Thursday. Ger y Felin.

Home again. The drive was scenic! We saw the Seine which completes our set of all the major French rivers!

We didn't get to the Millau Viaduct but we did see its little brother - the Pont de Brotonne - much less scary. Then a mild crossing....

and so we say farewell to France, or is it au revoir?

We were held up on the ship..... they loaded extra lorries, cars, people who were ex-Brittany Ferries passengers which meant we were sat waiting to off-load for an hour. Got away at 10.30 then the long drive home. Several stops for coffee later we got in to find everything nice and cosy.

Wednesday. Maintenon.

Today we head for Le Havre for the five o'clock boat. There doesn't seem to be a scenic route so we will just try to avoid the Peage and see where Snooper takes us. Then back to sunny Wales as soon as we hit dry land. (Although I gather from the forecast it may be soggy land.)

Tuesday. Maintenon.

And so we say farewell to the Auvergne ......


and just in time judging by those clouds!
We headed up to the Loire Valley and followed it up to Orleans. Not that we saw much of the Loire - it was hidden by trees mainly. But we did see quite a lot of the Loire Canal.



Then we headed for Chatres. We saw the cathedral ..... fleetingly through trees at traffic lights.


Now we are settled in at our site which is on the outskirts of Maintenon. As you can see we had to fight for the best pitch....

Monday. Ceyrat.

A rest day. No, really, a day of resting. A short stroll into town to buy bread (shops close on Mondays!), a mid afternoon walk around the site and a gentle evening perambulation is all we have done. The rest has been sitting and reading and surfing (web surfing, not the wet kind).




View from outside reception.




Walking on site.




There are a lot of sweet chestnut trees here.




The sun going down.
Tomorrow we head north along the Loire valley for an overnight stop a few hours from Le Havre. We hope to see some chateauxses on the way.

Monday, day off

Really a day off this time. We walked into town to buy bread, and some fig rolls for Chris (why?). We read, or iPadded; I am reading a History of France, which is entertaining and interesting, although consists almost entirely of fighting. If not French fighting French, then French fighting Abroad, or Abroad fighting French. Or Black Death, famine, revolution...not a light hearted read. We went out for a walk in the afternoon and then saw an art exhibition in a Cultural Centre just on the edge of the town. I liked a series of cartoon drawings someone had done, and a very good study of a woman and her bright red shoes. So, a quiet day, restful and peaceful. No scary precipices, no 6.5 km walks. We may watch Love in a Cold Climate this evening, or we may not.

Sunday, Puy de Dome and long walk

Geology day today. Plenty of it around here, and very interesting it is too, also very pleasant to look at. Puy is a geological term used in the Auvergne to mean a volcanic hill. There are a lot of Puys, and we went up the Puy de Dome, which is a pretty big one and can be seen from miles around. We went up in a little train, a rack railway, with fabulous views from the big picture windows. At the top you could walk all around and see panoramic views of the Auvergne and lots of evidence of major volcanic activity roundabout, including many other smaller Puys. There were also the remains of a Roman temple to the god Mercury, who was the god of commerce, medicine and travellers, a pretty useful kind of god, I'd say. But the temple was eventually knocked down and a saint Barnaby was installed, who specialised in erasing pagan gods. Now, there is also a massive communications tower and associated tall building at the very top, above the temple, so I imagine saint Barnaby is not too pleased about that.
I had to take a picture for a big group of French people who said 'cheese' for me but I made them say 'saucissons and sausages' too, just to be sure.
We moved on in the afternoon to look at more places but got sidetracked quite soon by a large lay by next to some really amazing basalt formations towering high above the road. Out of the car before us came people with walking boots and sticks, then another car came, walking boots again, and we thought, are we missing something here? So on with our walking boots and, will you credit it, another 6.5 kilometre walk, only worse this time, for upness and major downness. A good walk, woods, close up basalt formations again, rolling countryside, one cafe for oranginas, and through a farm with cows. Blue markers and blue crosses all the way. Very glad to get back to the Rosie May.
We have moved pitches because we had to have a push from two other campers this morning to get off our pitch which was grass and turned out to be quite soft underneath.

