Day 1 - Northampton to Auxerre and tricky manoeuvres!
I woke up at 1.30am and went downstairs to make myself a cup of coffee. Keith was already up, showered and dressed. At 2am I showered and we were all ready to leave at 3am, Sophie saying she felt very tired, bless her!
We had an excellent journey to Dover and made it by 5.40am. Because of this, we were offered an earlier P&O sailing which we gladly took! We were given vouchers for the Club Lounge and as soon as we boarded, we made our way up to the top level of the ferry and went into the sumptuous surroundings, marvelling at all the food and drink on offer! There were pastries, cereals, hot food such as bacon rolls and scrambled eggs, snacks and biscuits and a whole array of alcohol!
The lounge was empty at first but after a while, another couple came in. And that was it! Five of us in a beautiful lounge with staff on hand to help! It was certainly worth the extra money!
We enjoyed coffee, egg and sausage baps and pastries, and Sophie took some snacks to keep us going on the journey. It was blissfully quiet and was a lovely experience, and a lot better than I'd been expecting. Outside, it was grey and cloudy and as we came into Calais it started raining. We could see the coastline and probably the area that we drive through to get to Wimereux.
All too soon, we were being called back to our vehicles, and we sat patiently for about twenty minutes before we could drive off. We had been up on a higher deck and the drive down was a bit hairy! Once off the ferry, we were straight onto the autoroute and heading for Paris and Reims. It was raining hard and our plans to stop and attach the headlamp converters had to be delayed for a while.
The autoroutes in France are privately owned and have tolls. We encountered our first toll before St Omer where we took a ticket. The road was very quiet indeed, with only a few cars making the journey south. All along the motorway, we saw big birds of prey perched on the fence lining the road. We think they were buzzards and they were just sitting watching. We didn't see a lot of roadkill so we have no idea what they were doing!
Through the course of the morning, we stopped for petrol and various tolls, as well as using the conveniences at the "aires" which were located about every ten kilometres. These were incredibly useful but the toilets left a lot to be desired! The French don't seem to believe in toilet seats, which was a bit weird!
We were still full from our breakfasts, so we didn't stop for lunch and by about 1pm, we came off the A26 at Troyes and took the N77. After a brief sighting of the sun in the industrial area around the Champagne town of Reims (not romantic as I had imagined!), the weather had turned cloudy again with heavy, leaden skies. I wasn't expecting to leave the autoroute so soon as I thought that Auxerre was close to the motorway, but we had about 50 miles to go on a single-carriageway.
Sophie needed another trip to the loo (she has a bladder the size of a pea) so we searched vainly for a WC. We came across an Intermarché supermarket and wandered about the aisles looking for a toilet but they didn't have one. This road was quite lonely with rolling hills, fields of spent sunflowers and an occasional deserted village where all the houses seemed to be shuttered up or falling down. There wasn't even a bar or café open where we could have a drink and use the loo!
As is usual, every slow car in the vicinity appeared in front of me, which was a pain as I'm not a fan of overtaking in my Dad's automatic car, and certainly not while driving abroad! We came to the village of Pontigny and I suddenly spotted toilets in a car park, near to what looked like a camping ground. We sped into the car park, gravel flying, and Sophie ran to the loos. Ahhh!
Our satnav (let's call her Trish) then directed us off the N77 and onto a tiny, narrow country road that wound through fields of grazing white cattle and deep woods. What is this fetish that satnavs have about rural roads?
One road was very narrow with soft gravel at the edge and a local came hurtling at me, almost causing me to pull over. A ruined tyre would not have been welcome at this point, miles from anywhere! Happily, after about five miles, we turned back onto the N77 and soon we were heading into Auxerre, a very pretty town perched on the river Yonne. Chablis, the famous wine village is close by.
We had booked a night at the Hotel Ribiere, right in the centre of the town. Trish directed us superbly but what she didn't know was that the Rue Temple was closed on Saturdays for some kind of local festivity, so she kept trying in vain to make us go along this street, the only access to our hotel on the Rue Hippolyte Ribiere.
After three laps of the town, we managed to park in a small area near to a gorgeous church. Parking was free for an hour so we walked the short distance to the hotel to see if we could find out another way to drive there and park in the grounds. There are no signs outside the building that says it's a hotel and we managed to find the button to press to alert someone to our presence. The owner, Bathilde, had glowing reviews on Trip Advisor and Booking.com for being friendly and helpful, but today she was not in residence and had apparently sent me a text with instructions for letting ourselves in. We consulted the text and I did speak to her but it was obviously one of those Ring doorbells where people can talk to visitors without actually being in the building.
We managed to get the key and went into the beautiful old house. There was a small, gravelled courtyard for parking, accessed through narrow gates. Our room was on the first floor and we had two bedrooms and a bathroom. It was immaculately clean with views over to the nearby church.
By now, I was shattered, but we had to go and get the car so while Keith opened the gates and kept a lookout, Sophie and I did another lap of the town. This time I had no choice but to make an illegal turn into the No Entry street and was beeped at by a French driver! Very carefully, I drove into the courtyard and reversed the car into a corner. Phew!
We took the overnight bags up to the room and decided to go out and explore. We were within easy walking distance of the main street and wondered what was going on, and why the road was closed. I had read about this in an earlier review but thought it was just that particular day, but it seems that every Saturday the road is closed.
We found a small bar and had a very welcome beer!
Our main aim was to scout out a restaurant for tonight's dinner so after paying the bill we went on a wander, finding a delightful old clock tower and a pretty square where people were sitting enjoying a drink.
We came across two places that looked promising - a little French bistro and a restaurant specialising in Mediterranean food. It was lovely to wander about and look in the shops. One place seemed to specialise in macarons!
We were flagging a bit by now and the early start was getting to us, so we returned to the hotel to shower and relax for a while. The building was beautiful, with two rooms downstairs and an impressive entrance hall.
Unfortunately, there was no hot water so we had to message Bathilde again to let her know. She sent back a text saying the engineer was onto it, and that she'd let us know when it was back on. Luckily, it was lovely and hot when we started taking showers at 5pm. As it was Keith's birthday today, he opened the cards we'd bought for him. We had promised to buy a present for him in Spain, maybe a special dinner or a new leather wallet.
We had decided, after looking at menus, to book a table at La Palmerai and had salivated over their tagines and couscous. We were ready by 7.15pm and strolling down to the restaurant on a quiet corner. We were the first to eat, and the proprietor didn't speak English so I had to rely on my schoolgirl French!
We had a lovely meal, the highlight of which were the "bricks" for starters. We think they were filo pastry parcels filled with eggs in one, and meat and potatoes in the other. They were delicious! For our main courses, we chose tagines - a lamb one for Keith and chicken for Sophie and me. These were accompanied by a big bowl of couscous which soaked up the lovely juices. Sophie and I shared a bottle of wine called Sahara des Sables, which was from Algeria, while Keith had a beer.
 |
| A brick |
We managed to find room for desserts - creme brulee for Keith, a gorgeous dense chocolate cake served with cream for me, and banana flambé for Sophie. The bill came to 115 euros.
Back at the hotel, it was time for a much-needed sleep in the wonderfully comfortable beds!
No comments:
Post a Comment