Drive to Calais

Up reasonably early (breakfast in the apartment) and packed the car ready to head-off. But first we had to walk down- town so Anne could have her morning-starter Café Crème to kick the day off. The drive was just under 200 kms and staying off major roads took about 3 hours with a brief stop for some French pastry. At one stage we passed a very Ditch looking windmill looking thing and I thought Anne’s navigation had brought us to Holland!!!! One of the small villages we passed through had a road closure and a detour sign pointing to the left. This would have been fine if there were further signs getting us back on the road but there wasn’t ☹️. We ended up doing a couple of 3 point-turns in dead-end streets and then going down an increasingly narrowing country lane getting caught behind a 🚜. We stopped to get out to have a look at what was being farmed, which was something we don’t see in Australia very often (if at all), - sugar beets. I actually had to pull one of the ground to see what it was, then a vehicle came up behind us so I threw it in the paddock and 🚶‍♀️back to the car pretending “nothing going on here”. Eventually we made it back to the road. It was overcast,with occasional rain most of the way, but the trip was ok. When we got to the hotel we were staying overnight there was a father and son from Austria with an old MG the dad had done up. They were off to the UK Goodwood for an MG rally that would end up in Spain. We had a chat with them (they were pretty excited), the young fella was drinking an Austrian 🍺. I’m not sure how many he’d had, but it was more than one🤭. They asked if I wanted to try one of the beers but I politely declined 🤔. The hotel was cheap - it was clean but we got what we paid for (a very very basic room, not even a kettle for tea/coffee☹️). Drove into town for dinner (Anne had fish and chips and I had the best toasted ham and cheese panini - most of the cheese was on top!!!). My attempt to order in French failed miserably, the waiter said he thought I was speaking Spanish 🤨). A quick reconnaissance of the car terminal then back to the room. Looking forward to the car ferry trip tomorrow (hopefully no hassles at the border - when you tell immigration that you don’t have a ticket back to Australia, they ask a few more questions 🙄) and then driving on the left (even if driving from the passenger side). With any luck London tomorrow.Read more