On the Road...

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We said some teary goodbyes to Jean's parents (well tears from me...since that's not so hard) and his dad dropped us off just outside town. We were planning to hitch a ride to Nantes and stay at Michele's for the night and then head towards central and southern france. After 5 minutes on the side of the road as luck would have it ...Zine...one of Jeans mates comes past and gives us our first lift! and for even more luck he was headed to another mates place Hugo's who was heading to Nante that day so we managed to catch our first 2 rides with mates which was pretty cool! Hugo was headed for Corsica...so planted the seed that it would be a nice place to stop on the way to Italy! We stayed at Michele's that weekend...so relaxed and for all the football heads...also managed to a rugby union match on TV with Mark Gasnier playing!

Leaving Nantes, Michele dropped us off just before the freeway out of Nantes and after about half an hour got our first ride...and after 6-7 hours managed to get about 200km towards Dordoygne in central france where Jean's mates Ludo and Lori's and their beautiful children Asha and Tai live. We spent our first night near Angouleme and camped on the side of the road in our home for the next bit (our tent named Sirius 😊 It was a gorgeous night with lots of stars above...which also meant another thing...it would be cold...and geez it was cold! After buying some cool ultra tiny sleeping bags (which are really handy to travel with!) this also meant they weren't so great for the cold! i think we progressively moved every hour to put some more clothes on and maybe got a bit of sleep when the sun came up to warm up a bit!

After a nice cup of tea and thawing out a bit we headed back onto the road to see if we could get to Ludo and Lori's that night. We were pretty close (about 120km away) so we were pretty hopeful we could get there that night...however our hopes faded a bit after spending almost 2 hours with no luck. After we walked a bit we were lucky to finally get a ride with a really nice english guy to a gorgeous little town. However we were faced with another cold night becasue at about 5:30pm we had only managed to get about 40km in 5-6 hrs! but with the fairies on our side...as we were facing another freezing cold night on the side of the road and jean was checking out for a place to camp we got a ride with a guy to Brive and then managed to get a ride shortly after to the town which ludo and Lori live close to!

So we walked up to their place...through the forest and to some amazing colours on the horizon as the sun was setting over the hills 😊 Our lucky timing ...we knocked on their window just as they were having dinner with Lori's mum and sis who were visiting also... and got a very warm welcome and dinner when we arrived! That night we slept in the luxury of their caravan on their amazing property under a couple of warm blankets. We spent a couple of days at their gorgeous place, met their new goat Julie and their horse and pony. We saw the amazing sight and sound of cranes heading south for the winter and saw flocks of them in their amazing formations in the sky as they flew south...and we knew there would be lots more cold weather ahead!

After a couple of days with Ludo and Lori and their family and their beautiful company at their gorgoeus place and treated to Ludo's great cooking we headed off to visit Jean's aunt and cuz Patrice just a bit further south. They live in a beautiful old house in a beautiful place with vast fields surrounding. Here we got treated to some more great french cooking from his aunt and got to hang out with the fine style and class of Patrice! We met Pat's 2 very cool peacocks and ... and spent time just catching up with some stuff and organising ourselves a bit more for the trip ahead...including buying some more warm gear to camp with!

After the week with Jean's aunt and cuz, Pat dropped us off and we headed our way further south. We got our first taste this trip of hitchhiking in the rain as it drizzled on and off all day! We some great rides that day from some really different cool people and through some beautiful back roads to avoid the big cities 😊 Towards the end of the day we reached some beautiful parts of southern france with gorgeous cute villages and beautiful mountains and landscapes...we stopped and camped at a camping ground that night at a beautiful town which our last ride dropped us off at. It was quite a beautiful mild night but unfortunately we got woken by the sounds of shotguns and dogs of people hunting in the forest nearby. We took this as a sign to move on...so we headed back on the road and got some great rides through some cute small villages before meeting up with Jean's mate Nico (Ludo's brother) who lives near Montpollier. It was great to hang out with Nico and good timing meant we also got to hang out with Ludo and Asha and Tai who were visiting for school holidays. We headed to spend a day exploring a cool place near by with some amazing cool rock formations, hills and plateaus...you could spend hours checking out lots of cool little spots in this place and the boys even got to a spot high enough to see the Meditteranean!

