The Grand tour of France August – September/October 2022

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We have just completed our first ever motorhome tour in Europe.

And both we and ‘Bryony’ our Autosleeper Broadway EB absolutely LOVED it!

Over the next few weeks’ we share our itinerary, activities and lessons learned as motorhome newbies let loose in France. We hope it helps and encourages all of you thinking of doing your first tour abroad.

So, without further ado, lets jump straight in.

30^th August 2022  Day 1

Booked on the overnight Brittany Ferry ‘Pont Aven’ on the Plymouth to Roscoff route. Makes sense as it is right on our doorstep. Bit overkeen, we arrive at 5pm for the 8pm sailing and get terribly excited when thirty minutes later they wave us through – wow, loading already! Naive fools we are! Customs are pulling us all through to a secure area where there are many more lanes and lots of vehicles waiting. We eye the Customs/border force team suspiciously and the longer we wait the more nervous one of us gets (yes, ok it was me!).

“Please don’t pull us, please don’t pull us.”

“Oh my God, do they allow you to take Marmite in to France?”

“I hope they don’t confiscate all my astronomy gear – its all in bags – please let them be careful with it.”

“Oh my God, the shower! Everything is dumped in there. Its going to freak them out. They’ll be doubly suspicious.”

“They are so going to strip out our moho”

We are called forward, stopped and then waved through to the lanes beyond the search shed. Phew! The motorhome ahead of us wasn’t so lucky. He gets the full stop, question and search treatment!

In the lane for motorhomes under 3m height and I start to worry once more. I can’t remember what I put on the form. We are normally 2.87m but with the semi air suspension? Fortunately, the loader decides we are 3m+ and directs us to the appropriate lane, where we wait for another hour! It’s fascinating seeing all the variety of motorhomes and camper vans in the different lanes. We snack on chocolate chip shortbread biscuits and look at the different little adaptations people have done. Canvas shoe racks on habitations doors. Same canvas racks on internal walls just inside the door; metal boxes on bike racks on tow bars; plastic boxes on cycle racks wall mounted to rear walls. Lots of things to think about for ‘Bryony’ in the future. 

One of us (guess who? Yep, the sailor in the partnership, so that would be…….me) gets very sea sick. I’ve taken two tablets and am hoping for a good night’s sleep and a comfortable, ‘smooth’ crossing. Our departure is a sunny affair in breezy conditions; blowing from the north east, so that should be astern of us for most of the crossing.

Still waiting at 1850. They seem to be waiting for the ‘last minute’ cars to arrive. No motorhomes loaded yet. How frustrating. And they will get to the restaurant before us. Where is the justice in that, eh? I feel a strongly worded email of protest to Brittany Ferries coming on! But only after we have done the return journey, obviously! 

We eventually find our four-berth cabin on deck 5. It’s clean, basic; with a grimy, salt-stained porthole window. Belongings are dumped; we go off to explore the rabbit warren of ten decks, which proves rather disorientating. On an outside deck walk way behind glass screens, we grab two deck chairs and watch our exit out of Plymouth Sound. My home sailing waters, so this high up gives me a new perspective of the bBay. We wave to HMS Somerset at anchor but nobody waves back.

Back in the cabin we make hot soups and then head to the bar for drinks and a read of the newspapers. Of course we buy some ‘Fruit and Nut Toblerone’ at duty free, I mean who wouldn’t?  Overpriced but hey its holiday time!

Helpful information: starting with three quarters of a tank of Diesel; 75% full water tank and full toilet cistern. LPG tank is full.