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Published: January 18th 2011
Pisa
Corny photo I know. But AWESOME!Bonjour!
The last 10 days or so we have spent meandering up from Rome, around the coast of Italy and the south of France, up to Le Puy en Velay to drop off the camper.
This leg starts with the departure of Jacko (Renton still cries at night for you Jacko), and we started heading north. As we went past a town called Pisa, we thought there was a famous tower there or something, so we stopped for a look. Turns out the Leaning Tower of Pisa is on quite a lean.
We continued north, stopping at the coast to have a look at the Med (it looks like any other sea really), and up around the coast of southern France. Here we stayed at a camp ground halfway between Nice and Cannes for 4 days, partly to chill out, and partly to fix all the stuff Jacko broke in the camper. Since Jacko left he has been getting the blame for everything. Don't worry Dave - the campers fine! It just has a new table and we tightened a few screws here and there. It also gave me a chance to try and kick a flu that I'd
Pisa
Yup, its really on a lean. picked up, although 2 weeks later it's still hanging around. Trying to explain to the pharmarcist that I wanted something with Psuedoephedrine in it was interesting, I think he thought I was a P addict.
From Nice we continued north, up through the picturesque countryside of France, stopping at a couple of camp grounds, paying hefty tolls on the way (the toll roads here are good, but expensive!). Renton's french is coming along though. He starts a conversation with "Bonjour", adds in a few frenchy sounding words (eg. merci, we, non, croissant) and finishes with "Au revoir".
Here's an example from a toll booth:
(drives up to toll booth)
(machine charges the wrong toll - it's different for cars, and classes of trucks)
(renton presses the "help" button)
Operator: "Bonjour"
Renton: "Bonjour Mademoiselle, par le vous englese?" (do you speak english?)
Operator: speaks a bunch of french (so clearly no english)
Renton: "yea, the machine is charging us as a truck and we are only a van"
Operator: speaks a bunch of french
Renton: "its charging us wrong, we're not a f**kin "Le truck", we're a "Le van"
(expletives included, as he was getting a bit wound
The Med
Us checking out the Mediterranian Sea. up at this stage)
Operator: bunch of indignant french
Ginette (having caught a few words in the french data burst): "Um Renton, I think she wants you to put the ticket in"
Renton puts the ticket in, the toll changes (to the charge for a "Le van"), we pay it, and the barrier arm goes up.
Renton: "Merci, Au Revoir!"
Operator (ignores him)
Renton: "See, you speak a bit of french and they understand you!"
Ginette: "I don't think there is such a word as "Le truck" or "Le Van"...
Renton (smugly): "maybe not, but they understood me!"
um yea...
So anyway, that brings us to Le Puy, where there are a couple of big pinnacles we wanted to climb as they were closed last time we were here - one has the chapel of St Michel on it, and another a huge statue of the Virgin Mary. However, God clearly didn't want us to go up there as both were closed for maintenence, so we'll have to be satisfied with climbing the Eifffel Tower instead. We've returned the legendary camper, the old girl did us proud, we did a fair few miles in her and she
French Riviera
Driving along the coast ran like a dream the whole way (except for the small inconvienience of getting stuck in the snow a couple times, but that wasn't her fault). Thanks Dave for lenidng us the camper for so long!
As I write this we are just about to depart for our train to Lyon, then tomorrow to Paris... oh yea!
Au Revoir!
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