After a few days at Nico's we headed towards Marsaille on the south coast of France to catch a ferry towards Corsica! We were really lucky of got some great rides including our last ride who dropped us at the ferry terminal in Marsaille so that we could take the ferry that night! That night we took the overnight ferry to Corsica and said goodbye to mainland France where we had spent a beautiful 6 weeks with family and friends. We took a huge ferry called the Napolean towards Bastia in the north of Corsica.


en francais

😱 Voila le 10 oct (avec 1 mois de retard) bye breizh et bonjour la france!!! stop a nantes chez ma soeur et en route vers la dordogne!!! Le stop est une belle aventure quand il fait beau et que les voitures s'arretent!!! premier jours arret apres angouleme!!! petit feu et tente le paradis quoi!!! sauf que nuit super glaciale et sacs de couchage pas assez chauds!!! enfin bon nous sommes des durs 😊!!!
Un beau matin, du soleil, la foret, les paysages du bas des charentes et du haut perigord, mais pas d'bagnole!!! 40kms en 7 heures!!! et oui ca aiguise la patience ca messieurs!!! enfin bon une bonne gueule qui trainait par la avec une clavicule pete et hop 200bornes et hop une p'tite marche et hop on est chez ludo lori tai et asha en dordogne!!!
Voila un beau coin et une tres bonne maisonnee!!! toujours super bien recu, bon faut bosser aussi 😊 hein 😊!!! mais oui je blague putaing!!!! des chataigne dans le feu, des grues dans le ciel volant vers afrika, pinot chez seb, du vin, du bonne air, de la super belle nature, du foot et rugby avec tai, enfin bon un super cocktail de joie et de bonne humeur!!! super merci ludo lori asha et tai!!! hey desoled les gonzesses mais on regardais tellement en l'air pour voir les grues que on a pas beaucoup d'photo d'en bas d'chez vous boudiou 😊!!!
Retour sur la route et super belle journee avec que des gens sympas marrants et aidants!!! le boheur n'est pas que dans le pre hein dit 😊!!! le lot et tarn et garonne magnifico d'enf!!! allez voir Lauzerte super beau!!! enfin bon 7kms du but et pan on est coince!!! alors pat mon cousin adore vient nous sauver avec ca belle auto et voila nous nous retrouvons chez ma tante au coin du feu et heureux!!!
Merci ma tante et pat pour la bonne semaine passe a vos cotes!!! angela etant pas vraiment remise de son coup de froid, ce p'tit pit stop lui a permi de se remettre parfait!!! donc la pareil super coin de france avec superbe nature!!! un peu d'australienne vibrations pour angie, avec pat l'autralien du lot!!! enfin bon un excellent moment en famille!!! merci super beaucoup!!!
On the road again!!! une nana et un ancien sympa qui nous font eviter toulouse!!! des villages magnifiques que l'on traverse les yeux tout grand ouvert!!! la pluie qui mouille parfois!!! arret au camping et reveil avec les mechants chasseurs tueur de p'tits oiseaux sans defense!!! enfin bon la nature et l'homme quoi 😞 parfois!!!
En route vers nico the bro!!! que des jeunes nous prennent!!! vive le jeunes alors 😊!!! coup de fil a nico et hop il apparait avec son beau cheval blanc et nous amene chez lui!!! merci nico!!!
Chez nico the bro et comme d'hab on ce marre!!! ludo asha et tai debarque!!!Bonne balade dans les colinnes autour!!! demi casquette et benh oui mon copin hein!!! en tout cas une super reverence a toi mon copin nico pour toutes tes bonnes ondes!!! un jour y faut qu't'y aille en NZ!!! y sont comme toi mais en anglais 😊
Nico nous met sur la route et hop 1, 2, 3, 4 bagnole et c'est marseille la belle!!! avec avant quand meme fosse sur mer ou comment bousiller la nature et l'homme avec le capitalisme!!! ENCULES de non ecolos!!! enfin bon marseille ca chante et pot de bol heureusement c'etait le jour d'avant les barricades des hooligans dans les rues!!!
On attend le ferry vers l'ile de beaute et on a vraiment hate......😊

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Photos

First ride
zine the magnific

Sylvie
little pixie