Sunday. Ceyrat.

As you will know Sunday is a day of rest so we only went up one volcano and did a 6.5km walk.
We did go up on a train though.



Two for the price of one - here you have a Roman temple (dedicated to Mercury) and also a volcanic landscape littered with cones.



We then drove on, heading for somewhere, and pulled in to a lay by for a photo opportunity and found a walk. We never got to the somewhere!












Rock is amazing stuff.

Saturday, rest day Ceyrat

When I say rest day, I use the term loosely.
First, let me say a word about the loos here. Oh dear. There is one of those, you know, not very nice foreign arrangements, involving a hole in the floor and not much else. Most unsuitable. Men and women together. Well, my dears, I don't think so. Rosie May's splendid English facilities will be used to the full during these few days here.
The rest day consisted of not taking the van out. We strolled around the town
for a while, particularly enjoying the most striking hanging baskets in vibrant, brilliant colours and blossomy, leafy profusion. Then we took a short walk starting a little way from town, up the Gorge de Ceyrat. A thickly wooded footpath with not a soul about. Lovely to be among such lush green vegetation after the strong yellows, reds and browns of the Camargue. What a contrast.
The path led upwards and we just kept going, meaning only to see what was round the next corner, since there was limited visibility beyond the trees and we didn't know where we were going. The notice at the start of the walk had said follow the blue marks for a six point five km easy walk. Not if it was a circular walk or not. We came across a stone Dolmen, a small notice told us that this was what it was, though Chris had his doubts, a prehistoric rock fall landing one massive rock lid upon some other massive rocky debris seemed more likely to him. The walk eventually opened out onto a hilltop from which we could see for miles and miles over the landscape to mountains beyond. Cows with bells on their collars provided the soundtrack. Chris asked a friendly native, with impressive gestures and non specific vocalisations, can we carry on or do we have to go back, if we wish to return to Ceyrat? Continue, he said, with a laugh, and went back to collecting blackberries. We began to feel it might be a circular walk, and so it was. So, down again to the town, through a village, Verzet, where some of the houses had truly magnificent views but in many cases large specimen trees planted squarely between the views and the windows. What I especially liked about the footpath was the way marking, in that, every time you wondered, were you on the right path, a small blue oblong marker on a tree or stone came into view. And best of all, if there was ever any possible doubt in your mind, there was a blue X, so you knew, Non! This is Not the Way you Want, Madame, Look for the Small Oblong Bleu, and you will be Fine.
About five miles in total, but a lot of up, and glad to get back to the kettle and bottle, respectively.

Caption competition: things are not going to plan, he has seized a twig, what is he saying?



Alleged Dolmen...

Saturday. Ceyrat.

Today was our rest day so we didn't do much. Just a five mile walk into town and along a gorge and up to the hills above the town and back down again. Lovely views at the top.

Friday, from The Camargue to The Auvergne

This was a journey between two very different regions, becoming softer, greener then more mountainous as we moved North. The main road into the Auvergne was a magnificent route through mountain passes and in and out of valleys. We had to peer through the mist in places but could see the splendid scenery from some quite high roads, occasionally with a drop at one side, but not as hair raising as other mountain routes we have taken.
The road took us through Le Puy en Velay about which some rude words have been written by my co-author. There may well be some delightful rustic and picturesque parts to the town which we did not see en passant. It is a town which is supposed to have three peaks, each topped with a church or statue, one of the most impressive sights in France. We found, from the main road through, that it had an impressive amount of road works and traffic lights, also a good number of traffic snarl ups. We didn't see it at its best. We passed a very impressive statue commemorating the resistance, however, but we didn't stop to admire it.
We did a brief supermarket stop and bedded down for the night at Ceyrat, in a leafy berth, with not a mosquito in sight.

Friday. Ceyrat, nr Clermont Ferrand. Auvergne.

