Nous sommes arrivés…..

We have arrived!!!! 

We left Alencon at 8.15 yesterday morning, in the dark, in the piddling rain and thick mist, without even a cup of tea or coffee inside us!  No way were we paying the Ibis price of €9.50 for a croissant and a cup of tea or coffee!!!  The town centre was absolutely dead – we could have been leaving at two in the morning for all we knew – in fact I checked the time, thinking that something had gone wrong with Rog’s watch!  Straight back onto the motorway, which was also quiet, at times we were the only car visible.  We soon found a rest area with services, so a couple of coffees and a couple of pain-au-chocolate (I think I might get seriously addicted to pain-au-chocolate) and we were sorted.  The motorway service areas have improved hugely since our last trip to France about 15 years ago – gone are the awful holes in the ground that you had to squat over to wee – now fairly clean, modern loos are present at most of them (although apparently the holes in the ground do still exist in some places!).  Le Mans came and went, as did Tours, Poitiers and Angouleme, and we were soon leaving the motorways behind and heading across country.  Naggin’ Nora did take us a rather more rural route than we had expected, but we reached our destination without any major hitches, apart from the time she told us to take a wrong turning off a roundabout as it had all been recently changed, but we realised very quickly and turned around.

We got to Saint Méard de Gurçon in the Dordogne at about 2.15pm.  Our hosts, Lynette and Dave were very welcoming, and after showing us round the gite, they left us to it.  After unloading the car, we headed off to do some essential shopping.  ‘I know where the Leclerc is ‘ said Rog. And he did,  only it had been shut down for some time! so we were reduced to using the Inter Marche.   It was very small, but we managed to get enough stuff for a couple of days.  Having spoken to Dave this morning, we do now know where the Leclerc has moved to – we’ll go and have a shufti tomorrow.

We are planning a few quiet days getting to know the local area, before heading further afield.  It is, after all, still January, and most of France is closed!!!  A few attractions do start to open for a limited time in February. 

No photos of the gite as yet as it’s still bloody raining, and I’d like at least a little bit of sun before I start snapping away.