Update posted Thu 25 Jun 09

Preparations for the big trip - Tue/Wed 23 & 24 June

Although we don't start our travels until next Monday (29 June) we thought it would be interesting to mention these 2 days as part of our preparation to leave, if only because we discovered a very nice campsite near Durham and had excellent service from a motorhome dealer.

We tow our Smart car behind the motorhome on a Brian James trailer and we noticed a thin line of rust along the upper weld of the towbar hitch. This needed attention and so we arranged to take the motorhome on 23 June to Hedleys of Durham who fitted the towbar back in September 2008. It turned out that the rust was a surface flaw not affecting the integrity of the weld but Hedleys re-welded the hitch in any case -done under warranty and seems an excellent job - we continue to be very impressed with the service from Hedleys. We had booked the motorhome in on the 24 June for a habitation service at Tyne Valley Motorhomes(TVM, near Newcastle), preferring to have this done before our travels rather than on our return which would be a month after the due date in any case.

Rather than trek home across the Pennines only to have to return the next day, we camped near Durham. Yet again we found the local Caravan Club site to be fully booked (we wonder if it really was!) so we used a site just 6 miles east of the city at Strawberry Hill Farm. This was in a a delightful situation and a lovely site. It has a spotless although quite small sanitation/facilities block and is laid out on several levels with flat, marked pitches; a mixture of harstanding and grass, all with electric hook-up. Although there are only 2 loos and 2 showers in each of the ladies and gents, it's worth remembering that the site itself is not large.

The policy of the site's owners towards conservation of both wild vegetation and wildlife is superb and worthy of note. You may see rare species of moths and butterflies here. The weather for our one night stay was warm and sunny, but this is a great site in any weather. And only 40 minutes to TVM for our 10am appointment on Wednesday.

We did not buy our motorhome from TVM - we bought it from Discover, Carlisle. Carlisle is one of the many branches recently closed by Discover and leaves us with no local dealer handling our Swift Group product. We approached TVM having had several good reports of them and with support also from Swift, TVM were happy to "take on" our motorhome. Although any work at TVM means a 140 mile round trip, we think we are luckier than many owners affected by the Discover closures. Our welcome at TVM could not have been friendlier and the whole service was performed most professionally and efficiently at a most reasonable price. We cannot praise TVM too highly.

The service did not uncover any problems and we were on our way home by 4pm, having spent a pleasant day walking around the National Trust estate known as Gibside Chapel about 2 miles away. The fine weather encouraged us to walk there and back - the estate is a lovely place to stroll or picnic on a nice day. It also has a fascinating history. We enjoyed a late lunch at the Pack Horse Inn just 300m from TVM and serving good pub grub - good value too and made even better by a discount voucher from TVM.

Apart from last minute items our MH is packed and we are getting excited as departure day approaches!

Introduction - The Plan

To celebrate retirement we are making a 3-month tour starting in France and then taking in parts of Germany, Luxembourg and the Ardennes. We thought it would be fun, and we hope interesting to record our experiences in this blog! This will be our first big trip abroad in our motorhome since we bought it in September 2008.

For this tour we will be towing a Smart Cabriolet on a Brian James trailer behind our 7 metre Bessacarr E560 so we'll be a long outfit - about 11 metres total length. We leave home on 29 June and return on 24 September. The middle part of our holiday will be in the highest of the high season, and we suspect that with the trailer/car we will not be able to make much use of aires because of the space we would take up. So we have pre-booked campsites in the South of France (not the coast!) for what we think will be the five busiest weeks, while for the rest of the time we hope to use a mixture of accommodation from friends (with room for us and our outfit) and the France Passion scheme; perhaps also some campsites in the less popular areas and outside of the busiest weeks.

The planning and any booking are pretty much done now and we are getting excited. We will post our diary in more detail as we go along, but this is just an introduction and here are the main aspects of the trip:

• Dover-Dunkerque with Norfolk Line 2 July


• Pre-booked campsite near St Omer for 2 nights to 4 July just to have a relaxing start


• Making our way to La Rochelle via parts of Normandy and the Loire Valley to arrive there on 9 July to visit our friends for an 8 day stay. We've nothing booked between 4 and 9 July and hope to use France Passion as much as possible (numerous choices in the Loire)


• Leaving the MH at friends' house in La Rochelle (plenty of room there) and going with them to the Ile d'Oleron for a big Bastille Day party on 14 July


• Leaving La Rochelle on 17 July and making our way gradually to a site between Rodez and Albi where we've booked for a week from 23 to 30 July. Nothing has been booked between 17 and 23 July but our intended route is through Charente (Cognac!), Limousin, Correze and Cantal, relatively quiet places, so we hope not to have a problem with getting in either at FP locations or at campsites as long as we arrive fairly early each day. For our (booked) week in the Aveyron we intend to use the Smartie to explore this wonderful area.


• On 30 July we move on to a site at Millau in the Cevennes (well-known, at the S end of the Gorges du Tarn) - this is pre-booked for a week to 6 August when we move a fairly short distance East to another pre-booked site at Le Vigan. The idea of this is that it should allow us to explore (using the Smart again) the complete span of the Cevennes from West to East including the gorges and the very different landscapes around Mont Aigoual. It's an area we know well and a big favourite with us. We hope to do lots of walking in this area, just using the Smart for access. The Le Vigan site is booked to 13 August, when we move on to Provence.


• We have booked two further sites in Provence. The first is just NE of Orange and we are there just 4 nights - we chose the location because it is fairly near the Ceze and Ardeche gorges which we want to re-visit. On 17 August we move on to a site just E of Avignon where they encourage you to take your clothes off! We discovered this kind of thing in the former Yugoslavia in the 70s and especially enjoyed swimming "au naturel" and getting all-over tans. Not to everyone's liking of course and we're not as young as we were then - but it's quite an encouragement to slimming!!! We'll be careful about any photos we post from there!


• We start the Northward leg of our journey on 24 August and for this there is much less planning and so less detail. Basically we have to be with friends near Rouen on 21 September and what we do in that 4 weeks is up to how we feel at the time - nothing is booked at all and we hope that things will be quietening down enough, especially as we move into September, for this not to present us with a problem, even though we are towing. Our preferred routing would take in the Rhone Valley, Burgundy, Alsace, the Black Forest, the German Hunsruck (between the Rhine and Mosel), Luxembourg, the Ardennes and then via our friends to catch the (pre-booked) Norfolk Line ferry at Dunkerque on 23 September. We should get home on 24th.

Well that's just about it! But you know what the Scottish Bard said about "the best laid plans o' mice and men"!!!

We don't intend using toll autoroutes any more than we can help (though we may succumb at times I suspect) and we intend to do plenty of self-catering, especially barbecues. But I'm sure there will be some eating-out treats too!

There will be photos on the entries too; also reviews of campsites and FPs and tales of the many adventures that lie in store!!! We will try to (and hope to) avoid the dreaded D(isaster) word.

Roger and Marian