First stop France 2023 - No Particular Place To Go

Packed up and ready for this year’s adventures we head off with what we believe to be plenty of time to get to the port of Dover but as we travel along the A20 there’s a bang and when John gets out to have a look he can’t quite believe our luck that another tyre has burst.

The road we are on is notoriously busy and with lorries hurtling past we are pleased to see the arrival of the highway’s authorities who bring the traffic to a halt until a plan is set on how we are recovered. However, they soon inform us that if their recovery arrives before ours we will incur the cost, so John sets about calling the AA whilst I try to rebook our ferry.

Unfortunately for us, the highways recovery arrives first and it doesn’t take long for them to load the motorhome onto their lorry and take us to the nearest garage.

So, a few hours later than expected, and with one new tyre, the remaining three checked and a two-hour battle with the AA and let’s not forget the several hundred pounds lighter, we are finally boarding the ferry where we hope things are calmer. However, we aren’t long out of the dock when the sea becomes rougher and the boat starts to rock and sway and we find ourselves surrounded by school children who if not running riot, have their faces in sick bags, Sai La Vie.

It’s early evening when we roll off the ferry and it’s blowing a hooley and once the rain starts it continues into the night so we hunker down until morning.

One of the great advantages of adventuring in a motorhome is having everything you would have at home, including an in-built fridge that keeps everything nice and cold. Normally we stock it up with some of our favourite things before we leave but thankfully on this occasion we only took a few essentials because this morning we woke to find the fridge as completely stopped working and no amount of switching between gas, electric or battery is working, so we shop every couple of days until we can get it fixed.

We normally poodle from place to place but we are on a time limit as we have agreed to return to house sit for Geoff and Anne in Portugal, so over the next seven days we travel roughly 150 miles a day which is something new to us and not sure we would do it again but I suppose the greatest part of any road trip isn’t how quickly or slowly you arrive at your destination, it’s all the wacky stuff that happens along the way that matters.