Drive thru Paris and half of France

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Our start to our arrival in France was yet another interesting adventure. It was late when we arrived on the ferry into Calais. Our plan was to drive to Paris and spend the night somewhere in the area. We programmed Lee (the GPS) to get us there, but discovered it was going to take half the night (not using the Toll highways). Ernie was getting low on diesel so on our way we tried to find a petrol station. After searching out 2-3 stations, we discovered that people in France must not drive through the night because they were all closed. So our first night in France we stayed in a giant parking lot close to a McDonalds. My secret plan was to get up in the morning and get an egg mcmuffin!

We woke up the next morning at 7am…or what we thought was 7, but it was really 8am. It wasn’t till hours later that we discovered that France is in another time zone, so we are an hour ahead of UK time. Who would have thought that! So I’m all excited for my egg mcmuffin, and we walk over, and it’s not even open! No breakfast at McDonalds in France. Well you can imagine my disappointment. I’m not a morning person so I was feeling a bit grumpy…not getting my breaky and no petrol the night before….my first impression of France was that it sucks! 

So we carried on our way in Ernie, with Lee leading the way! Well it turns out that France is very pretty. We went through many little villages, with medieval like architecture….different, but nice! So we arrived in Paris about 4 hours later. The plan was to stop for some lunch, then carry on to Dijon or Lyon. We decided that we would hit Paris on our back to London in July. We didn’t really know where in Paris Lee is taking us, but we trust him. Well we ended up on the Ave Des Champs Elysees towards the Arc de Triumphed. It was cool at first until we discovered we were in a huge traffic jam. There were a ton of police around and they had the whole Arc de Triumphed and round-about blocked off with lots of military. We found out later that it was some ceremony for the new French President!

Once we got out of the traffic we were on a road over the river and found ourselves driving past the Eiffel Tower. Well I was pretty excited…I don’t know why I’ve always wanted to see it. The architecture in Paris I found to be a lot nicer than in London. It was a quick stop and we were on our way again.

We decided to only drive to Dijon which was another long drive. Using the non-tolled highways was definitely a nicer drive, because we got to go through a bunch of villages. I think we got to see more of France that way. But it just took a lot longer to get there than we expected. Lee took us through some back road, crazy road way to get us to our first campsite in France. It was in a small village just outside Beaune called Savigny-les-Beaune, which is in the Burgundy region of France. We got there quite late…like 9ish, and hadn’t stopped for groceries, so we had no food. In the little village we found one small restaurant that was closing up, but allowed us to stay if we wanted a salad. The French make great salads! We had a bottle of the local red wine with some bread and cheese, and ended up being a perfect little dinner. It’s been great that James has gotten to use his French, because without him I wouldn’t be able to get by very well. I understand a little, but as James is talking more, he’s remembering more words and is able to communicate very well! I knew I brought him along for a good reason! 

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Photos

Arc D' Triomphe
There was a presidential ceremony that blocked off the whole roundabout! Tons of french traffic, with crazy drivers.

Effiel Tower
I know you've all seen pictures, but I was quite excited to see it!

Village in northern France
One of the many villages we drove through with narrow streets. Ernie through, but just barely.