Pleasant drive up country through cities, towns and villages. And one spectacular gorge on the l'Allier. We broke the journey by trying to visit Le Puy en Velay. The guide book says it is picturesque with churches and castles built on volcanic peaks. And it is a World Heritage Site. It is an eyesore. This is my picture of Puy en Velay.....



It is a volcanic bomb used as an edging stone in a lay by. It was the most interesting thing we saw.
Other highlights from the journey ....






And this is our pitch.

Thursday. Les Saintes Marie de la Mer.

A day out in the van to drive around the Carmargue. We called in at various ornithology sites.





We drove past fields where they were harvesting the rice!



And we went out to where sea salt is created by evaporating sea water.

Thursday, to La Palissade

After a windy night the day turned out to be, yes, hot and sunny again. There was a little pleasant and cooling cloud in the morning, but the afternoon and evening were full on, heating turned up to full whack. In order to avoid scratching like flea ridden mongrels, we are both regularly anointing ourselves with antihistamine cream; the Camargue mosquitos are vicious. Chris has one bite that he swears is a vampire bite, but he hasn't started shimmering yet (in-joke). They introduced a fish from Florida into the lagoons that was supposed to eat the mosquito larvae and reduce the problem, the fish liked it here, the egrets loved the fish, but it didn't reduce the number of mosquitos.
We drove around the Etang de Vaccares, right to the other side. It was a very interesting drive through Mediterranean wetland landscape. We saw water in the form of lakes, canals, ditches and later the river Rhone itself on either one or sometimes both sides of the road, with the reeds that grow so prolifically fringing the banks and the verges. There was great birdlife too, plenty of the flamingos we are now used to, pink flamingos, they call them 'flamants' here. We stopped at the Centre of Information of the Reserve National of Camargue. We had a walk of around a kilometre and a half with hides every so often. Chris tried hard to photograph an exceptionally lovely butterfly, large and plentiful, but constantly on the move and always closing its wings the few times it landed. He didn't manage to get it. He also tried hard to capture the one cattle egret that still had a yellow mop of feathers on its head. But the bird was perched in a frothy, frondy bush and was engaged in giving itself a lengthy and thorough pedicure with foot massage and full toe and ankle preening, in short, it kept its head down.
The next time we stopped properly, other than to take photographs which we did a lot, was at the observation area for the salt pans at Salin de Giraud. Lorries were scraping up the salt from the dry pan beds and filling other lorries which shuttled back and forth between the salt pans and two salt mountains. It was possible to buy a kilo of salt for 3 euros at the works.
We had our baguettes and cheeses for lunch at the observation area along with another of the wicked almond pastries.
The end of the line for us was La Palissade and beyond to the shore of the Mediterranean, at the point where the Rhone joins the sea. Lots of motor homes lined up along the shore, and further along an area with motor homes and caravans that looked run down and scruffy. We had left Rosie May looking towards the river, over a lagoon with a noisy colony of Sandwich Terns, splashing and squabbling together in the sunshine.
Back at the site, we were both surprised to see someone had parked their van in our space, even though we had left it clearly marked, and our water carrying things and marker had gone, too. Not a pleasant return, till we realised we were looking in the wrong place, and our space was in the next bay along, behind the hedge. We were greeted by two English vans parked opposite to our real space, newly arrived and both identical to ours, friends travelling together. Same make, same year, but named differently as theirs were from the next and last batch of Autocruise vans, just before the company was bought out by Swift. We all congratulated each other on the excellence of our good taste, wisdom and general perspicacity in making such an enlightened choice of vehicle.

Wednesday. Les Saintes Marie de la Mer.

At last! We have got to reception with no-one else on line so all the backlog of posts have gone up.

Wednesday. Les Saintes Marie de la Mer.

We cycled to the Parc Ornotholigique. Lovely but windy weather. Many flamingos and a few other treats.

