July November 2010

We attended a few club rallies in England during the first part of 2010 and met some very nice people and saw some interesting vans.

Then on July the 20th we set off for Dover on the start of a 4 month trip. Took a late crossing to Calais with Sea France, then made our way to Carrefour supermarket at Cite Europ in Calais. To spend the night this is a free overnight stop provided by the supermarket, there are no facilities, but it is reasonably secure and brightly lit, and is normally well patronised it was quite busy on this night, but still had parking for dozens of motorhomes.

Carrefour at Cite de Europe

  Left early next morning for Cologne in Germany via Belgium and Holland arrived camping Berger midday 
http://www.camping-berger-koeln.de/ 
see Germany 2009 for all details and photos stopped a few days,  but weather not great so decided to move on. 

 Travelled on to Konisburg and spent night at camping am Konisberg Wolfenstein
www.CampingWolfstein.de 
nice site with  good facilities, but a bit expensive.

  The next night stopped in Heidelburg  http://www.eurocampings.co.uk same as last year. We are creatures of habit , and if we liked a site previously we will visit again if close by.

Crossed from Germany into France near the Swiss border spent a couple of nights at Village Center Les Lupins in Seppois-le-Bas http://campings.village-center.fr/alsace/camping-campagne-lupins.php  
. A very nice campsite opposite the stork park and only 10.20 euros a night. Spar supermarket in  easy walking distance, and nice village.

There are lots of Storks in this area

Stayed a couple of nights then carried on south to the Drome area found a really nice camp site with good bar and free wifi, weather now a lot warmer and drier stayed a couple of nights highly reccomended.
http://www.kawan-villages.com/en

Kawan Village Les Quatre Saisons

Grâne, Rhône Alpes

This small, terraced site, open all year, nestles in the hillsides of the lower Drôme valley close to the Vercors Mountains. With its 82 pitches (71 for touring units), it provides mainly overnight accommodation but it is worth a longer stay. The pitches are level and stony, of variable size, cut out of the hillside and reached by a one-way system on tarmac roads. All pitches have electricity (6A), some with water and drain. The modern main building houses reception on the top floor, with other facilities below, and provides commanding views across the valley towardsCrest and the vercors. 
        

the most pleasant communal wash up ever                                                   Kawan village pool
 

Made our way south to Macon stayed at camping municipal Macon very popular with most travellers heading south and handy for all the motorways. This is an immensley popular site and is always busy with arrivals late into the evening, but seems able to accomodate all comers.
 http://www.macon.fr/Tourisme/Camping 
 there are lots of references on the web suprisingly 2 of the links were from myself. The toilet blocks have been rebuilt this year and are excellent.There is a McDonalds outside gate and a buffalo grill plus  several supermarkets within walking distance.

 entrance to camping Macon

Still travelling south now in Montelimar famous for its Nougat, 

 

Wandered Eastward instead of South and Made a slight unintended detour to Avignon city of the popes

 

Stopped that night at   camping le fou de Roi   http://www.campinglefouduroi.fr  
a pleasant very busy campsite with swimming pool and bar

The "Prairie"  at camping le fouduroi

 

Carried on to Spain next morning crossed border and headed to Blanes on the Costa Brava 

 

3rd August arrived at Blanes on Costa Brava. Went to camping Solmar see Spain 2009 for details. http://www.campingsolmar.com/  It was the height of the holiday season, and all sites were quite full. There had been a cancelation on our favourite site so we managed to get a pitch on there, we were going to stop 10 or  11 weeks. The Site was full of Spanish seasonal campers stopping April to October, and Dutch staying July to end of August. One family of Dutch campers exceded 200 members in various caravans and campers. The dutch left in dribs and drabs over the next  4 - 5 weeks, their caravans went into storage and all their accumulated accessories, ground carpets barbecues chairs tables fans and lots of other stuff was just given away to whoever wanted it. We acquired a lot of things to use whilst on site, but abandoned most when we left, but we still have some really good ground sheets. Whilst on site we decided we needed a Gazebo for shelter from the sun in the daytime, and the occasional thunderstorm of an evening. The local equivalent of B&Q cheapest Gazebo was 115 euros. So using the internet we ordered a Gazebo from Argos Spain for 26 euros plus 9 euros delivery from the UK. We were really surprised when this was delivered direct to our motorhome 6 days later, and was quite good quality.

 Went to the festival of the Giants in blanes There were about a dozen Giants accompanied by marching bands that paraded and danced up and down the town for about 2 hours. Most towns in Spain have similar parades, but the reasons are lost in antiquity we did a bit of research but could not find origins.

communal barbecue at Solmar

 After spending 10 weeks at Blanes it was time to move on before the site closed at the end of the season. So pack everything away and move 200 miles south to camping Eden Peniscola Valencia. See spain August November 2009 for details.

http://www.camping-eden.com/

The old town at Peniscola

 During October all the foliage is removed from the trees, the result may look a bit bleak, but the amount of extra sunshine coming through is wonderful. The temperatures remained in the mid twenties right into November, but the evenings got progressively cooler.

Time to pack up and move on again, drive up to Barcelona and visit relatives at Cardedeau, 

then on to camping Blanes at Blanes for two nights to get some spirits, wine, and christmas shopping. 

Travel on Northwards into France stop at camping Fondespierre at Montpelier. 
http://www.eurocampings.co.uk/

 Once you get into November the choice of campsites in France becomes severely limited so we revisted the campsites we used last November. After 1 night at Montpelier northwards to Beaune, stopped 1 night at Camping Les Bouleaux, Beaune http://www.gralon.net/campings-france/

Looking in the Caravan Club Europe book we found a site at Tournon we would like to visit so travelled North to Tournon and arrived at

http://www.camping-tournon.fr/index.htm 

A nice site on the river bank in quite a busy part of town with shops retaurants and a bar so we were able to take a nice stroll around well worth a visit.

 Set off North again next  morning when disaster struck just north of Troyes the clutch gave up the ghost,  Called ADAC and we were recovered within the hour, and taken to a commercial garage in Troyes, being late sunday afternoon we slept in the van overnight , and had it repaired the next morning. We were back on the road by noon with the wallet a lot lighter.

all the graveyards have visitors books to sign

We wanted to visit some first world war one graveyards so went to the Somme valley, and stayed at camping Hortensia by Peronne http://campinghortensias.free.fr/ 

a small site on a working farm with good clean facilities and very friendly owners.

 

Decided to stop two nights  so we could visit the museum of the great war in nearby Peronne it was very interesting, and good to see that it was patronised by lots of groups of school children.

After visiting museum its back to the campsite  for our last night in France for a few months. Off to Calais in the morning to catch Ferry home, short run to Calais about 75 miles. Then Sea France to Dover with a nice calm crossing. Then Motorways all the way back, M20 M25 M1 and M6.