We stayed in our Dutch camping – La Motte – in the middle of absolutely nowhere – for two nights hoping Glenda’s back would get better. We had a lovely lunch on the terrace at the Bistro de Circuit. We thought Circuit was the name of the village. But it wasn’t. The Circuit de Haute Saintonge is a motor racing circuit constructed in 2009 to attract employment to the area – and probably to let the owner race his Lamborghini off the road.
It’s mainly a weekend sort of place where amateurs can get to try out fast cars. Had we eaten there on Saturday I guess it would have been rather noisy! We didn’t, so it wasn’t!
A quick visit to Chalais, the nearest, biggish town introduced us to the concept of Terrace Rental Wars. A small cafe run by ex-pat volunteers located on one open space was not allowed to serve their customers on said terrace because a bigger outfit (which was actually on a different street across the road!) had claimed the space! That’s Europeans for you. Which reminds me we were approaching election day. This town listed no less than 34 parties/candidates to choose between – including… Oh No!…
Somebody should tell them… Or we could lend them Boris or Theresa! Or both!
We managed a couple of miles walk that evening, but Glenda was extremely sore even with lots of tablets plus wine.
The next day, we tangled with the Spanish and Portuguese lorries on the A10 and A63. Great strings of the things – but at least they are not permitted to overtake for miles in the vicinity of Bordeaux.
Us mixing it with the big boys…
We had thought we might stop at Rauzan near St Emilion before heading to Oyambre in Spain. We met a couple Americans there last year who were travelling in a rented camper van (rented camper vans are OK, btw). Ann and Glenn. In the end, we rushed straight past. Had we stopped we would have met Ann and Glenn who were, coincidentally, camped there for a couple of days this year too! First missed friends!
We had supposed to be in Oyambre with Mad Mary and Barry this week, but because of a certain ferry company cancelling crossings left and right (did I mention that already?!), we didn’t arrive in Spain until the day before they were due to leave. And it was raining on the north coast so we dived south to Haro. Second missed friends!
We were due to meet Barry and Sybil in Haro, but the site was jammed with weekender so we left there the following morning heading for Morocco. Third missed rendesvous!
And with Pia and Grant near Jaca, we won’t be seeing them this trip either! Number four. Oh dear. Nobody will be speaking to us!
The site we eventually settled at was Camping Monte Holiday at Gargantilla del Lozoya, in the valley of the Lozoya River. As it was still the weekend it was full of Madridians. Spaniards can be noisy at the best of times, but when 15 families with 600 children between them get partying, it’s, well it just IS anyway! On the bright side, by Sunday afternoon we could hear the birds singing and passing traffic again!
We were left in splendid isolation …
… with great panoramic views of the surrounding mountains out of our windows…
OK. Enough’s enough. More about some firsts we have experienced on this trip later.
I didn’t get any “notification” about this post, so that doesn’t seem to be working as yet. You are getting better weather than us at the moment- we’ve had a fair bit of rain the last two days in Sarajevo, but nice when the sun does come out. Heading to Dubrovnik tomorrow, so hopefully better weather on the coast. I assume you have arrived in Spain at last, my knowledge of place names in that area is very limited.
Always have so much trou le logging in to the site…..maybe it is me?????? Xxxxxxx
Possibly. I haven’t heard anything about this from anyone else. But you never know with these clever systems!