Wednesday, Camargue

Windy, windy, windy. Un vent violent all day; we have taken down the awning for fear of taking off like Mary Poppins. The wind has blown away the mosquitos so it must be the ill wind that blows no-one any good. It has been sunny, too, so we have had the benefit of warmth with airy coolness. We spent most of the day in the Parc Ornithologique at Pont de Gau. It is about 4 or 5 km. from our site and with the strong head wind it took us about twenty minutes or so to get there on our bikes, using the cycle lanes clearly marked on the main road. The way took us past six or seven stables with groups of the local white horses saddled ready and waiting for visitors who wish a 'promenade en cheval'. One specialised in palominos, in case the more discerning visitor might wish a horse of a different colour.
The Parc is part of the Etang de Vaccares National Nature Reserve. It is beautifully kept and managed, with many different birds too see. A very few are in captivity in aviaries...horned owls, short tailed eagles, an Egyptian Vulture and some black storks. The rest are in the two parts of the reserve, one part with a concentration of 'collection' birds, white storks, three kinds of egret, flamingo and herons, for example. Possibly these are fed, some pochard were pinioned so had to stay there. This was also where Chris spied a bright green lizard half way up a bush by the side of the path. The other part is wilder and takes longer to walk round. There are hides with no seats and with long narrow windows that are too high or too low for most people. But with good birds, so we forgive. Chris spotted a night heron which had just caught an enormous frog and was juggling it about prior to swallowing it with some difficulty. We also enjoyed seeing five or six snipe feeding out in the open. All along the watersides, both sides of the footpath, are wonderful tall rushes which provided a magnificent dry, rustling soundtrack for the afternoon. We explored the first part of the reserve in the morning and the second part in the afternoon, with a picnic lunch in between.
The cycle ride home was a lot faster with the following wind. We sat out for about an hour with beer and tea before we needed some respite from the wind and took shelter in the van.

Tuesday. The Carmargue.

Again, we are having a little difficulty blogging, Chris's iPad 3 wasn't able to send, though my prehistoric iPad 1 had more success.

We set out on the bicycles in the morning, thinking it would be cooler and we would see more birdlife. It was cooler and we were glad it was not full sun as we made our way along the cycle path leading away from the town and into the wetlands, the Camargue National Park. There was so much to look at that we made slow progress. At times big, colourful dragonflies would travel apace with us, or swerve across our path, seeming to be just about to crash into us at times. As we approached the entrance to the Park water was being pumped into the lagoon and a string of flamingoes paddled and swilled in the churned up water. Richer water, no doubt. At the edge of the lagoon you could see how red the water is; these flamingoes have naturally pink plumage, nothing needed out of a bottle for the Camargue birds. The path was excellent for almost all the way we chose to do. It had wonderful views on both sides, the sea on one side and the lagoons on the other. In just a few places a great deal of sand had blown onto the path and we had to get off and push for a short distance. We saw dried evaporated river beds covered thickly with salt, white and shiny in the sun. With tracks of some smallish animal criss crossing every so often, coypu perhaps.
Tea break overlooking the water basin, we had a bottle of water and scrummy pastries: long and thin, flaky pastry, filled with vanilla scented creme patissiere, almonds, sugar...I wish I could have another one...ah, wait, I can...I will have another tomorrow.
We have seen Camargue white horses and black bulls, very romantic.Town in the afternoon, very full of tourists, an interesting church with no windows, a fortress against the Saracens. We climbed the tower for a view of the sea and the National Park behind the town.

Tuesday. Les Saintes Maries de la Mer.

We are having difficulty blogging on this site - the wifi signal is very poor and times out. So briefly - having a lovely time still. Lots of flamingos around. The sun still shines. Will try harder to post tomorrow.

Tuesday. Les Saintes Marie de la Mer.

We learned today that the proper name of the town is Les Saintes Marie de la Mer and we went to the fortress church built in their honour.


Every year the statues of two Maries are taken down and into the sea for a blessing. In May. So we missed it.
More stairs based on the Cumbrian model.



We also cycled deeper into the Carmargue and saw more flaming-goes.





and this is why they are pink.