We’re back in France again…. and it’s instantly relaxing compared to the hustle of the southeast of the UK. The roads are smoother, there’s way less traffic and the morning baked goods are excellent.
We came through the tunnel as usual but this was the first time taking Merlin as a ‘Frenchie’ with her very own pet passport. Despite us being a bit nervous about how it would all work out, we sailed through without any issues. That was a seriously good investment as it saved us the cost and irritation of needing an Animal Health Certificate (AHC).
So we’ve planned very little for this trip as I’ve already mentioned, and we both felt like we’d like to be by the seaside so our first stop was pretty close to Calais in Le Touquet. (We actually ended up at the other end of the beach in the free aire at Stella Plage)
What a great start to the trip as we were just a couple of minutes from an absolutely great beach and the sun was back out. We did a long walk down the beach to Le Touquet in an attempt to find the bar we’d visited with Rich and Ian on the motorbikes but with typically poor sense of direction, I couldn’t remember exactly where that was in the end. On the plus side we did find a beach cafe for a coffee stop and boulangerie for lunch!
The 19th September was the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II and although it was sad, she had lived a long and extraordinary life and the send-off was something to witness, even on TV.
We’d made a list of places to see in Normandy, thank you friends for the helpful suggestions, and Fecamp was our next stop. The aire (free again thank-you French maintenance peeps) here is right in the middle of the town which is kinda of old town / working port mix really. Not without charm but perhaps lacking the beauty of somewhere like Honfleur I suspect. Whilst Sally had a workday, me and Merlin wandered up the cliffs to the see the church there and unexpectedly the old German ‘Atlantic Wall’ defences from the war. I guess that’s going to be a theme right the way down the coast. Cracking views down the coast of the cliffs towards of Etretat and of course we found a lovely little beach bar……
We travelled the short way from Fecamp to Etretat to see the cliffs. Made famous by Monet and the West Wing, we found the town to be really pretty, but it felt it was a bit touristy. Although we’re definitely heading towards ‘out of season’ there were more visitors here than anywhere else we’d been so far.
A change in the weather too meant we sneaked in a short walk up the cliffs before the rain came down and we made plans to hop a bit further down the coast for our next stop.
So, what else is new?
Well, it’s been a great first week of the trip and Normandy has given us exactly what we hoped for. Camping Cars (french for motorhomes) are everywhere in this part of the world and we all seem to migrate like a flock of wandering white whales, leapfrogging each other down the coast from aire to aire.
It’s fair to say that having been in the UK since April, we probably need to lose a bit of our ‘Britishness’ and remember that not everyone queues. Also, European vans have a different sense of personal space than on the regulated UK campsites and park MUCH closer than I remember. Still given the stature of Beatrix it’s not very often that we’re overlooked! I also forgot how much people stare at Beatrix….. I watched a guy nearly trip over his dog lead the other day as he was staring into the window for so long. It’s a bit weird really I think but we’ve taken to just waving now!
Next stop for us is the D-day landing benches which is something I’ve always wanted to see so we’re really looking forward to that.
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