No Omelettes Tonight

I thought my pronunciation was perfect but the chap in ALDI obviously didn’t agree. ‘Ou sont  les oeufs?’, I asked, perfectly annunciating ‘where are the eggs?’ Even my impersonation of a clucking chicken didn’t seem to help. ‘Je sais pas’, he said looking at me as though I had lost my mind. Maybe I’d better keep going with my french lessons. Oh well, tant pis. We shall remain eggless until an Intermarche comes into view.

Luckily there is a reastaurant in the teeny village of Ougney Douvot near Besancon (with a twiddly thing under the ‘c’). The path here was also twiddly and very thin at times but Dickie made it down the winding roads and we are now perched by a river. We’re watching a few swans swim past and a couple of happy black dogs writhing on their backs in the dust.

Why can’t I drive?

It’s too hot to go for a walk (31 degrees outside) so I’m reading The Night Circus and Graham is reading Bill Bryson’s ‘Down Under’. He keeps reading me snippets about dangerous animals and the number of slot machines per capita that Australia boasts - like I didn’t already know that :).

The fan is whirring in the background and Hugo has been for a dip in the river by the slipway. He loves a soggy tummy in this heat.

Graham has been loving driving on the French roads, spending nights parked up in pleasant villages, and walking along the canals. The landscape of Champagne can be a little drab with only vast farms and acres of grapevines to look at as we drive along but we are headed into Switzerland tomorrow which should throw a few more curves into the situation.

What’s on in Watten

Spent our first night at an Aire in Watten and met a lovely young Greek couple in a home made van, a couple of very attractive chihuahuas, and a racist Australian, (the last being a great disappointment).

Hugo is jealous of the chihuahuas because they are perfect in every way - see his blog

He’s currently lying under a wet towel to keep him cool. It’s 730 pm and it’s 28 degrees. We’ve had a pretty hot day but kept cool walking along Napoleon’s Canal - as you do.

Graham’s having fun sorting out the satellite signal on the tele. We may never find out how the Peter Pan Gramophone on Repair Shop turns out!

Napoleon’s canal

Watten canal

Sipping Napoleon’s canal water

How Now Brown Dog

Who’d have thought we’d find an American Indian campsite behind a pub in Sussex? Apparently, up the road from The Dog and Duck you’ll find the cowboy encampment. Who knew ...? Hugo enjoyed harassing the replica horse and the Fluffy One couldn’t help popping his nose inside the tents.

Welcome stranger 

I’ll just take a peep inside

He’s chasing me!

An Old World Ramble

What a beautiful day to spend wandering around the Weald and Downland Museum near Chichester. The sun was shining and the ducks were quacking.

Hugo and the Fluffy One got themselves into a bit of trouble and ended up in the stocks but I managed to extricate them from their bindings and we continued our perambulation around the resurrected buildings.

My, what a big bucket!

In trouble again

Summer in September 

Back with Blogger for Next Trip

Graham, Hugo and I are heading off on another European adventure and I've moved the blogsite back to Blogger as I'm now having trouble with Wordpress. 'It was ever thus,' she sighed.here is the link to the last blog if you want a catch up. Last year’s blog

After a while off the road due to various building works to our new house in Dorset, we are now ready to go off on another set of travels. We're starting in France then down to Italy and maybe Greece if we have the time.

We have some lovely friends looking after our house while we are away.

Follow us if you'd like to keep up to date with what we're doing. I'm hoping to get some great photos of the lovely places we'll be visiting. Here's one to kick off.

A stick on a beach

Dickie Does Dorset

The first time we went to Lulworth Cove a naked man with a gigantic penis emerged from the sea. It was December and the freezing rain and wind did nothing to cause the usual shrinkage that chaps experience in cold weather. Unfortunately I didn’t manage to get a photo as by the time I had regained consciousness he’d draped a towel around the offending article.

This time, yesterday, we met a film crew. Not quite as eye-popping but rather fabulous as they are making a movie of the book ‘On Chesil Beach’.  All that emerged from the sea was a rather attractive cameraman in a figure hugging wetsuit, fresh from filming on a rather attractive sailboat.

By coincidence, last night we found ourselves parked up by Chesil Beach when we discovered a place near Portland that is popular with Windsurfers. Loving the visitor’s centre there. Really interesting and attractive stock which is a massive change from most such establishments.

We’re in Dorset house hunting. Having spent the last 20 years in Boscastle we feel it’s now time to move on for a new adventure. The area we’re focusing on is around Hengitsbury Head/Southbourne but we may expand our search. We need somewhere that has beaches, walks, shops, theatres and good restaurants – np biggie. If anyone wants to recommend anywhere please do.

Orkney Field Trip

After Graham arrived at John O'Groats from 1150 mile walk he sat down and had a lovely rest...NOT!

So as not to get too complacent we got into Dickie and headed over to Orkney via the Gills Bay ferry to St Margaret's Hope.

The crossing was about £80 for two people and a 6M motorhome. Hugo the dog was free. 

It's a great place for anyone with an interest in archaeology. Our first stop was on the southern tip of the Eastern mainland at The Tomb of the Eagles. There we found both Neolithic and Bronze Age burial sites. 

We found a lovely place to stop for the night on the side of the road not far from there and had lovely views across to the mainland.

The next day was spent touring the Italian Chapel, the Ring of Stenness, the Ring of Brodgar, and Skara Brae.

We booked into see Maeshowe burial chamber on Monday as you can only see it with a tour guide and we headed off for a drive around the western island to see where we'd end up. We found the Brochure of Gurness and stayed the night there by the beach.

We loved Stenness so much we went back the next day and saw the Barnhouse just 200 m away from it which we'd missed the day before.

Maeshowe was interesting but no photos were allowed. It has some fabulous Viking rune graffiti on its interior walls. It looks a bit like Silbury Hill from the outside.

We caught the evening ferry back and unfortunately a truck reversed into our driver side wing mirror as it was getting onto the ferry. The ferry company was very good and accepted responsibility and will pay for the damage...we hope.

If you are interested in archaeology do go to Orkney - it's very easy to get around and there are lovely places to free camp or other campsites close to towns and beaches.