# Hi! From CAPTAINKING in France No1



## captainking (Jun 16, 2005)

A belated posting, we are still in the Lot area, have had problems with gprs connection to M/H facts site something with password, am using campsite connection, they will have wi-fi next year.

Please excuse any spelling mistakes! I will post 2 weeks worth while I have a good connection

Hi Everyone…….Progress report for our first European trip in our Hymer (house hunting in SW France)….Day 1. Left Barnsley (Sth York’s) 21:30 Saturday 23rd Oct in order to miss the traffic down to Dover for our 08:15 Sunday crossing to Calais…One problem reared it’s head going through my final checklist during Saturday the rear heating system failed to work…(had been working fine) hastily had a look at the igniter… seemed to work intermittently but electrode failed to spark….no time to strip down, as we have the front heating system and the engine heating we should not encounter the cold as we are heading south to warmer climes!

Navigating the M25 around Dartford we hit a deep rut across road with a thud that shook the entire M/H I instinctively looked in the rear view mirrors I saw our rear stainless steel hub cap careering across the motorway it was dark and busy so I would imagine it got squashed! anyway not worth risking life and limb for! We carried on our merry way, arrived in Dover, parked in the all night car park a few minutes from the ferry had a few hours disturbed sleep (very strange how people can stand in the cold having a loud conversation on their mobile phone at 4am for about an hour) Sue was planning on sticking the phone where the sun don’t shine but I pointed out that we need to catch the ferry, not spend the day with the police!

Had a nice flat crossing to Calais arrived to a beautiful sunny morning as we approached we saw people out beachcombing and fishing. We had no problems disembarking, we headed south to Paris after a short stop at the first Aire we came to just to check things over, like we still had all 6 wheels minus one wheel trim the trailer was still attached and that Sue’s little car hadn’t fallen off! 

We hit the outskirts of Paris and made an unscheduled tour of the centre………Traffic…People…Commotion…..busy busy our first visit in over 26 years hasn’t changed a bit! Still mad driving no wonder you see so many cars with dents in them, getting tired and disorientated we stopped on the side of the road in the middle of the city, got the kettle on and had some food, much to the amusement of the local Parisians! After setting up the GPS linked to Autoroute got a fix then clawed our way through many diversions due to new tramlines being laid, headed south on the A6 towards Orleans..Enroute we stopped at a busy noisy Aire too tired to carry on we had a disturbed sleep and discovered that French cars grow 4 extra doors for slamming.!!!! Is it a conspiracy?

Had a lazy start Monday a nice hot shower before heading south to Cahors, where we will be visiting some Immobiliers……As we crossed one dept after another we climbed the hills and rolled into the deep valleys of Limousine region towards Midi Pyrenees like a giant roller coaster reaching a height of 1660 feet above sea level, what views!………Heading south we only saw a handful of M/H’s in our direction all were heading north holidays over! We arrived at the Last Aire on the M10 a few k’s outside Cahors, the lorry park was full…we parked in one of the empty M/h bays then realised that this was the main exit route out of the services after a walk around we decided to move to the car parking area, this was over to one side near a valley drop with lovely views a lake with paths a large terraced garden area we heard the local church clock chime 19:00 on the hillside…lucky we got pole position not long after the whole area was filling up with trucks….just settling down, we got a knock on the window a French truck driver wanted us to move up so they could get their artic in (we take up a bit of space 40 foot)…we obliged with plenty of gesticulating and handshaking and smiles and reassuring that he had no refrigerator onboard, we had dinner, watched a video snuggled up under our new duvet’ and had a very quite evening and much needed long undisturbed sleep!

Cahors Tuesday 25th a new day!

Regards Captainking


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