RETURN TO BLIGHTY

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Despite our return journey from Italy into France, through Switzerland, passing uneventfully (if you exclude the stunning scenery of the Simplon pass), the same could not be said for the remainder of our journey. We arrived in France, as planned for our overnight stop, ahead of the trip to the port for a 6pm sailing the following day. You will have seen from the entry above that our planned Aire stop was less than satisfactory. However, this was clearly an omen for the remainder of the trip, which we had calculated as being c4.5 hours. We agreed to set off at 9am the following morning and take a leisurely drive to the port, and to eat in Dieppe sea front on our arrival. We awoke at c8am (later than usual) and set off at c9.30am. On setting the destination in the Sat Nav, the calculated time for our journey was >8 hours... Not what we expected. Surely we couldn't have calculated the journey time so incorrectly... With our ferry due to depart at 6pm, and with check in at 4.30pm, we would miss the ferry. Not a good start. We set out as planned and quickly found that we were, in fact, correct and that we were on track to arrive at Dieppe at around 2.30pm, which was a relief. That was until we took a detour off of the peage to purchase fuel from a local supermarket, as we had in prior years. A mistake. The supermarket had changed its pumps to pay at pump, by card, only - and didn't accept British bank (Visa debit) cards - despite these having been accepted at similar pumps in both Switzerland and Italy and on the French toll roads. The search was therefore on to find an alternative. Over half an hour later and back on the same peage we had left to head to the supermarket, we finally purchased the required diesel, in the nick of time, having broken our golden rule not to let the tank dip below a quarter full... Well below a quarter full... Perilously low in fact!

Our ETA was now 3pm - still enough time for a not so leisurely lunch in Dieppe ?However, we had not predicted the mayhem we encountered on arriving at the town. Unbeknown to us, Dieppe was host to a kite festival. FFS! As a result the town was Totally cocking gridlocked and, worse still, the motorhome parking was full. Having spent considerable time battling through the town we had one option only available - to head straight to the port and to pick up a snack on the way - not in our plan at all, having used up our leftovers the prior day, and without time to prepare a meal from scratch. We make a note to ourselves to have a contingency plan!

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