. The sky was still grey, so the Mediterranean wasn't the deep blue one expects it to be, but it was a very great deal less dreich than yesterday. 

Our first port of call was a Géant Casino (supermarket) just outside Cannes where I did a shopping and the SW swept out the van and had his coffee. The road there had been rather sick-making - hairpin bends the whole way - but not really frightening as it was nice and wide and had barriers both sides. 

After shopping, we drove up to Grasse, hoping to stop in the Pak'n'ride and see something of the town. Sadly, though, it was cars only, and although we parked up outside it to have an early lunch, we didn't feel able to leave it there. So that was a bust. 

The Swan Whisperer has some strange idea of taking the Route Napoleon (no, thank you!), but actually drove back west along the motorway (incidentally scoring some diesel which was about 20p a litre than the roadside garages, and even the supermarkets, are selling it for, when and if they have any) and up to this Camping-Car Park just outside Cabasse, but it isn't really possible to walk into the village as the road is very narrow with a lot of traffic and no pavement. So that's a bust, so too. 

I do hate not having a fixed (well, semi-fixed) itinerary, as I have no idea where we will be this time tomorrow, or whether we should start heading north, and how long will this fuel shortage last and so on. But the sun is shining and it is very warm again! 

The last dregs of summer, 9 October 2022

No summer today! It has rained nearly all day, and I don't think I have got out of the WoMo at all. Oh yes, to get bread and Sunday patisserie at the bakery in Le Val.

 Before calling at the bakery, we used the services and spent ages deciding where to go! It seemed an awful waste to be so near the Riviera and not visit it, but it was a horrible road to get there, all hairpin bends and steep drops with no barriers, horrendously narrow! And peeing with rain when we got there.

The SW had set the satnav to take us to Grasse, but the road up was again all hairpins, even though a main road, and I simply could not face it twice in one day!

But then I saw, on Google Maps, a place marked simply as "aire pour dormir", and we drove there to see. Just a large layby, but overlooking the sea, and loads of other motorhomes spending the night, too.

It is now stormy, windy and cold! I just hope this is the worst of the bad weather. The forecast does show it improving! 

The last dregs of summer, 8 October 2022

It rained in the night, and it was much more autumnal this morning. I hope we haven't said "Goodbye" to summer, even down here in the South of France. We said goodbye to our France Passion host, and our first port of call was a supermarket (naturally) where I bought our Saturday sausages and helped the Swan Whisperer buy a new cube of gas. He also topped up our diesel, as there is a severe, and growing worse, shortage of both diesel and, primarily, petrol, due to an ongoing refinery strike. 

We are hoping we can get diesel, at least until we get to Hauts-de-France, which is the area worst affected, as is the Paris area. But when we tried to come off the motorway to a service area to have lunch there was a huge, huge queue even to get off the motorway. So we came away. 

We basically drove down to Toulon and back up, but didn't see much because the main road through the city was all underground. But there were some lovely roads, although some awful hairpin bends - but only a couple at a time, not the unending array of them there was a few days ago. 

We arrived at this Camping-Car park in the village of Le Val, and after a cup of tea we set off to explore the place, which was lovely.

More photos on Facebook. And now back at the WoMo, hoping tomorrow won't be too wet, but the forecast isn't good! 

The last dregs of summer, 7 October 2022

A bit of a "nothing" day, really. I was tired, for some reason, and went back to sleep after breakfast, dreaming about a rather nice binman called Gordon (no, I don't know any binmen, and certainly not one called Gordon!) giving us a lift from Streatham in his bin lorry!

Anyway, when I came awake it was time to move on if we were not to have to pay an excess charge. So we went over to empty the grey and the black - we didn't need water, having filled the tank right up the previous evening - but when we got to the exit, my card didn't work. Again. Oh dear. However, I quickly discovered that the SW still had my card from turning on the water to empty the loo, and it was not too surprising that my Carrefour card didn't work! Once I had the correct card, no problem.

We drove through Martigues, stopping at the most enormous Carrefour you ever did see as I really fancied fish in parsley sauce for supper. Honestly, it was so huge it made the one in Cité Europe look like a convenience store in comparison.

We had decided to stop at a France Passion place between Marseilles and Salon de Provence, but when we got there, they were horribly vague about where to park, and we couldn't find the place at all, so we ate our lunch in the overflow car park and moved on to the one a few hundred metres down the road, where we were warmly welcomed, with a clear explanation of where to go, and the pitches are clearly marked, too. A lovely view of the hills (don't know why I can't move the picture!), and of the old house.

And little Thelwell girls

riding on Thelwell ponies. 

The last dregs of summer, 6 October 2022

There was such a lovely sunrise this morning! I actually got up before the Swan Whisperer, so it was my turn to make breakfast. After which, we called in at the farm shop where we had spent the night and bought some wine and one or two other bits. Including citronella essential oil to try to discourage the mosquitos that have been eating me alive just lately. I don't know how they get in - we are scrupulous about keeping the windows covered with mosquito netting at all times, but but... 

Once we set off, we made for Aigues-Mortes, a fortified town which we have been to before.

 We first called in at a Super U about a kilometre out of the town. Years ago, we spent a couple of nights at a motel in the same roundabout, and knew it was there. Then we moved on to the town proper. The motorhome parking was very near one of the entrance gates, and we enjoyed walking through the town to the main drag where every shop is a restaurant! We picked one at random to have lunch in, and I for one thoroughly enjoyed my open sandwich with onions, burger, egg and salad. Followed by ice cream. The SW chose coffee; I should have liked nougat, but they were out, so I had a scoop of "Fougasse d'Aigues-Mortes",. I am still not quite sure what it was, other than delicious! 

After lunch, we wandered back to the WoMo and set off again, this time round the Camargue to the town of Port-Saint-Louis-du-Rhone, crossing the river on the ferry we have used several times before.

We are in a Camping-Car park here, just by the canal, and we have seen several boats go up and down, including a naval vessel and the longest barge you ever did see - and so long I thought it was a train at first! The SW has gone for a walk, but has just come back as I type!