Saturday 8 Sept

Awoke at 9 am this morning having indulged in the final double episode of a downloaded implausible American thriller series , after a very quiet night , to find all the other vans on this pay d'etage Aire in St Aignan Central Val du Loire had upped and gone... We walked around this small town last night and admired the view over the river and woods from the grounds of the uninhabited enormous hillside chateau overlooking the town and examined the frescoes in the crypt of the collegiate 12 th century church of St Aignan , with an impressive white plaster statue of St Joan of Arc greeting us at the entrance Eschewing the tempting delights of the nearby 37 hectares Ecological Zoo Beauval ( impeccable credentials) where you can see the only giant panda family living happily in captivity in 'the best zoo in France', we moved off at 10.30am in the opposite direction from the stream of traffic heading for the zoo and opted for a long haul day on the toll roads towards Lyon, in brilliant sunshine 😏 accompanied by sounds from the eminently listenable to Massive Attack.  It took us 6 hours and cost us €60 euros in toll charges to reach Lyons at 5.30 pm. We booked into a campsite on the outskirts for 2 nights where fluent English was spoken by reception staff (such a relief ) and both feel happy to be on a campsite, the showers are hot (Camping Internationale de Lyon ) and it's surprisingly quiet being a bus and metro ride out of Lyon itself. Most of the other campervaners on site are German. Early rising tomorrow for a day sightseeing in Lyon before heading for the coast Monday morning

They've all gone!