Wednesday 13th December 2017

After a ‘day off’ yesterday it was time to head north again. Our target today was Camping de la Trye in Bresles, Picardy, a drive of around 230km. We set off in damp, cold, windy conditions with a forecast for more of the same. The wind was actually forecast to be 30kn gusting 55kn by early afternoon. As we proceeded the traffic grew and grew and google maps showed more and more delays so progress was slow. The gusty wind rocked the caravan a few times but not to the point of any alarm.

Towing Kilometres – Today: 226 Cumulative: 6,745

We received a warm welcome from the owner and he directed us to our pitch, next to another Brit couple. The cost for one night with electricity here was €15. The toilet/shower block was nearby and there was plenty of hot water.

Thursday 14th December 2017

We wanted to move to within an hour or so of the Eurotunnel because of our early booking. Looking at the Camping Card app showed nothing so we headed for an ACSI site, Camping La Fontaine des Clercs. The strong winds and rain increased and the temperature dropped as we progressed up the A16. As we approached the Aire de Baie de Somme, we drove into a sleet/snow storm that reduced our speed to 50km an hour and made the outside lane unusable due to the laying snow.

Towing Kilometres – Today: 160 Cumulative: 6,905

We entered the service area to let the storm pass and have a coffee. We set off an hour or so later and although we could see heavy storms around we made better progress to the site.

Once again we received a very friendly welcome from the owner. We made sure that it was acceptable for us to leave at 6am next day to make our tunnel booking and paid the €19.50 fee for the pitch including electricity.

We got set up in light rain then made our way to the local supermarket for supplies. As we left the supermarket another snow storm hit as we ran to the car.

Montreuil

The campsite sits among a large number of water courses and as we drove back we could see that many of these had gone into flood. On arrival at the caravan, a small stream was running down the hill through the site. I had concerns that if the rain continued we may not be able to leave in the morning.

Friday December 15th 2017

We were woken a number of times in the night by rain/hail hammering on the roof and I feared the worst when I got out of bed at 5am to start packing up. After a couple of coffees we were ready to move at 6am. On pulling out of the site we were met with an Audi, half parked on the pavement, half on the road, and leaving a seemingly too small a gap for the caravan to get through. As it happens, there were a few millimetres to spare between the car on one side, and a road sign on the other. Phew. This delayed us for a few minutes but the satnav suggested we’d arrive in good time and this we did.

On The Eurotunnel

We were put onto an earlier crossing and arrived back in the UK at around 07:15.

15.12.2017 Route

Towing Kilometres – Today: 304 Cumulative: 7,209

We made our way to Cobham Services as we had learned they had LPG so  we could fill the gas, then down the A3 as we had used this route a lot and knew there would be no problems towing.

We reached Middleton-On-Sea around 11 o’clock and motor moved the caravan onto it’s rather small ‘pitch’ for the next 3 weeks or so.

The Long Haul Completed

The Long Haul completed, it’s our intention to stay in Middleton until the second or third week of January to give time to visit friends and family before getting the ferry to Santander to continue our trip. All that remains of the blog this year is to wish our reader a Very Merry Christmas 🙂

Merry Christmas!