Bonjour

Bonjour Amis

We left you last time in Hastings where we stayed the night after finding out it was the annual Morris Dancing event – they are all so serious jumping around and the place just buzzing with people! After Hastings we decided to catch up with Rachel Cassidy again and get our insurance papers for the camper which we did in Brighton (no we aren’t back in Christchurch), the GPS told us it would take us one hour to get there however because of the traffic it took us two and half – Brighton was an even bigger seaside spectacle than Hastings – incredible – we sat on the beach with Rach and her friends then got a beautiful paella from a stall and headed to Dover where we had booked a ferry crossing for 1.15am - we know very early however the crossing was cheap at that time and we are unemployed!! Had a nice meal out and then slept on the side of the road for a couple of hours before heading to the ferry.

Now that we have exited the England, but going back later, we thought we might share a few of our thoughts.

One-liners ? The best we’ve heard is “that’s not my department” when trying to buy some deck chairs at a hardware store. Don’t laugh, the second guy came along and said the same thing.

Dogs? Dogs everywhere, seen them in a bank, a shop, even have their own “pub dogs”, everyone has a dog, more dogs than people and that’s saying something.

Outlook? Glass always half empty, “might be nice day now but you wait until the weather turns”.

Banking? Trying to do a transfer of money to buy camper cost us $60 and wasn’t a simple process of course, seems like we are back in ‘80s for banking.

Food? Chips with everything, fish & chip outlets prolific.

Pubs? On every corner, great country pubs with even the city ones having real character.

Scenery? Fantastic, country towns wonderful, London spectacular.

Useless information? Yes the water does go down the plug anti-clockwise, the sun still rises in the East and sets in the West but goes round the South direction.

Roads? Crap, going along the M25 is like riding over judder bars at 130kph. A couple of locals called the Motorways England’s biggest carparks. Traffic horrendous, it is unfathomable the amount of vehicles on the road, even the country lanes in the SE are busy, absolutely amazing. Might be clogged but generally more courteous than back home, a real plus for the English.

Ferried across the channel from Dover to Calais without any problems, didn’t even get asked for Passports or get checked by anyone, amazing.

WOW we are in France, it is 3.30am, we are driving on the wrong side of the road, Rae facing oncoming traffic, GPS not working again (different country) and two very tired people – what to do? Find a quiet country lane and pull over as far as we can and go to sleep for a couple of hours before being woken by the roosters.

We then drove to Dunkirk and had a look around the ANZAC war memorials before parking up at Dunkirk Beach for the night with about 14 other campers, it was a very cold wind blowing so didn’t move far.

Next day we went to Dunkirk markets and managed to buy fruit, veges, cheese and bread – our French needs to improve!

Went to a supermarket and stocked up (we think we got what we needed as everything in French). Drove on the back roads – a lot less stressful than the main highways and we get to see all the villages where if you put out your bread bag the local baker will leave you a freshly baked baguette, the houses are similar to the UK but very clean and tidy with shutters on the windows – we drove as far as Frevent and spent the night in a very average camping ground with no power but no matter as we were on the way to Paris, our next destination!

We arrived in Paris about 3.00pm as we were trying to avoid the traffic – I think we came in on the really dark side of Paris – we were the only camper to be seen, lots and lots of traffic and very narrow streets which if the Parisians decide to stop they just do – not so easy if you are a wide camper trying to go past – however that was nothing until we got to the round-about that our wonderful GPS told us to take the 5^th exit and there were about 6 lanes wide – well off we go – Brent asking who gives way to who – Rae replying just give way to everything and Brent saying well we are bigger than them let’s just go – Bali is nothing on this!!! We are now at the camping ground just 10km from the centre of Paris and looking forward to tomorrow to go sightseeing. Before that a few drinks to settle the road nerves and Rae cooking up a storm in the camping-car (that’s what our camper is called here). Paris central is home to over 2 million people and we are very much in the heart if it. Our Lonely Planet book said you need nerves of steel to drive in Paris, Brent has Platinum is his veins with maneuvering the wide 7m long camper through this, “out of the way sheep shaggers” came to mind several times.

A bientot