Club Motorhome Bloggers

From Vers we travelled a couple of hundered more miles south to an Aire that was new to us at Fanjeaux, a charming and very old village high up with great surrounding views including the snow capped Pyrenees.

Several more vans squeezed onto the Aire for the night and the  next morning we had a wander around the ancient village.

Next stop on our list was one of our favourite beachside Aires, Leucate Plage. We've stayed several times in the past, for as much as a week at a time. Situated right on the beach its a perfect spot!

We met Andy and Caroline from the UK who were returning from their over-wintering trip to Spain and Portugal, they'd had a great 3 months but were looking forward to getting back home. Their 2 Jack Russells became good buddies with Digger and enjoyed running amok on the beach 

Leucate is a payment Aire but when we arrived the recently installed new payment system was not working which was a nice bonus, although we discovered that the water was turned off too. The next morning however, engineers arrived to commission the system for the season and turned it back on - although the barriers stayed open. We had been very lucky on this trip with overnight charges so far being ZERO!

A very pleasant stop at Magnac-Bourg, its a very pretty and traditional village. 4 other motorhomes shared the Aire and they were all French - its not very touristy here, which is nice .

After a liesurely start (the best kind!) we made use of the free services and made our way to our next overnight stop at Vers in the Midi-Pyrenees region.

We found the Aire easily enough although it was one of those journeys where TomTom tries to take you down some dodgy looking roads, sometimes we ignore it and re-route and others we just go with it. This does seem to let us see some of the real back-and-beyond hamlets in France though. The Aire is basic but OK, next to a campsite that is closed until the summer so its quiet, only one other van which is English and on their way back from Tenerife and Gran Canaria in it!

As I'm typing this 2 more (French) vans have arrived.

The bonus with this place is that I found some more unsecured wifi! Hence this update . A while back I invested in a Faculty-X long range antenna and this is one of the few times it has been worthwhile.

Firstly, and most importantly, the long awaited grandchild arrived under HIS own steam just 2 weeks late and weighed in at an impressive 9lb 13oz!

After saying cheerio to others in the family we set off for our Eurotunnel crossing arriving in France in the dark and we headed to an Aire that we used a couple of years ago at Equihen Plage. Parking on the clifftop we quickly cooked our dinner and settled in for the rest of the evening, with that 'happy to be travelling again' feeling 

At around 9 the next morning we were woken by the police knocking on our door asking for €5, not being ready for this as last time it was free we only then wondered where we had stashed our Euros while in the UK. I found a little loose change in the ashtray and apologised to the officer who after a short exchange (the best I can do in French) he shrugged and wished us a good day - I think....

We had been in contact with friends and members 'stevegreen' as they were returning from their overwintering in Portugal. They had suggested our next stop as it had been recommended to them. By mid afternoon we met up at Criel sur Mer, a designated motorhome parking area just off the beach. It was a great opportunity for our 'Digger' to meet their 'Jack', they are friends on Facebook (yes really..... they each have their own pages - and many friends!)

We had a great meetup with Steve, Lorna and Jack and enjoyed their hospitality and lots (too many) glasses of Leffe and Bordeaux so the next morning was a slow start for all of us.