Gien – 25 april 2023

We are quite a few miles further north since my last post from Spain. Monday the 24th, yes Lisa‘s birthday, we drove to France. A beautiful route through the Pyrenees with steep roads up and down. The pass road consisted of a tunnel with one–way traffic so there was a short (10 minutes) waiting time. In France it went down quite steeply and that is no fun with this camper. The car is too heavy for the braking power of the engine and that means that you have to brake a lot and that makes them warm. And you have to keep the latter under control. The solution is simply to drive slowly and carefully and take the irritations of other drivers for granted.

We slept in the town of Cahors in a great spot near the river Lot that we hardly saw because it was already starting to get dark when we arrived. Especially the part through the mountains takes a lot of time.

Today we drove mostly on the toll–free A20 from Cahors towards Orleans and just before the paid part started, turned off towards Gien a town at the Loire. This road led us through beautiful forests on a section that is forbidden for through freight traffic. Exactly those cars were plentiful and that meant that I had to pay close attention because the road was quite narrow (hence the ban that no one adhered to).

The navigation sometimes led me through small towns where this camper is quite wide and high. It resulted in some laughable situations where an oncoming passenger car felt that it really had the right of way and did not slow down at a swerving spot for me. Ah, I‘m big he‘s small, shall we say! It just went right in the end with a lot of honking and swearing. I don‘t understand the latter!

On the way, to Lisa‘s horror, I bought a baquette from the bread machine for €1. She ate it later on her own…. We stay here for a few days so I can go cycling along the river and Lisa can go for a run. Tomorrow I will post pictures of castles and monasteries.