DAY 25/26: 23/24 AUGUST 2011

Camping Costs: Camping de Villey le Sec €44.60 + electricity – 2 nights

A little late rising, but not an issue as we had packed things up the night before and after all those early, record breaking mornings we deserved a lay-in. In the morning, tents packed up and off we went back to the supermarket to get a map so we could navigate back to Calais.

Map bought, and off we went, in the right direction. We drove to Nancy and decided that we’d pull over and look for a supermarket for food and then a campsite. After our supermarket trip, we saw signs to a campsite and so we decided to follow them. The campsite was ok, so we decided to stay for 2 nights.

We put up the tents, awning and had lunch. Dinner that night was simple, sausages, rolls, gherkins and mustard. As we cleaned up after dinner and put Cas to bed, we heard thunder rolling in, luckily Cas was asleep. The heavens opened up and it absolutely bucketed down!

As the night wore on, the thunder got worse and such Cassie woke up. She ended up in our tent again for the night. To say that we got no sleep would be an understatement. The storm did not relent, it just got worse. The rain got heavier, and as we were camped between a river and a lake, we thought that with both rising we might actually wash away. At one point, the thunder was so loud, it scared the living daylights out of us. From the outside, the tent must have jumped off the ground with our fright!

The tent held up despite the immense amount and heaviness of the rain, it did not leak once! Morning arrived and Cassie happened to be the only one out of us 3 that had managed to actually get a good nights sleep! The day seemed cloudy, but dry.

DAY 26: WEDNESDAY 24 AUGUST 2011

Tired and worn from the previous nights storm and restless sleep, we got up and had breakfast followed by 2 coffees! We simply lazed around. Cassie took some bread from todays baguette and went to feed the ducks. Cassie and Dan then played Mario Bros. on her Nintendo DS… Dan got carried away and had to get to the point where you could actually save your game.

After a stroll around the camp, Cassie started chatting to 2 English girls and so Dan and I got chatting to their parents. We shared holiday routes and journey lengths etc. They were travelling in a bongo and so Dan had a look out of interest for Carole and Daniel (Wendy’s Biological Parents who would be visiting us next Summer). The family were leaving that afternoon, and after a nice long chat we decided to let them pack up whilst we went back to the tent for lunch. The sky looked ominous, so we decided to string our tarp up over the tents. We then decided to take Cassie’s tent down, put her in our tent again, so that if it did rain again we’d only have 1 tent to take down in the rain. As we moved the tent under the tarp and got it semi to our desired set up, the heavens opened. We were thankful we’d put the tarp up and ate our lunch under the awning and tarp in dryness.

As quickly as the heavens had opened, they cleared up and the sun showed it’s face again. We all moved our chairs out into the sunshine and sat reading and playing games. We idled the day away, playing with Cas in the park, playing music, Dan taught Cassie knots and before we knew it, dinner time was upon us. A simple dinner of steak and salad which Dan made whilst Cassie and Wendy played in the park. Dinner over and dishes washed, Cassie showered, it was bedtime. Now the skies were clear and blue, Murphy’s law, take precaustions and what you plan for never happens. Better to be prepared though. Time to move on again tomorrow, heading for Reims. We will try to get 200km covered so we are near enough to calais for the ferry and last stop. The eeking out of the last days of holiday. Lets hope they stay sunny!