Thursday 6th September

Knocked awake at 6.10 this morning by the Portsmouth ferry terminal staff where we had been allowed to park the night before at 1.45am and had managed to catch a few hours sleep. We boarded the Brittany ferry at 7.00am ( so many Telegraph readers on board , does Brittany ferry own shares in the paper or vice versa ?) and we were underway by 8.10am , 5 mins before our stated departure time. Our journey out of the harbour was blissfully bathed in warm sunlight.We checked gratefully into our cabin (£20 for the 5 hour trip and worth it for the private shower and toilet alone, as well as some where secure to park your belongings with single bunk beds and clean duvets to lie on ) Breakfast on the ferry watching the UK slip away , proved most pleasant, and having been shooed off from re entering the sunny back deck by the cleaning staff , we retired back to our cabin for those delicious hot showers , a change of clothes and a lie down, but no sleep came despite the calm sea conditions and we disembarked at 2.30 pm.our time Having set the sat nav for LeMans 3 hours away for a campervan Aire site nearby, we rolled our way through the lowlands of Normandy countryside, taking the slower routes (B and C class) which were deserted , and both of us were feeling quite weary by 6 pm. There were lots of road side crucifixes on our 3 hour journey using this route , some with little rooves on top to shelter JC from the elements .... Much to the evident puzzlement of two men mucking out next to a tractor, as we flew past them into a central farmyard , we realised that we had miscalculated how to enter the correct ordinates into the SAT nav and had ended up an hour west of where we were meant to park up for the night . We wearily drove on to the next Aire 30 minutes away , in Mayenne, a medium sized town situated beside a large river in Central France .The Aire stop itself (which had a water point) turned out to be at the end of a long narrow road running alongside one side of the river .It comprised of a small square old gravel car park in a cul de sac , hidden from plain view , and was already occupied by an idling taxi driver and 2 young lads who all look very startled when we turned up at 7 pm, but no other vans... We erred on the side of caution and chose instead to squeeze in between all the other large campervans already lined up along the narrow road, (situated underneath an impressive looking chateau ) - safety in numbers we hoped We strolled into the town centre where Andy had a very strong beer called Slash Red (8%) in a cafe in the local square , which seemed to have a strong anaesthetising effect, rendering him in need of some assistance in paying the bill and a gentle steer back to the van. Andy said the beer had sent him quite deaf in one ear , amazing stuff ! After a sleep of only a few hours last night , a day of sailing , four hours navigating French country roads, an empty stomach , and a very strong beer , for once and for a change , Andy was in need of outside support .Hurrah ... After much Davey sighing and huffing, we returned to the van and supped on tomato soup, bread , cheese and salad and gratefully clambered into bed after a long and tiring first day in France

Riverside parking ...

...preferable to under the M-way bridge!